PLDT Inc. said Wednesday its fiber infrastructure reached 395,000 kilometers as of end-September, making it the most extensive and advanced digital transport network in the country.
“Despite pandemic conditions, PLDT has relentlessly continued to expand its fiber optic network. Expansion works are ongoing to extend PLDT’s footprint by another 81,000 km, 31,000 km more in 2020 and 50,000 in 2021,” Mario Tamayo, PLDT-Smart senior vice president for network planning and engineering, said.
The company’s backbone network capacity as of end-September was at 55 terabits per second. With ongoing works, PLDT is looking to increase this capacity by another 37 terabits per second.
The capacity expansion aims to serve customers’ growing demand for data and deliver technologies like 5G, LTE and fiber-to-the-home.
PLDT’s extensive fiber infrastructure supports its mobile subsidiary Smart’s network by providing high-capacity links for base stations.
Base stations are electronic equipment installed on cell sites that transmit and receive radio frequencies. These stations connect customers’ mobile devices, such as phones and WiFi routers to the network.
“From the base station all the way to the data centers, the connection is mostly fiber. Faster transmission of data is best enabled by fiberizing the base stations, so our customers can have a better experience when streaming videos, for instance,” Tamayo said.
“Additionally, this better experience is possible because of the international submarine cables that connect our network to the rest of the world where most of the content is hosted—and these submarine cables also happen to be made of fiber,” he said.
Tamayo said PLDT and Smart aimed to deliver more improved services and ensure a future-proof, reliable and resilient network by focusing on expanding and upgrading their entire network ecosystem which consists of thousands of cell sites; 56,799 base stations; 3.81 million ports for outside plant facilities; 25 core data centers; three cable landing stations and international gateway facilities.