Fiber-Optics Firms Pursue Military Local-Area Business.

• Author: Kennedy, Harold

As the downturn in the high-tech industry continues, fiber-optics manufacturers are stepping up their efforts to corner a larger share of the potentially lucrative business of installing cabling for local-area networks, or LANs, for computer systems on the nation's military installations.

In all, the Defense Department operates more than 25,000 computer systems, located on 519 fixed installations in the United States and abroad. These computers are key elements in many high-tech weapons, command and control functions, the Global Positioning System, inventory and transportation management programs, medical equipment and pay and personnel record-keeping. Most of them, these days, are linked through LANs.

Upgrading the cables and connectors to handle recent technology--such as video-conferencing, multimedia and 3D modeling-could cost as much as a billion dollars per year, according to Dan Silver, market development manager at the 3M Telecom Systems Division in Austin, Texas. His company, he asserted, is leading the competition for the fiber-optics portion of that business.

"It's a huge market," he said, "and we're the only company focusing on an all-fiber technology.

Fiber optics are bundles of thin glass filaments through which light beams are transmitted, Silver explained. Fiber optics can carry up to 30,000 times the information of electric waves over copper wire, he said.

Traditionally, however, LANs have used copper cables--the original conduits for electrical power--because they were considered less expensive, more supple and simpler to install than fiber. In fact, Copper still accounts for 80 percent of LAN cabling. But it has limitations compared to fiber optics, according to Silver.

"Copper cabling can be run no further than 90 meters from a central telecommunications closet to a desktop computer," Silver said. But fiber can span distances as great as two kilometers or more, he said.

This means that an organization using fiber needs fewer closets and can place its computers further apart. That's significant for military bases, which can stretch over hundreds of square miles and include hundreds of offices, Silver said.

Then, there's the matter of longevity. Copper cabling usually is replaced every three to five years, Silver said, whereas fiber is good for 20 years or more.

Three years ago, 3M came up with a product that it says makes use of the strong points of fiber and overcomes its weaknesses, making it competitive with copper.

The product, called the Volition system, consists of all of the components needed to install a complete fiber optic-system, stretching from where the cable enters the building to the desktop, explained Silver.

The key ingredient in the...