optical line distributor (OLD)

An Optical Line Distributor (OLD) is an active optical distribution component in an optical access network( OAN).

Such an optical line distributor is an optical multiplexer( OMUX) and demultiplexer. On the one hand, the Optical Line Distributor bundles several optical user lines into one message line, on the other hand, it unbundles the optical lines coming from the Optical Distribution Network( ODN) for Optical Line Termination( OLT), which continue to the subscriber where they are terminated with the Optical Network Unit( ONU).