The Broadband Forum has released a new version of its GPON interoperability test plan, including new verification tools to simplify equipment selection: BroadbandSuite 6.2.

Simultaneously, the Forum said that Lantiq’s FALC ON GPON system on chip (SoC) is the first new product to achieve certification conforming to the new standard. Lantiq‘s FALC-ON is a family SoC devices for optical network termination in all FTTx scenarios.

BroadbandSuite 6.2 builds on the Forum’s BBF.247 ONU Certification Program, which verifies the conformance of GPON ONU devices to the ITU-T G.998 GPON standard, and to the Broadband Forum TR-156 specifications.

With this new release, the BBF.247 test plan now offers new options for verifying ONUs against multiple VLAN profiles and functionality tests.

This release also includes two pending technical reports:  a new test plan for XG-PON1 (WT-309), as well as a new PON Optical Layer management report (WT-287).  WT-287 looks at how to optimize a multi-service PON network catering to both business and residential customers.  It covers system architecture, use cases, functional requirements and interoperability requirements. The specifications in WT-287 apply to both ITU-T and IEEE PON systems. 

The BroadbandSuite 6.2 release includes:

• IR-247: GPON ONU Conformance Test Plan (detailed version, available to members only)
• ATP-247: Abstract GPON ONU Conformance Test Plan (summary of IR-247, publicly available)
• TR-255: GPON Interoperability Test Plan
• WT-309: XG-PON1 Physical layer Interoperability Test Plan (in final development)
• WT-287: PON Optical Layer Management (in final development)

“Service providers need world class, market-ready ONUs and network interoperability,” said Robin Mersh, CEO of the Broadband Forum. “To reduce the cost of fiber rollouts, providers want standards-verified fiber products. With a reliable certification program, testing burdens decrease, and more vendors can ship interoperable products, which means a reduced time to market.”