Abstract

Glassfiber communication activities began in 1966 in the AEG-TELEFUNKEN Research Labs, in Ulm. 1967 Messrs. Schott + Gen. started the production of mono- and multimode fibers, though they featured a high attenuation. The break through of Corning in low-loss fibers (1970) and Bell in DHS-room-temperature lasers (1970) activated a big lot of work in industry, in universities and at PTT. Additional to hardware components work system considerations were made which led from simple substitution of classical, cables to highly sophisticated integrated communication networks without exchanges /1/.../10/.

© 1975 Optical Society of America