High-speed Internet for Elbmarsch

More and more municipalities are now addressing the urgent need to expand broadband coverage under their own direction. Competent partners help ensure they succeed in that. That is demonstrated by a powerful fiber-optic network in the joint municipality of Elbmarsch, for which euromicron’s subsidiary SKM Skyline provided high-quality infrastructure components.

There is no disputing that municipal broadband expansion is a key infrastructure task. In particular in many rural regions, which tend to be economically weak, access to high-speed Internet is crucial to the quality of life and their (remaining) economic attractiveness. Yet progress in this field is often only sluggish. That is because the major providers are often not willing to invest in broadband expansion in structurally weak regions.

More and more municipalities are therefore beginning to take things into their own hands and implement broadband expansion under their own responsibility. The joint municipality of Elbmarsch, which is located southeast of Hamburg, also did not want to be cut off from technological progress and so decided to establish a fiber-optic network that ensures citizens and companies in the community will have a powerful Internet connection for years to come. The model for that was Eichenzell in Hesse, which successfully accomplished broadband expansion under its own direction in 2012 with the support of competent partners. Unlike in Hesse, however, the joint municipality did not implement broadband expansion under its own direction, but instead founded ElbKom (Elbmarsch Kommunal Service) in 2013, a separate subsidiary that has since been in charge of conducting the project. By April 15, 2015, around 60 percent of households in the community had contractually undertaken to have a fiber-optic connection, ensuring that ElbKom could cover its operating costs and work on the fiber-optic network could start. The consulting firm LAN Consult from Hamburg was responsible for concrete planning of the network. The network operator is pepcom GmbH from Munich.

ElbKom enlisted the services of SKM Skyline GmbH as the technology partner for fiber-optic infrastructure components. The subsidiary of euromicron AG had successfully supported broadband expansion in Eichenzell and so boasted good credentials for the Elbmarsch project. However, the crucial factor at the end of the day was that SKM was best able to cater for the technical parameters in the invitation to tender. That was especially true as regards the project’s biggest challenge: creation of the network in the dike foreland, which is important for tourism and is home to a camp site near to the river, among other things. This area is very popular in the summer months and is often flooded by the Elbe in the winter. The working order of the network and its components must not be impaired by that. SKM was able to impress in this regard with highly water-proof fiber-optic cables, pre-assembled and pressure-sealed fiber-optic splice closures, and cable distribution boxes with multifunctional cabinets. The closures were integrated in the distribution boxes and offer the sensitive splices reliable protection, even in the event of floods.

The broadband network for Elbmarsch has been implemented as a FTTB (fiber to the building) network, i.e. the fiber-optic link extends to the individual buildings. The point-to-point design of the cabling – the optical fibers are connected in one piece between the individual network nodes – means that virtually unlimited scaling of the bandwidth is also possible in the future. The invitation to render originally demanded a broadband supply of at least 50 Mbit/s. However, 200 or 400 Mbit/s is already available – and the medium-term goal is 1000 Mbit/s. In view of such transmission rates and the high resilience of the components, it is no surprise that the prestigious expert Werner Stelter from the German Federal Technology Center for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology has certified that the Elbmarsch network is of the very highest quality.

ElbKom is also highly satisfied with the results. “The fiber-optic network works smoothly and there hasn’t been a hint of problems so far,” emphasizes ElbKom’s Chief Executive Officer Uwe Luhmann. In fact, the project is such a success that several neighboring communities will soon follow suit and wish to implement high-speed Internet under the management of ElbKom.