ARLINGTON, VA — The Fiber Optics LAN Section (FOLS) of the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA) has announced the election of officers for 2004. The FOLS serves as an educational resource, providing information to users about the benefits of fiber in customer-owned networks.
John Struhar, director, fiber structured cabling system solutions at Ortronics (New London, CT) was re-elected as section chair. "I am delighted to chair FOLS again in 2004," he said. "Last year we made significant progress by expanding our charter beyond fiber-to-the-desk applications to include additional customer-owned networks. This year we see great promise in the emerging zone cabling standard, which offers users another cost-effective way to deploy fiber in their networks."
In addition to Struhar, the other elected officials include vice chair, Gary Cawley, Optek Technology (Carrolton, TX); communication subcommittee chair, Rodney Casteel, CommScope (Hickory, NC); membership subcommittee chair, Robert Reid, Panduit (Tinley Park, IL); and standards subcommittee chair, Herb Congdon, Tyco Electronics (Harrisburg, PA).
Struhar predicts that 2004 will be a strong year for the deployment of fiber in customer-owned LANs. "The cost for deploying all-fiber LANs is lower than it's ever been," he said. "In many scenarios it's now very competitive, or even lower, than the cost of installing UTP copper cables." Struhar referenced the interactive cost model developed by FOLS and Pearson Technologies, available on the web at www.fols.org, which allows users to compare the installed first costs of an all-fiber network to a fiber/UTP copper network. "The cost model has generated a great deal of interest over the past six months. It's a powerful tool that allows users to model the cost for their own networks and shows them where fiber is cost effective to install today." He added that the FOLS and Pearson Technologies are already working on the next update of the model.
Now in its 11th year, FOLS was originally founded to provide information on the use of fiber in the backbone and horizontal portions of premises networks. To meet the emerging needs of end users, FOLS members decided in 2003 that it would expand its scope to cover customer-owned LANs such as data centers, storage area networks, and industrial applications.
