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Microsoft, RBOCs are testing gear Corinex started shipping its 200 mbps BPL-to-Ethenet in-premises network box, the AV200 Powerline Ethernet Adapter last month and took an order for 30,000 from a tier-one Spanish telecom firm. The Vancouver, BC, manufacturer's Director of Business Development Brian Donnelly reminded us that that's not an annual order. That's for the third quarter. The firm is using the boxes to deliver digital television — IPTV. Tier-one telecom firms in Belgium and France are checking out the gear, said Donnelly. In its first couple weeks on the shelves the AV200 Powerline Ethernet Adapter has left those shelves headed for over 50 buyers from distributors to telecom giants, a virtual who's who of the network operations world. All the baby bells plus Bell Canada, Deutsche Telecom — just name the top telecom firms, said Donnelly — all are or placing orders for the system. Why? AV 200 uses DS2's G3 chipsets and can deliver HDTV to set-top boxes (STB) throughout the home or business — sweetening prospects for firms, including BPL operators, that can deliver broadband access. One customer bought the boxes to replace wireless video systems that deliver in-house corporate video in a thousand or so field offices, said Donnelly. It's IP, folks, throughout the home or office. Use your imagination. At least one STB maker is considering embedding the Corinex solution into its own devices to fulfill oft-heard predictions of the ultimate plug-and-play simplicity. For now the AV200 can connect any ethernet-enabled IP device — and virtually all new computers, VOIP routers and digital STBs ship ethernet-enabled. So picture the TV market of the future — say Q1, 2006. By then Donnelly predicts he'll be taking orders for a couple hundred thousand boxes/month. Vast tracts of Europe — entire countries in some cases — that until now relied on rabbit-ears and rooftop antennas for TV broadcast will start to have access to HDTV, digital video-on-demand and digital video recording plus affordable VOIP and highspeed networking for the first time — delivered by the local telecom firm or power utility. That picture requires enough backhaul bandwidth to get the service to the home yet clearly, firms placing big orders see that problem as solved. Advances in DSL are delivering high-bandwidth service perfect for some markets, especially in Europe where telecom density is high, hence the buzz at telecom firms. “Internet access is nice," but "AMR is huge," said Donnelly, who sees a big demand for utility services such as meter reading, load shedding and balancing, outage islanding and the rest. What happens on one side of the BPL world affects the other, he reminded. Donnelly just got back last week from a trip to Slovakia—hoomeland of Corinex founder Dr Peter Sobotka and home of the firm's R&D . He spoke to about 50 telecom and electric utility representatives about BPL in general and Corinex devices. Many in the room represented Eastern European firms eager to deliver the triple play — in some cases to their entire country. The nationwide power utility in Slovakia faces massive power stealing, reported Donnelly, and the firm wants to move ahead with BPL and AMR to stop that in its tracks. Some meters there don't get read more than once/year, he added. Why isn't Corinex a household name? The firm had 48% of the small office/home office (SOHO) networking market in 2003 according to a InStat/MDR report (IN0401227RC) — compared with Phonex's 23% and name-brands such as Linksys with 15% and Netgear at 6%.
Rather than try to compete with established WiFi players for shelf space, Corinex did an end run and concentrated on striking deals with integrators and installers in the telecom and IT markets to network cable, DSL and satellite services on-premises as those markets grew.
The firm is planning to host a big BPL Corinex ‘pipe’ faster, more secure Worked with DS2 to craft G3 chips The AV200 (above) creates not just a bigger pipe, it's a better pipe, said Brian Donnelly (above), with levels of high security and quality of service not found in other systems.
