2014 CTO Roundtable Cuts A Wide Swath Across The Industry

2014 CTO Roundtable cuts a wide swath across the industry
http://www.cedmagazine.com/print/articles/2014/06/2014-cto-roundtable...
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Home > 2014 CTO Roundtable cuts a wide swath across the industry

Mike Robuck
This years roundtable is chock full of the cable industrys hot topics and trends from the CTOs
that are the movers and shakers across the cable landscape. The large panel assembled here
included tidbits from the CTO panel at The Cable Show in Los Angeles that was moderated by
Leslie Ellis, as well as additional interviews after the show. Where possible, weve blended
together responses to similar questions. Lastly, some of the replies were edited for clarity and
length.
CED: What are your top two or three engineering priorities this year?
Tony Werner, CTO, Comcast Cable: For this year weve got a lot of initiatives that are very
important for us, but one is the XI platform that weve been on a steady progression of rolling out.
Rolling it out at scale is a big deal to us and so we intend to do that. And adding features, a lot of
which were showing here (at The Cable Show). The next big one happens to be cloud TV and
that really is providing a cloud DVR service.
Joe Jensen, CTO, Buckeye Cable-System: I wish I only had a top three. As I tick down the
major items, were still moving into major analog reclamation activity. Thats going to be
consuming a lot of time and energy from a network and engineering perspective this year.
Certainly an IP video strategy solidification is going to be pretty high on the list.
Weve got node and laser upgrades across the system that we continue to press forward with.
Those will, one, allow us to more easily segment nodes as we need to, and two, upstream laser
replacement is critical as we start enhancing the upstream speeds.
Were looking for some new capabilities utilizing the full spectrum analysis
aspects of the new chipsets in the cable modems. We would really like to
significantly reduce our truck rolls and we see that as one major area.
Thats probably more than three already, but the last one is what alternatives are
there for delivering local broadcast stations to our customers other than retrans?
Is there a technical solution, can we find an efficient way of getting off-air
antenna established in the home, and integrate that in with our programming
guide and DVR functionality?
Kevin Hart, CTO, Cox Communications: I would say No. 1 is our continued focus on the
customer experience and thats all around the availability and reliability of the network and
products and services. Thats always kind of our top goal.
No. 2 is network next generation readiness.
So were continuing on an all-digital path right now because we have to free up the spectrum for
3.1, or Gigasphere. Getting ready for DOCSIS 3.1 is a key component of our network readiness.
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Those are the two key things from that perspective.

Were also moving forward on IMS and a few other
components to enhance our capabilities on the network. A year
or two ago, the second one would have been product delivery/
product development. We delivered as many products last year
as we did in the prior two years in terms of throughput for
Contour and products like that.
The last is not very glamorous, but it's backoffice readiness. So
a couple of different components for Cox Business, which is our commercial services, putting in a
new sales force automation or management, bringing in some of the billing backoffice, but also
trying to standardize our video middleware backoffice so we can plug and play with the different
platforms and our partners across the industry.
Ralph Brown, CTO, CableLabs: I think its pretty clear that one of the priorities that they (MSOs)
have really emphasized is DOCSIS 3.1, and were right on track for getting that work done. In
fact at the show I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly the manufacturers are moving in the
development of the product.
So that was really encouraging.
Wireless in general, but more specifically Wi-Fi is where were spending a lot of our time these
days. Both around public Wi-Fi access points and roaming, but as well working on spectrum
issues and trying to work with the NCTA and FCC on getting more spectrum for unlicensed use
and in particular use by Wi-Fi. Then community Wi-Fi activities as well. Essentially access points
within the customers home and making those be available as part of the overall Wi-Fi network
that users can take advantage of.
Balan Nair, CTO, Liberty Global: Across video, we have been very bullish with
what we call the Horizon family of products, which has now launched in four
countries. Cloud DVR we launched in Switzerland last fall and were going to
scale that to a number of countries this year as well. Those are two big things
on the video side.
On the broadband side, we made a commitment that every country that we
operate in would have a full size product for data that would be a minimum of
100 megabits, and for the most part its coming in between 120 and 140. So weve spent a
significant amount of time with that.
The third big one for us is mobile reach. We recently launched in Switzerland and then well be
launching in the Netherlands next month (May). We already have our mobile offering in Belgium,
in the UK and in South America in Chile. Thats a very big part of our core strategy.
Yvette Kanouff, formerly executive vice president, engineering and technology,
Cablevision: The first would be the quality of experience for our customers. Its a big year to
focus on having the best service for our customers. Having so many cloud services, we have to
make sure that we have a unified back end. Doing things like higher storage for our cloud DVR
as well as offering more tuners. Were at 15 tuners with our cloud DVR service. And focusing on
SLAs, really focusing on what the reliability is for each service as opposed to just the feature and
functionality.
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The second big focus for us is connectivity.

