Australia’s NBN Co has called in an American outfit to help untangle looming problems with its planned fibre-to-the curb (FttC) rollout, which it was hoping to deploy to around one million premises.

According to a US press release, Huntsville, Alabama-based Adtran, which describes itself as a “leading provider of next-generation open networking solutions”, has been hired to supply software, hardware and services for the multi-million FttC rollout. The effect of this deal on NBN financing has so far not been publicly stated – but it presumably won’t be cheap.

The Adcan release said the US outfit has already completed a “GPON interoperability proof-of-concept trial” and “a collaborative, agile development process with NBN’s IT team to implement Adtran’s standards-based, multi-vendor DPU management solution, utilising an open microservices architecture.”

It adds that the executed supply agreement covers software, hardware and services. Financial arrangements of the agreement were not revealed. The recently signed agreement is said to include commitments to support the nationwide network rollout.