Start-ups and telecoms giants among latest additions to Broadband Forum as 15 new members join

Fremont, California, 26 June 2017. The Broadband Forum today announced it has welcomed 15 new members – including three start-ups – as it continues to address the fast-changing broadband landscape.

The broad range of industry expertise displayed by the new member companies highlights the continuously expanding breadth of the Broadband Forum’s work which has grown to include a strong focus on next-generation broadband technologies such as virtualization, Software Defined Networks (SDN), the Internet of Things (IoT), next-generation optical networks, 5G and Gfast.

The latest additions are CableLabs, EANTC, Fujitsu Limited, Genesis Technical Systems, Go!Foton, Jabil Circuit (Shanghai) Company, MaxLinear, Radisys, Shenzhen Gongjin Electronics, SK Telecom, Telekom Slovenia, Tellabs, TiBit Communications, VoltServer and Works Systems (Tianjin) Co. Ltd.

Robin Mersh, CEO of the Broadband Forum, said: “We’re delighted to be able to welcome so many new members into the Broadband Forum, including – for the first time – start-up companies, as this is where so much innovation is happening. The work the Forum is carrying out to deliver on our Broadband 20/20 vision is attracting a lot of interest from companies across the industry and the Forum is the perfect platform for them as every member has an equal voice, whether they are a start-up or a long-established operator. Today the broadband industry is changing and evolving at a rapid pace and the addition of these new members demonstrates the Forum remains a clear voice amid the changes.”

Broadband 20/20 focuses on leveraging emerging technologies and approaches to enable new services and business opportunities across the entire network-enabled broadband ecosystem from user devices to Cloud data centers.

A number of initiatives have been launched to deliver on the vision, including the Cloud Central Office (CloudCO) project, an evolution of the popular TR-069 protocol into the world of the IoT and consumer electronics with the User Services Platform, and preparation for a significant cooperation with 3GPP that will lead to the advance of 5G on a unified network.

Richard Stanfield, CEO at Tibit Communications, a start-up developing next-generation pluggable devices designed to virtualize the access network, said: “Joining the Broadband Forum is a significant step for TiBit Communications. Its work in the fields of virtualization and GPON were crucial in our decision to join and we look forward to working with the Forum to further develop these technologies.”

Stephen Eaves, CEO and Founder of VoltServer, a start-up which develops innovative power distribution products, said: “Joining the Broadband Forum is a significant step for us and provided us with a way to gain customer contacts, learn about the industry and help us know what is going on in standards development to help us navigate the future.”

For more information on the Broadband Forum’s work, visit: www.broadband-forum.org.