Thats a broad topic, but connectivity in the home. We launched our 802.11ac
routers and were doing community Wi-Fi. The next is in home communication
capabilities that should be very Wi-Fi centric for our customers.
Mike LaJoie, CTO, Time Warner Cable: So for us the big focus from a
technology perspective this year on video is to follow on the cloud based
Navigator that we launched last year. Were at about four and half million boxes
now and well be in about six and half million by summer. We have a new
HTMLbased guide that were going to try to get to customers during summer.
We still have a lot of new platforms that were launching on our Time Warner Cable TV. We have
hundreds of streaming channels up to the iPad and to the Android platforms.
Its out on Roku. Its out on Fan TV and more platforms will be announced this year; so, much
more of all of your programming on any device that you want.
On the data side, weve begun aggressively rolling out CCAP. So were focusing on the 24
channels of DOCSIS turned up on the CCAP platform. Were going to a 300 megabit product
offering in a couple of markets in LA and New York this year, and then broadening that out
next year.
On the commercial side, we finished last year with over 8,000 buildings directly connected to
fiber on our plant, and well have over 9,000 by the end of this year. So a big focus on driving
commercial business.
Overall, just doubling down on reliability and making sure that the plant is in great shape and that
all of the applications are running solid and that were really delivering a great quality of
experience to our customers.
CED: Wi-Fi has become an increasingly important service for cable operators. Where are
you with Wi-Fi and what is the impact of the ruling by the Federal Communications
Commission for additional unlicensed spectrum?
Brown: They (FCC) recently announced opening up 100 megahertz in the 5 gig
spectrum.
We were involved in providing the technical analysis that was necessary to
really satisfy the FCC that there was a good strategy there, and that it was going
to be a good move. We were happy to see that the FCC agreed to do that.
Thats going to add to the unlicensed spectrum capacity that cable operators will
be able to take advantage of.
Nair: That additional 100 megahertz is amazing.
Wi-Fi is now becoming the No. 1 call driver in our call centers, primarily over things that we
absolutely have no control over; things like interference from having concrete walls. In some
cases there are things we can do to help like channel hopping, et cetera.
With the capabilities of 8011.ac and the additional 100 megahertz, I think it will help consumers
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significantly, and it will help us as well. Suddenly the in-home experience is no longer going to be
the limiting factor. It used to be that even when we had a 100-megabit product and somebody
had an old 11.n that operated only in 2.4, they just didnt hit a 100 megabits because you had a
crappy access point.
Werner: We all feel that first of all that the FCC did a very good job there. They
had a lot of people weighing in on both sides and they came up with a very good
answer for the consumer. Wi-Fi is becoming a much larger used service. Its one
that is used both in the home and out of the home. Its great to take DOCSIS 3.1
up to a gigabit per second but you can't always get it to the devices. Most of
devices that are being manufactured out there are capable of operating in these
new bands, so I think its great.
Jensen: We have a managed Wi-Fi solution that we sell to our residential customers. We have a
number of venues in our footprint that we have established hotspots that are available to our
subscribers and non-subscribers on a purchase basis. Wi-Fi is a tough animal right now in my
opinion. It is tough from an engineering perspective to plan a network when the fundamental
technology specifications change every two years.
So weve gone from N to AC now, and as the tea leaves indicate were moving to I believe
AH next. How do you plan for a network when you have that kind of volatility? Thats a real
challenge.
And then on top of that, youve got LTE unlicensed that may be impeding the ability to provide
Wi-Fi in the traditional sense. There are a lot of factors in this, and as a smaller operator we
arent as attuned to the transport corridors.
So were going to continue to watch what is happening. As weve seen the larger operators
cooperate, the smaller MSOs have not really been able to play in that and were hoping that in
some form or fashion we can federate to allow our customers to roam and allow our other MSO
customers to roam into our area. So there are just a lot of variables there.
Hart: For us I think it will be a combination of both customer and community
Wi-Fi.
Well be making more announcements in the near future. Particularly around
what were trying to do from a community and metro perspective and then were
also taking a look at the in-home Wi-Fi service, trying to improve the service and
capability.
Kanouff: I think that theres so much that we can do with Wi-Fi. Theres no
doubt that its really becoming so much more important in our service offering.
As to what services we offer, theres so much flexibility and were looking at all of those things;
what services we can use to further stretch Wi-Fi and give our customers more flexibility.
CED: Does it seem feasible for a cable operator to use a Wi-Fi first strategy that adopts
Wi-Fi over cellular?
Kanouff: As far as specifically being a replacement service for LTE, thats not what were looking
at at Cablevision, but were certainly looking at the broad gamut of the other services and what
we can do for connectivity.
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Brown: I think theres a lot of interest there.

