US cableco Mediacom Communications has announced that its entire broadband network will be Gigabit-capable by the end of 2016, a feat it claims will make it the first major US cable operator to have upgraded its full operating system to the DOCSIS 3.1 standard. As a result of the upgrade, virtually all of the three million homes and businesses that it serves across its 22 state footprint will be able to enjoy speeds that are up to 40 times faster than the minimum broadband definition set by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
Rocco B. Commisso, Mediacom’s founder and CEO, commented: ‘Mediacom was founded on the principle that hard-working families in the smaller cities and towns in our nation’s heartland deserved the same advanced communications services enjoyed in the largest metropolitan areas … After the ‘Gigasphere’ modems became available earlier this year, we accelerated the first phase of our previously announced three-year, USD1 billion capital investment plan so that Mediacom’s customers could begin taking advantage of super-fast speeds as soon as possible.’
According to separate vendor press releases, Mediacom’s DOCSIS 3.1 deployment utilises the Cisco cBR-8 next generation converged cable access platform (CCAP), and the C100G CCAP courtesy of Casa Systems.