As we look to the future of broadband technology, CableLabs is leading the way with a bold vision designed to be a catalyst for transformational change. Our mission is to unite our members and vendor community to create a collaborative context where we can work together to overcome industry challenges and seize opportunities.
Through events and activities, we invite industry leaders, technology experts, and product strategists to come together to see how they can partner with us as we shape the future of the industry, address industry challenges, and create a healthier, more competitive ecosystem.
Inspiring Transformational Change Through CableLabs Technology Vision Framework
Facilitating collaboration to create impact together is a tenet of CableLabs’ technology vision. With core goals of delighting customers, providing seamless connectivity, and growing into new markets, the technology vision creates a roadmap to achieve the goal of holistic, context-aware connectivity and an adaptable, intelligent network.
To achieve this ambitious mission, CableLabs members and the vendor community must work together to create solutions at scale and harness the power of collaboration. By aligning industry goals, combining expertise, and sharing resources, we can offset risks and costs, bring together diverse perspectives, and accomplish more together to create a seamlessly connected world.
The technology vision framework is based on three main pillars:
Comprehensive Intelligence, Security, and Privacy — Building intelligence at every point in the network to ensure high performance, reliability, security, and privacy for all users and devices in any connectivity context. Seamless Connectivity — Enabling new customer experiences and new revenue opportunities for operators by connecting anywhere, from any device, regardless of access network technology or how the user moves across the network. Evolving Network Platform — Developing innovations that will drive the most reliable, cost-effective, and sustainable network architectures for our members, ensuring unparalleled scalability and flexibility while delivering seamless connectivity experiences for users.
Leading the way to a new, adaptive era of broadband innovation
The evolution of broadband is defined by three distinct eras: the Age of Speed, the Age of Experience, and the Age of Adaptation. These phases reflect the continued advancement of network capabilities and user experiences. During the Age of Speed, technology innovation focused on competition based on standards. As we move through the Age of Experience and into the Age of Adaptation, the driving force has shifted to differentiation and consistency (the Age of Experience) with the ultimate goals of service flexibility and ubiquity (the Age of Adaptation).
The Technology Vision Framework promotes alignment between member operators and the broader vendor community through several strategic initiatives:
Specifications and Standards SDO Participation and Ecosystem Development Technology Transfer Member/Supplier Contact Points SCTE Chapters and Training Events (SCTE TechExpo, Engage, Summits) Open Source
Within these initiatives, key focus areas encourage collaboration to deliver flexible network solutions that can enable new services and improve user experiences – ultimately helping us build a seamlessly connected world.
Workgroups: Tools for Success in Industry
Success in the industry requires balancing the needs of both operators and vendors. CableLabs and our affiliate, SCTE, support working groups that provide the mechanisms to do this by creating cost-effective, timely solutions that benefit operators, vendors, and customers. The greatest successes are achieved when industry stakeholders collaborate to develop solutions that meet the business needs of cable operators and can be scaled in a timely and cost-effective manner to support those needs.
CableLabs working groups typically develop industry-specific specifications, focusing on the research and engineering of the solution. SCTE groups focus on how to deploy and operate that solution. In general, the two integrate across the value chain, from idea to specification to implementation and operation. This has been done in different ways historically—including DOCSIS, gap nodes, smart amplifiers, and proactive network maintenance (PNM).
The end result of both approaches is the development of specifications, standards, and other outputs that enable the production of new products and services that operators want and suppliers can manufacture. In all cases, active participation by suppliers and operators is critical to the success of the project.
Here are examples of how working groups get results:
Co-provisioning and PON management
Provisioning and managing passive optical networks (PONs) is critical to developing cable network capabilities, overcoming integration challenges, and removing interoperability barriers.
Short-term goals include simplifying PON integration by leveraging existing DOCSIS back-office systems, developing the OpenOMCI Cable specification, and enhancing interoperability. Longer term, the group is exploring software-defined networking (SDN)-based solutions and virtual PON architectures to support future growth and flexibility. Outcomes include a technical report on DOCSIS provisioning and the OpenOMCI Cable specification.
Visual Operations and Maintenance Working Group
The Optical Operations and Maintenance Working Group (OOM-WG) focuses on infrastructure assessment, telemetry evaluation and translation into field practice. Delivery objectives include:
Unified Telemetry Specific guidelines for the core architecture based on similarities and differences General network operations approach for FCAPS: Identify the problem, resolve the cause, locate it, and address it with appropriate action, whether it is maintenance, capacity management, or any other action
Ultimately, the goal of this suite is to reduce troubleshooting time and costs while increasing network capacity and uptime. This includes integration across the toolkit to reduce the burden of engineering, operations, and troubleshooting.
Proactive Network Maintenance (PNM) Working Group
The Proactive Network Maintenance (PNM) Working Group is focused on standardizing and accelerating the use of new proactive network maintenance technologies in operations and in the field. Part of SCTE’s Network Operations Subcommittee, the group works in collaboration with our member and vendor communities to develop standards, operational practices, guidance, and training content to support their initiatives.
Fostering innovation and creating impact in the broadband industry
Are you ready to join CableLabs in driving industry innovation to create a seamlessly connected world? Explore our working groups, SCTE standards, InteropLabs events, and SCTE TechExpo events, as we seek to address key industry challenges and opportunities. By fostering collaboration between members and vendors, we are paving the way for a future of comprehensive intelligence, seamless connectivity, and adaptable networking solutions.
