{"id":285,"date":"2017-12-12T20:59:40","date_gmt":"2017-12-12T20:59:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/10.10.1.214\/?p=285"},"modified":"2026-11-04T21:00:19","modified_gmt":"2026-11-04T21:00:19","slug":"cpe-architecture-when-does-all-ip-equal-all-in-one-part-ii-market-segments-and-access-tech-trends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/12\/cpe-architecture-when-does-all-ip-equal-all-in-one-part-ii-market-segments-and-access-tech-trends\/","title":{"rendered":"CPE Architecture: When Does ALL-IP Equal All-in-One? [Part II] Market Segments and Access Tech Trends"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"366\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/figure3-1024x366.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-286\" style=\"aspect-ratio:2.7950310559006213;width:2250px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/figure3-1024x366.png 1024w, https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/figure3-300x107.png 300w, https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/figure3-768x275.png 768w, https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/figure3-1536x550.png 1536w, https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/figure3-2048x733.png 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In Part I we introduced the idea that multiple factors govern the best decision about CPE artictecture. Now we will dig deeper into what some of those factors are. ..<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Market Segmentation\u2014Economies&nbsp;of scale<\/strong><br>First, not all customers are the same. Customarily&nbsp;the telecom market can be roughly segmented into&nbsp;three categories: <em>residential<\/em>, <em>large enterprise<\/em>, and<br><em>small-to-medium enterprise (SME)<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><strong>This post<\/strong>&nbsp;is Part II in a series about &nbsp;the tradeoffs with single-unit versus multi-unit CPE architectures. Part I introduced the various congifurations for covering OSI layer functions. &nbsp;&gt;&gt;<a href=\"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/2017\/08\/29\/cpe-architecture-when-does-all-ip-equal-all-in-one-part-i\/\">Read it here\u2026<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Residential<\/strong>. The residential market is characterized\u00a0by large volumes with a highly-standardized\u00a0service offering. Service deployment,\u00a0management and maintenance are designed\u00a0for process-oriented procedures. Chipmakers\u00a0and equipment vendors have developed highlyintegrated\u00a0and extremely cost-effective solutions\u00a0that focus on these requirements.\u00a0Because the large volumes justify the up-front\u00a0investment, one-box solutions\u2014that is IADs\u2014dominate this market segment.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Large Enterprise.<\/strong> On the other end of the scale,\u00a0large enterprises typically have proprietary business\u00a0processes that demand customized network\u00a0environments. Solutions typically require a\u00a0project-oriented approach with unique system\u00a0designs. Solutions providers combine best-of-breed\u00a0software, hardware and services to build\u00a0an ALL-IP solution that satisfies the need.\u00a0Commercially, equipment cost is less relevant\u00a0than overall project pricing. The CPE setup may easily include four or five dedicated devices to\u00a0provide such functions as transmission, routing,\u00a0firewall, bandwidth-optimization, media gateway and signaling.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>SME.<\/strong> Between residential and large enterprise spaces, the SME market presents specific challenges. On one hand, system requirements and company sizes can vary wildly; on the other hand, there are relatively high volumes that call for process automation and standardization. For the SME environment, there are several arguments arguments\u00a0that favor a two-box or multi-box solution.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Access Technology Trends<\/strong> Transmission technologies for network access\u2014and&nbsp;their availability\u2014are still rapidly evolving. This is true&nbsp;for wired and wireless solutions. In the SME space,&nbsp;asymmetric (ADSL, VDSL) and symmetric (SDSL,&nbsp;EFM) technologies are both relevant. On a roughly&nbsp;two-year cycle, improved standards emerge that increase the bandwidth capacity of legacy copper&nbsp;lines even further. More and more fiber deployments&nbsp;continue rolling out from city centers to suburbs and industrial areas. Meanwhile, wireless (4G, 5G) connections&nbsp;gain importance as fall-back, or even primary,&nbsp;Internet access links. This CPE architecture corresponds to the Modem &amp; Router\/Gateway column&nbsp;in figure 1.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image size-large wp-image-548\">\n<figure class=\"alignright size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"529\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/cpe-arch-figure1-e1503682694963-1024x529-1.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-287\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/cpe-arch-figure1-e1503682694963-1024x529-1.png 1024w, https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/cpe-arch-figure1-e1503682694963-1024x529-1-300x155.png 300w, https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/cpe-arch-figure1-e1503682694963-1024x529-1-768x397.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Figure 1: One-Box Versus Multi-Box<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Service providers must select which access technologies&nbsp;to employ in their SME offerings based on&nbsp;price, bandwidth, and geographic coverage. Rolling<br>out a new access technology represents a costly,&nbsp;long-term infrastructure project. Service offerings, on&nbsp;the other hand, can evolve more rapidly.&nbsp;Under these circumstances it can make sense to&nbsp;separate the access transmission functions (OSI&nbsp;layer 1 and layer 2) from the routing and service functions<br>(layers 3 to 7), provided by two separate&nbsp;devices. Such an approach eliminates dependencies,&nbsp;increases flexibility in designing services, and&nbsp;expands geographic coverage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Logistics<\/strong><br>Let\u2019s assume a service provider wants to offer business&nbsp;services for SMEs ranging from 4 to 30 voice&nbsp;calls with varying subscriber interfaces and over<br>three different access networks. Let\u2019s consider how&nbsp;many box types the provider must purchase, stock,&nbsp;manage and maintain for each approach: one-box&nbsp;and two-box.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Part III will cover the logistical details comparing single and multi-box CPE deployments. Plus discussion of service evolution and security concerns.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em><strong>&gt;Or you can download the full white paper here. . .<\/strong> <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.patton.com\/whitepapers\/CPE-Architecture-When-Does-ALL-IP-Equal-All-in-One\/\">CPE Architecture: When Does All-IP Equal All-in-One?<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>What do you think?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Which access technologies are currently available in your service areas?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Which do you consider most cost-effective?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Add your thoughts<\/strong>&nbsp;in the comments below&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Part I we introduced the idea that multiple factors govern the best decision about CPE artictecture. Now we will<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":286,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":288,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285\/revisions\/288"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.patton.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}