Requirements for the IoT Infrastructure in the Customer Premises

By  Rajesh Abbi, Charles Chapman (EnerSys),  Sudheer Dharanikota,  Kyle Haefner (Cable Labs), Clarke Stevens (Shaw)

September 01, 2022

What is the Problem?

Premises networks are changing rapidly with the introduction of new IoT applications and services.  Cable Operators need to evolve the traditional “wiring closet” that was designed for legacy services.

What are the new needs and requirements for the wiring closet of the future?

Key Takeaways

  • Customer Premises needs are evolving
  • Many new IoT applications are being introduced
  • Cable Operators are right in the middle of this
  • They need to develop a standard framework for the next-generation wiring closet
  • We highlight some of key needs and requirements for such a framework

Executive Summary

Customer premises networks have been evolving since the early days of POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service). The introduction of new services like Cable TV, Broadband, and later VoIP, has driven numerous changes in the premises networking requirements. It is therefore no surprise that with the emergence of a vast array of new Internet of Things (IoT) applications and other revenue-generating applications, the premises networking requirements will change yet again. Also, with the advent of these new service offerings such as Telecom for Wellness (T4W) [3], [4], [5], and Smart Cities [12] applications, even the definition of the term “customer premises” itself needs to be realigned.

To better understand these changes in the customer premises networks – as well as plan for them in advance – the SCTE has launched a new initiative under its IoT Working Group called the Wiring Closet Drafting Group (WCDG) [13]. This is a cross-functional team comprising members from the IoT, Smart Cities, Telehealth, and Aging in Place (AIP) working groups. The expectation is to gather and consolidate customer premises networking requirements from all these various classes of IoT applications and make recommendations for future customer premises networks that can be built in a modular fashion using the recommendations from the WCDG.

In this paper, we explore the special needs arising from these recent developments in the customer premises network and outline a framework of requirements that are being compiled by the SCTE WCDG. We highlight key service and business considerations for various application use cases including managed WiFi, home security, home automation, telehealth, aging-in-place, hospital-at-home, smart cities, and their associated security, installation, and support services. We believe this framework can greatly enhance the serviceability and adoption of these new services and can enable significant future revenue opportunities for communications service providers (CSP).

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Key Words: Customer Premises, IoT, Wiring Closet, Requirements, SCTE