The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA)—the trusted industry association for the connected world—today announced it will lead the establishment of U.S. standards for free-space optical communications (FSOC). This effort will be led by a sub-committee of the TR-45 – Mobile and Point-to-Point Communications Standards committee and be called the FSOC Working Group. The FSOC WG, under the TR-45 team, will be led by Attochron (Lexington, Virginia, USA), a US-based carrier-grade FSOC technology development company, with support from key US-based carriers and participation of other interested FSOC companies.
FSOC has recently added to the telecommunication connectivity fabric, joining and notably complementing fiber-optics and radio systems at a time of global convergence. When FSOC – also referred to as optical wireless communications – can meet carrier standards, it provides a new path to extend the optical footprint of fiber networks everywhere. Today, commercial customers need that optical extension the most as almost 75% of enterprises, cell sites, and multi-dwelling units (MDUs) globally lack a fiber-optic connection despite typically being just one mile from existing fiber infrastructure. These customers require dedicated and uncontested access rather than shared fiber-optic service, but the construction costs for such connections are often prohibitively high. FSOC will push new traffic and ROI to existing fiber networks while enabling wireless carriers to deploy cell sites as they originally hoped and planned.
“As demand for high-bandwidth, low-latency connectivity accelerates, free-space optical communications are emerging as a critical frontier,” said Tom McGarry, vice president of standards at TIA. “TIA is proud to convene a new working group to develop a robust technology standard that ensures interoperability, reliability, and scalability across terrestrial and satellite systems. This effort reflects our commitment to shaping the next generation of secure, high-performance communications infrastructure.”
Tom Chaffee, founder and chief executive officer of Attochron, stated “Attochron couldn’t be more excited about the TIA’s formation of the FSOC Working Group after Attochron’s successful enterprise access, real-world proof of concept with Tier 1 carrier Lumen and a Fortune 200 retailer. This POC effectively demonstrated all three of the critical use cases at once and with carrier-grade performance.”
Key areas of standardization include at minimum:
- Laser safety
- Propagation and system compatibility
- Application-specific requirements
- Electrical/grounding safety standards
- Installation safety standards
To join TIA’s TR-45 Standards Committee or learn more about the Free-Space Optical Communications (FSOC) Working Group, send an email to membership@tiaonline.org.
