Moto, Juniper Eye Modular CMTS

Motorola Inc. and Juniper Networks Inc. are announcing plans Monday to collaborate on next-generation modular cable-modem-termination-system technology.

Cable’s modular CMTS initiative will allow systems to separate hardware and software elements in order to provide greater network efficiencies for news services riding on cable’s Internet-protocol platform.

Operators would be able to provide unified data, voice, video and on-demand services over IP, along with robust network-security and policy-management tools, plus a migration path to IPv6. The new design would be compatible with existing CMTS and IP-network assets.

The news brought a thumbs-up from David Fellows, executive vice president and chief technology officer at Comcast Corp., who said in a prepared statement: "The modular CMTS initiative is a promising technology that will both reduce costs and increase network performance as we rapidly move toward network convergence.”

Time Warner Cable senior VP of advanced engineering and technology Mike Hayashi added, “We are pleased to have partners like Motorola and Juniper and look forward to deploying these next-generation platforms. As we aggressively move to offer consumers unified services over our advanced platform, products like the new M-CMTS will help us to maintain our competitive edge."