Preform Plant to Ease Fiber Shortage in China

VANCOUVER, BC, Canada, Feb. 7 -- Golden Fortune Investments Limited reports that that Golden Fortune has been selected by the Chinese government as project manager to build and operate a new optical fiber plant to be located in Shanghai.
The initial capacity of the plant will produce 30 tons of quartz preform rods per annum to draw 1 million km of optical fiber, with expansion plans increasing output to 90 tons, to draw 3 million km within the following two years. At current prices of US $35 per km of optical fiber in China, revenues are initially projected to be $35 million rising to $100 million.
With nearly two hundred fiber optic cable plants and only a handful of optical fiber factories that produce quartz preform, China is at an early stage of development. China is only able to supply less than 20% of its own fiber optical market needs. Currently, Philips Electric and Lucent Technology have joint venture factories that produce 70% of China's optical fiber supply.FIBERTeradyne Wins $4.5 Million Contract from Czech TelecomDEERFIELD, Ill., Feb. 7 -- Teradyne has received a $4.5 million order for its 4TEL II Voice Customer Care Test System from Czech Telecom, the national telecommunications provider in the Czech Republic. The contract covers deployment of 4TEL II to monitor more than 2 million phone lines operated by Czech Telecom.
The system will be installed beginning in March 2001, with full implementation throughout Czech Telecom's network completed later in the year. Czech Telecom has used Teradyne's system to maintain its network since 1998. The knowledge-based component of 4TEL II, called ExpertLink, also provides part of the software analysis infrastructure of Celerity -- Teradyne's newest test system focused on DSL qualification, provisioning, and service assurance.