Weve done some analysis of the business model. It really depends on what the economics are
for the MVNO relationship you have. How much do you pay for the macro network minutes? If
youre going on a Wi-Fi strategy theres a certain threshold you have to get to in order for the
business case to have a positive cash flow.
The sensitivity seems to be around the amount of offload. When you get above a certain number
of subscribers then the business case makes sense. So that threshold is really where you need
to determine does the business case make sense? Our members are very interested. I think
theyre looking at how that works. Theres a certain level of robustness we have to get in terms of
the Wi-Fi network and that gets at this whole issue of carrier grade Wi-Fi. There are number of
pieces that go into that, but it is very interesting and weve been taking a very serious look at it.
And have been looking at what makes sense from the business model perspective.
Jensen: Wi-Fi First is interesting. Youre never going to have, from what I can see, a Wi-Fi
standard that allows you to effectively address a moving vehicle. Thats certainly off the table.
Being able to have a Wi-Fi First strategy as part of an operator, thats certainly interesting.
Again were somewhat handicapped because we dont have that high traffic concentration in our
footprint aside of a few venues.
CED: Mike LaJoie previously mentioned CCAP, but where is your company in regards to
CCAP, DOCSIS 3.1 and the migration to IP? How do these play together, and how do
operators manage the network for a graceful transition?
Hart: We continue to experiment with CCAP in our lab. We have a little more flexibility given the
capacity in our network that well probably be more of a follower with that particular technology
solution. Given where we are in terms of our preparation, I think in 2015 well have another one
or two vendors that will have additional prototypes and well continue evaluate CCAP in 2015.
[Cox CEO Pat Esser] referenced this and youll hear more about this from us in the coming
weeks, but the capability to leverage our existing network to provide gigabit service to all of our
customers over time is what appeals to us the most in regards to 3.1.
Brown: I think CCAP is the near term evolution.
What were seeing is the density of the technology is getting to the point where you can
synthesize the whole spectrum out of one port. So this idea of having external combining
networks doesnt make a lot of sense. Integrating all of those things into this integrated
architecture called CCAP is something that were going to see in the next year, two years, and
three years in terms of deployments.
Along that timeline there are a few DOCISIS 3.1 linecards. I saw where Arris was showing OFDM
downstream out their of existing equipment. So this idea that you could potentially get DOCSIS
3.1 anyway with existing hardware is kind of an interesting concept.
Well see CCAP coming
in the near term and then
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DOCSIS 3.1 being

