Newport Fiber Optics Conference Draws 170 from 17 Countries

Worldwide fiber optic cable deployment reached 22.8 million kilometers in 1995 and will top the 63 million mark by the year 2001 with the US, Japan and China leading the way, according to sponsor KMI Corp.'s researchers at the 19th Annual Newport Conference on Fiber Optics Markets. About 170 executives and marketing professionals in the fiber optics industry from 17 countries were on hand for the mid-October event, which took place in Newport, R.I. The keynote speech, given by Herwig Kogelnik of Lucent Technology's Photonics Research Laboratory, addressed applications of wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) for increased networking capacity -- including what he called the first large-scale WDM deployment. Other conference topics detailed US and other North American markets for fiber optic cable and interconnect hardware, photonic solutions for broadband access, and networking opportunities in emerging countries.