Andalucía assesses the investment needed to deploy a fiber-optic network

Setting up fiber-optic telecommunication networks requires large investments. The regional government of Andalusia assigned us the task of developing a tool capable of evaluating the deployment cost of a network to connect large cities and also to include smaller towns, to prevent their falling behind in the information society. The Andalusian regional government aimed to deploy a network capable of accessing most of the municipalities in the region, even those municipalities that could not be profitable from a monetary perspective. We developed a nonlinear mathematical-programming model with special focus on the investment costs. These costs included the costs of civil-engineering work, as well as those for deploying telematic links. We solved this complex problem using a genetic algorithm that we had previously tested with a set of trial problems. The government used the results to persuade private companies to expand their fiber-optic networks to reach small towns.