added to that mix. The
timeline of when do you
retire the QAM video
channels really gets to
when have you started
turning off those QAM
set-top boxes and when
do you think youll be
done with that? That
whole transition period, I
like to make the analogy
that it was sort of like the
analog to digital
transition that took us a
long time to get through. This QAM video to IP video transition will be a similar because we have
such an installed base of devices that you need to migrate through the network.
Werner: I think its looking like in Q2 of 2015 as when well start having the first silicon provider
with (3.1) equipment that is already built and constructed. Then probably by Q3 and Q4 well
have the other two silicon providers for CPE. I think thats pretty safe. So I think well be able to
start buying modems certainly in the year 2015. Then it depends on which manufacturer of
CMTS gear. There are some that are saying theyll have at least downstream in trial in 2015 and
most of them are saying that theyll have product in early 2016, or the middle of 2016. So
probably 2016 is the year for services to be looked at on it, but the hardware seems to be on a
very good path.
I think between now and then what most of us are is doing is spectrum planning and the nice
thing about 3.1, of course, is that it's backwards compatible to 3.0. I think as much as anything
for most us it's hub site planning, critical infrastructure, making sure that we have growth
capacity, and spectrum planning, which is moving stuff around so that youve got the spectrum.
Jensen: CCAP theoretically sounds very good.
I think as we start seeing products come out we hope to be fast followers on that. A lot of this is
still driven by the cost per QAM and the cost per bit, and so as we move in that direction that will
certainly be one of the major items that well address.
The other is moving our DOCIS network into much more of an IT environment in managing the
packets so to speak in a way that is consistent across the network. We certainly do see some
value there. Timing wise well see where the costs come out and how we want to make that
migration work.
I have mixed concerns about 3.1. As an engineer looking at the standard QAM/ DOCSIS stack,
youre losing 15 percent of your spectrum just for guard bands. DOCSIS 3.1 promises a
significant increase in the bits per hertz, which is certainly attractive.
The challenge for operators and ourselves is that to take full advantage of the DOCSIS 3.1 spec
in the downstream you really need about another 6dB, and I think the promise that the low
density parity check will get us about halfway there, but were going to have to find some way to
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get another 3dB of signalto- noise to make this work.

CED: Whats next for CPE?
Hart: Right now were working through our CPE roadmap. Obviously weve made some
decisions around the Contour environment.
With our all-digital project we're looking towards an HD DTA, and in the lab were also evaluating
just different IP and Wi-Fi enabled CPE, as well as leveraging the RDK.
Jensen: I think were really looking at a tiered approach. Were still very interested in deploying a
high end, whole-home solution.
Were currently deploying the Arris Moxi product. We see this IP hybrid device as being the
standard fare going forward, but as the capabilities develop that device could ultimately support
network PVR, it could support a lot of capabilities that we currently see in the higher end
products. I think as we see in almost any industry, a lot of this is going to be moving to the cloud
over time.
We filed a waiver with the FCC in March for a hybrid DTA, IP device. The waiver would allow us
to deploy this device and use the DTA functionality to support video QAMs, but use an IP
component to begin the migration to an all-IP network. Were hopeful well get the waiver. Not
only for us, but for other operators this would provide an efficient way of transitioning between
QAM video and IP video.
CED: Your first thought when you heard that Comcast wanted to acquire Time Warner
Cable?
Jensen: My first thought was now Well, now were surrounded. In our footprint we have
Comcast to the north and Time Warner to the south. Well see how that plays out. Im not sure
how the joint venture (SpinCo) will play into this. Were just waiting to see. We hope theres a
continued positive experience in both of those directions. Weve been competing in some areas
with both of them on the commercial side, so I think things will continue in that direction.
Hart: Obviously theres a lot of consolidation in the marketplace but theres also a lot of
collaboration around industry platforms and scalability.
Cox is fortunate to have good working relationships with most, if not all, of the MSOs but
particularly with Comcast and Time Warner Cable.
So we look forward to partnering with them around standardized platforms for the industry.
CED: What are the last two apps youve downloaded?
Hart: Theyre both sports related. Strava, which helps track things like running and cycling, and
is GPS enabled. And then Score Soccer; all three of my kids play soccer so its a real time
soccer app that you can use on weekends when youre tracking games or when youre remote.
Jensen: At least one of those is pretty easy.
The NCTA Cable Show app, which saved my bacon a few times when I was trying to find booths.
The one before that was Scribd.
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Its kind of the virtual library where you can check out a wide variety of e-books. Scribd is a
monthly subscription and you have access to thousands of e-books.
Brown: Ive downloaded the Metawatch app.
Metawatch is one of these smart watches that has some interesting capabilities, so lots of things
are at your wrist. Its very convenient for notifications and things like that. Rather than having to
be so obvious as to haul your smartphone out from your pocket, now you can be very subtle and
look at your watch.
The other one is the Narrative app. Its a little wearable that has a camera on it and every 30
seconds it takes a picture and then it creates your life narrative. It records all of these pictures in
the cloud so you can go back and review the highlights of your day and all sorts of things. Its the
ultimate in narcissism. Its all about me.
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