Not that any other BPL system out there is doing 200 mbps — yet, but the firm worked closely with DS2 to ensure some high-tech bells and whistles Corinex customers demand were available from the start. Corinex was the first firm to deliver HomePlug 1.0-compliant gear several years ago and has shipped more HomePlug customer premises equipment (CPE) than any other company, Donnelly reminded. That gave the vendor first dibs on valuable customer feedback. Corinex took that feedback to DS2 when it opted to use the latter's chipsets for theAV200. Having an existing "path to the customer” informed Corinex on some needed changes to DS2’s at-the-time evolving G3 silicon and firmware, said Donnelly. Corinex remains a committed HomePlug member but as a manufacturer isn't locked into any one supplier, he added. The eagerness at Corinex to build a box that could deliver in-premises 200 mbps and the triple-play drove the decision to use the DS2 chips. Donnelly blamed wrangling at HomePlug for the delay in that group's 200 mbps offering and believes he's now got a 6-month head start in the market. HomePlug's G3 chipset is called HomePlug AV and is due out in September. What are the Corinex-driven bells and whistles? Video quality of service is one, making sure video frames aren't lost when the network gets busy. High level encryption is another as well as VLAN Tagging — a system that makes sure multiple users on the network can’t see each other. The firm has a multi-dweller unit (MDU) solution for hotels, institutions and condominiums in the pipeline, said Donnely. He’s certain that top-of-the-line hotels won’t accept a network for their customers without VLAN Tagging. Coming on the heels of AV200 is a home gateway, said Donnelly, a central processing device for the networked home that lets IP-enabled devices report information and receive commands — within the home and over the internet. A short list of predicted IP-enabled devices includes lights, HVAC, smart appliances, digital video recorders and TVs, stereo components, computers, game consoles, security systems and monitors, surveillance gear, smoke detectors, air quality monitors, medical equipment and the list goes on. Note here that all those devices and almost any other we've ever heard mentioned are normally plugged into the power network — starting with light bulbs a century ago and since then refrigerators, washing machines, TVs followed by a landslide more and last but not least — the telephone once wireless systems were introduced. We learned how to "plug something in" back when Victrolas and washboards were common household gear. Engineers have figured out now how to get all those devices to connect without the copper and plastic spaghetti common in most modem entertainment setups. Corinex created a software package to help manage all those devices — the only one out there for HomePlug gear and called Open Powerline Manager. The firm's working on an AV200 compatible version. Vendor pushing UPA's interop vision IEEE p1901 forms to make mix & match BPL Corinex (above) is a founding member of the Universal Powerline Assn (UPA), a group that at first seemed like a rebel BPL camp based on the DS2 chipsets after that chipmaker pulled out of the HomePlug Alliance (BPL Today, 5/30, 4/04). That's not true, Corinex's Brian Donnelly (above) told us last week. The goal of UPA is coexistence of — and interoperability among BPL systems. Like its member Corinex, the UPA embraced the DS2 200 mbps chipset because it was first to market. Donnelly assured us that chipmakers including DS2 have limited voting rights in the group and all chipmakers are urged to play a role. UPA has a digital home standardization committee, chaired by Corinex founder Peter Sobotka working to create specs to let in-premises and access BPL coexist and ultimately make every BPL box replaceable with any similar box from any other hardware maker. An example of the coexistence problem came up when Motorola reported its recent news event for its new access BPL solution inLong Beach that the system couldn’t be used with an in-home power line solution such as HomePlug. Getting proprietary solutions out the door to kick-start the industry makes sense to Donnelly, but the next obvious goal is coexistence and interop. Being first out the door with G3 gear may be why the firm is revved up about moving on to the next step. UPA member Ilevo is co-chairing the IEEE p1901 BPL study group Donnelly reported. The "p" stands for PAR (project uthorization request). That group is committed to creating a standard for in-home and access BPL coexistence and interop and making sure its final product works within all emissions limitations around the world. "This is a global initiative," Donnelly reminded, not just for the US and Europe but all of Asia and the rest of the world. The other co-chair is Jim Mollenkopf from Current Technologies — a HomePlug member and Donnelly called that balance at the top between technology camps "a good thing," since neither group could hijack the proceedings. As a top vendor for both camps, Corinex has seen the effects of discord on getting products to market and stand to gain from harmony among chipmakers. Donnelly expects p1901 to win full IEEE working group status soon. The 1901 process falls under IEEE's Communications Society or „ComSoc“ (pronounced COM-sock). The study group met at the Vancouver BPL symposium in April (http://conferences.ece.ubc.ca/isplc2005/) and at last check was waiting for final PAR approval from the IEEE — expected within a couple weeks — before setting its next meeting. The Vancouver 1901 meeting had 40 attendees representing 19 voting companies and of those firms nine are UPA members, Donnelly reported. UPA recently signed with UPLC to work together on coexistence and interoperability (BPL Today, 5/30). Donnelly believes both are attainable. Other UPA members include BPL vendor Ambient (USA) and Ascom (Switzerland), DS2 (Spain), generation and distribution firm Electricite de France, Vendor Ilevo (Schneider Electric Powerline Communications, Germany), 150-year-old multinational import/export giant Itochu (Japan) and high-tech Japanese manufacturers and vendors Sumitomo Electric Industries and TOYOCOM. French BPL chipmaker Spidcom has shown an interest and Donnelly hopes HomePlug or at least the chipmaker the alliance’s standards are based on — Intellon — will join the
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