Optimization of PON Planning for FTTH Deployment Based on Coverage

With the growing demand of very high bandwidth services such as high definition IP Television (IPTV), Service Providers (SPs) are moving to fiber-based solutions such as Passive Optical Networks (PONs) to meet current and future bandwidth needs. As these networks are deployed, coverage tends to directly affect Capital Expenditure (CAPEX) per subscriber served, with a minimum cost per Optical Network Unit (ONU) translating to a maximum Return on Investment (ROI). By including coverage and Economies of Scale (EOS) into the optimized planning model, a more accurate representation of deployment scenarios can be determined. In this paper, the incorporation of deployment coverage and EOS into a Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) formulation is presented and solved for a number of EOS scenarios. Results suggest that stepped approximations of non-linear costs based on the number of Optical Network Units (ONUs) can be effectively included in the MILP model without sacrificing the ability to compute solutions for larger scale networks.