The Optical Communications Reference

6.5.2 User demographics

One of the most dramatic and unexpected drivers for

fiber-based broadband access has been the explosive

growth of the internet and its associated applications. As

early as April 1993, when the Mosaic browser became

available, the public began to use the internet for transfer

of text messages, photos, and data files. Building on that

initial application, the number of Internet users has

grown to 211 million in the United States alone, and

represents about 70% of the population now, while

globally there are about 1.2 billion internet user repre-

senting about 18% of the world population [7, 8]

(Figure 6.5.4). Not only has the number of users grown,

but individual usage has expanded exponentially, until

today we routinely exchange music, photos, videos, and

software files as large as 10’s of megabytes each.

A close look at the bandwidth available to access the

Internet shows that it was gated by the technology being

offered [9–11] (Figure 6.5.5), with new ones adopted in

cycles of roughly 5–6 years each [2] (Figure 6.5.6). For

example, the earliest users bought phone modems, ini-

tially at 9.6 kb/s, then increasing in performance to

14.4 kb/s, 28kb/s, and finally 56 kb/s [10]. Typically,

a group of early users (indicated as Initial Users in

Figure 6.5.6 , representing the top 25% of users) adopt

the new technology first; the mainstream follows, and

finally everybody else (Slow Adopters in Figure 6.5.6 ,

representing the bottom 25% of users) takes advantage

of the technology. Wh ile the entire adoption cycle takes

8–10 years from introduction to 50% adop tion, newer

technology is introduced before even half of the users

have the old in place. By the time the Slow Adopters

begin to use one approach, another newer approach is

being offered and adopted by a new set of Initial Users.

The cycle of technology adoption by Initial Users,

Mainstream Users, and Slow Adopters has experienced

two full cycles now, and is into its third cycle: phone

modems, then cable modems and asymmetric digital

subscriber line (aDSL) modems, and now fiber-based

access.

In Figure 6.5.6, phone modems were introduced in

1993 and by 2001 the overall average user bandwidth

exceeded 56 kb/s. Cable modems, introduced in late

1997, were adopted similarly with average user band-

width exceeding the 1 Mb/s cable modem bandwidth by

2006. Now that FTTH has been introduced, with pri-

mary service of ferings ranging from 5 to 30 Mb/s, initial

users are beginning to subscribe to this technology, es-

pecially at 10–15 Mb/s, which will take several years to

reach the 25% penetration level and a few more years to

achieve the mainstream. We can expect that by 2010

a significant number (perhaps a few million) of those

users will be looking for something more, very likely

100 Mb/s service or higher. It is interesting to note that

each of these technology cycles has resulted in band-

width offerings about an order of magnitude larger than

the previous, even though the price of the service of-

ferings has only doubled for each cycle.

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

1989

1991

1993

1995

1997

1999

2001

2003

2005

2007

Australia

Netherlands

US

Korea

Japan

Canada

UK

Germany

Italy

France

Mexico

Brazil

Russia

World

China

India

Population

Internet users

2006 Statistics World USA China Japan

127M

86 M

•

People

301 M 1322 M

• Internet users 211 M 144 M

• Broadband

6.6 B

1.2 B

0.1 B 57 M 52 M 26 M

Figure 6.5.4 Internet usage worldwide.

0

50

100

150

200

250

0002

1002

2002

3002

4002

5002

6002

7002

8002

9002

0102

1102

2102

FTTH

FTTC

HFC

aDSL

Fixed wireless

Satelite

ISDN

Modem (56K)

Modem (33.6K)

Modem (14.4K)

)snoillim( sresu tenretnI

Projected

Figure 6.5.5 US residential access technology adoption over

time (this figure may be seen in color on the included CD-ROM).

417

Fiber-based broadband access technology CHAPTER 6.5