Telecom and utilities news and perspectives

From fiber-to-the-home to utility grid modernization, there’s no shortage of complexity in network management. Planning, design, mapping, permitting, and database integrity all shape how telecom and utility providers deliver reliable service. At 3-GIS, our team contributes daily to advancing the field, bringing a deep understanding of these challenges and the solutions needed to overcome them. Take a look at our take on what’s happening across telecom and utility networks, from fiber mapping software and OSP design software to smarter approaches for telecom network management and utility network solutions.

Industry news and perspectives at your fingertips

May 29, 2025 5:00:00 PM
  • Telecom technologies
  • App modernization
  • Communications service providers
  • Press

VIAVI and 3-GIS partnership enables faster, more accurate fiber fault location at Windstream Wholesale

Chandler, Ariz., May 29, 2025 – Viavi Solutions Inc. (VIAVI) (NASDAQ: VIAV) and 3-GIS, a market-leading fiber network design and management software provider, today announced a partnership to empower businesses with faster, more accurate fiber fault location capabilities, while also leveraging customers’ existing Geographic Information System (GIS) investments. The combined solution, currently deployed at Windstream Wholesale, automates the current manual processes, offering significant advantages in improving network maintenance, minimizing downtime, increasing revenue and reducing cost. VIAVI, 3-GIS and Windstream will discuss this joint solution and its customer benefits in a webinar hosted by the Fiber Broadband Association on June 12, 2025.

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May 26, 2025 6:00:00 PM
  • Fiber network management
  • App modernization

Beyond the basics: How to use fiber management systems in 2025

A few years back, the telecommunications industry experienced a major shift. Network operators moved away from disconnected processes and basic tracking toward dedicated management platforms. But now that we have experience with these systems, a critical question emerges: Are we actually using them to their full potential?

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May 19, 2025 5:00:00 PM
  • Fiber network management
  • Telecom technologies
  • 3-GIS | Web
  • Fiber network planning

Planned Connections: Redefining how teams handle change in a live fiber management system

In fiber network operations, change is constant. Whether turning up a new customer, rerouting around a break, or expanding capacity, the underlying network data is always in motion. Planning those changes within fiber network management software helps ensure accuracy, visibility, and alignment across teams—but executing them without disrupting the live operational environment presents an entirely different challenge for network operators: the need to understand both what’s currently installed and what changes are planned.

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May 12, 2025 11:00:00 AM
  • Utilities
  • Communications service providers
  • Fiber deployment

Fibre at the core: Powering the smart cities of tomorrow

One global report estimated that the smart city platform market is set to be worth $292.1 billion by 2028, the primary factor driving this growth being various government initiatives to develop digitised, smart city infrastructure.1 Meanwhile, at a European level at least, FTTH Council reports that full fibre coverage across the continent has reached 74.6%.2 As these two trends converge, the message is clear: the future of smart cities and the expansion of fibre networks are not just parallel initiatives—they are fundamentally connected.

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May 5, 2025 5:00:00 PM
  • Fiber network industry and markets
  • Telecom technologies
  • GIS

How GIS transforms fiber proposals - Part 3: Creating accurate cost estimates

Cost miscalculations. The silent deal-killers of the fiber proposals process. Following our exploration of slow, manual processes and asset visibility challenges, we now address the most problematic factor that 37% of organizations we surveyed in a recent webinar identify as their biggest hurdle: creating accurate cost estimates.

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Apr 28, 2025 5:00:00 PM
  • Fiber network management
  • Telecom technologies
  • 3-GIS | Web

How GIS transforms fiber proposals - Part 2: Maximizing success with network asset visibility

Valuable fiber assets often sit unused while providers build costly new infrastructure alongside them. Why? Because many providers simply can't see what they already have.

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Apr 21, 2025 5:00:00 PM
  • Fiber network industry and markets
  • Telecom technologies
  • GIS

How GIS transforms fiber proposals - Part 1: The cost of manual proposal methods

Ever wonder why some fiber providers consistently win contracts while others struggle to close deals? In a recent webinar, we pulled back the curtain on what's really happening in the proposal process. The (not so) shocking reality? Many providers are losing winnable deals due to slow, manual processes, poor visibility into their network assets, and proposals with cost estimates that miss the mark.

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Apr 14, 2025 9:00:00 AM
  • Fiber network management
  • Fiber network industry and markets
  • Communications service providers
  • FTTH

What did FTTH Conference tell us about the future of fibre?

If this year’s FTTH Conference in Amsterdam made anything clear, it’s that the fibre industry is moving faster, growing smarter, and getting a whole lot more collaborative. The exhibition hall was alive with activity, as rows of booths hummed with demos, meetings, and panel debriefs. Conversations were wide-ranging: AI and automation, sustainable transformations, new builds, rural challenges, and, of course, how to plan, deploy, and manage networks that are only getting more complex.

But as much as the conversations varied, there were some common threads.

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