Clearfield Inc. (CLFD) In The News
At a time of year when the number of press releases is relatively low, one Company, that we have been following for some time, stood out this week with two announcements: Clearfield Inc. (CLFD – $1.77) .
Clearfield, which manufactures and sells fiber distribution systems, optical components, outside plant cabinets, and fiber and copper cable assemblies for the telecommunications industry, announced on Tuesday an expansion of its FieldSmart Fiber Delivery Point (FDP) Wall Mount Panel product line.
This series of Wall Mount Panels is used for the deployment of PON-based1 FTTH networks2 in Multi-dwelling units (MDU)3, allowing for up to a total of 144 ports from one single deployment point.
Triangle Communications needed a versatile, easy to work with and cost effective solution to terminate outside plant fiber optic cable at a customer premise location in their new FTTx installations. Ben Calvert, Lead Engineer of Triangle Communications, explains why they chose Clearfield’s Wall Mount Panel line: “The versatility that the wall mount panel provides, allows us to use one product to fit a variety of customer needs. In many of our FTTx applications, space is limited, so having the ability to grow without having to replace the wall mount panel is a big plus.”
And on Thursday, Clearfield announced a new product launch, the FieldSmart Fiber Entrance Cabinet (FEC). The FieldSmart FEC allows users to dedicate 288 fibers of splice capacity and grow with ganging options as fiber needs dictate.
“Clearfield’s design team is dedicated to reducing the cost of broadband deployment,” comments Cheri Beranek Podzimek, president & CEO of Clearfield. “The FieldSmart FEC is another element of our aggressive product development efforts to give broadband service providers the tools needed to make universal broadband deployment a reality.”
We expect Clearfield to announce third quarter results for the period ending June 30, 2009 mid August.
1 A passive optical network (PON) is a point-to-multipoint, fiber to the premises network architecture in which unpowered optical splitters are used to enable a single optical fiber to serve multiple premises.
2 Fiber to the Home (FTTH) is a term used for a broadband network architecture that uses optical fiber to replace all or part of the usual metal local loop used for last mile telecommunications.
3 The term Multi-dwelling units (MDU) is used when referring to in-house networks that support commercial or residential building with multiple offices or apartments. ISPs and carriers increasingly offer specialized systems for such facilities.