Home > Network > Technology > Optical Fibre

Optical fibre technology has revolutionised the transport of information. An optical fibre is a single strand of glass, thinner than a human hair that can convey signals from a tiny laser at almost unimaginable speeds - up to 1 Terabit per second (one million million binary digits per second).

Optical Fibre Technology and the Neotel Network

The backbone of our network consists of many thousands of kilometres of optical fibre cable following railway lines and power lines across South Africa. Eskom and Transtel developed and patented techniques that led to the deployment of the fibre. The fibre is either wrapped around the wires or within the wires of power lines, suspended along the electrical masts of railway lines or directly buried alongside the lines.

Our optical fibre technology also takes advantage of the latest advances in the science of photonics and opto-electronics. On major routes, every optical fibre is lit with a rainbow of coloured lasers (Dense Wave Division Multiplexing or DWDM), each carrying a separate high bandwidth signal at several Gigabits per second (billions of bits per second). Adding the ability to switch these optical signals from one path to another at key nodes around the country (Optical Cross Connects) creates a network resilient to fibre breaks.

Find out more about our telecommunications technology.
Copyright © 2009. All rights reserved Neotel Private Property.