The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 14, 1996
Filed:
Jul. 07, 1994
Rolf Heidemann, Tamm, DE;
Heinz Krimmel, Korntal-Munch. both of, DE;
Alcatel SEL Aktiengesellschaft, Stuttgart, DE;
Abstract
It is desirable to offer the subscribers of a cable television distribution network, in addition to the cable TV service, a video-on-demand service. Since, in the foreseeable future, the fiber-optic portion of the cable television distribution networks will not extend to the subscribers (111) but will terminate in optical network terminations (ONT.sub.i) from which a respective optical access network (108-110) will extend to the subscribers, the problem arises how to transmit the entirety of subscriber-assigned video signals to the subscribers so that the latter can receive the requested video signals. According to the invention, the transmission from the center (100) through the fiber-optic distribution network (101-107) to the optical network terminations (ONT.sub.i) is digital, using time- and wavelength-division multiplexing. In each optical network termination, only that portion of subscriber-assigned video signals is removed which is intended for subscribers connected to the optical network termination (ONT.sub.i). The removed subscriber-assigned video signals are modulated onto subcarriers (M.sub.1 -M.sub.6) and frequency-division-multiplexed with the cable TV signals which are distributed over the electrical access network (108-110) to the subscribers ( 111) connected to the optical network termination.