FiberStar & Huawei: Building Digital Indonesia, Lighting Up a Smarter Future

As the global digital economy advances, people's expectations for network services have evolved from accessing simple connectivity to smarter, premium experiences.

Indonesia, an archipelago of over 17,000 islands, has a median population age of just 30. This young demographic has a strong appetite for digital services, ranging from gigabit home broadband to agile enterprise cloud adoption. A high-speed, reliable, and intelligent network has become the cornerstone of the nation's digital journey.

FiberStar is a pioneer among Indonesian Internet Service Providers (ISPs). Since its establishment in 2013, FiberStar's mission has been to drive digital transformation across Indonesia. With a focus on building 100% fiber optic networks in an open access architecture, FiberStar is committed to becoming an infrastructure service provider that upholds net neutrality and delivers diverse services.

"Our core vision is to bring high-speed connectivity to every household and business," said Sugiharto Darmakusuma, President Director of FiberStar. However, to achieve this ambitious goal, FiberStar must overcome three challenges: the escalating demand for high-bandwidth networks across premium enterprise and diverse residential scenarios; the surge in data center traffic driven by AI advancement, which places immense pressure on network capacity; and the need for more efficient Operations and Maintenance (O&M) and faster fault handling to deliver the availability and agility required for digital and intelligent transformation.

To address these challenges, FiberStar worked with Huawei to create the target architecture for an integrated, intelligent IP+optical network, supported by three key pillars: ultimate experience, super-fast interconnect, and intelligent O&M.

• Ultimate experience: Centered on home broadband and enterprise services, this pillar relies on a high-capacity, stable backbone network integrated with Segment Routing over Internet Protocol Version 6 (SRv6) and Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD-WAN) technologies to deliver differentiated services, effortlessly accommodating recent bandwidth demand from multiple services.

• Super-fast interconnect: Targeting AI computing needs, this pillar uses a 1.2T Data Center Interconnect (DCI) solution to build a high-bandwidth, low-latency network foundation for data centers. It provides reliable transmission support for AI computing power connectivity and multi-cloud collaboration.

• Intelligent O&M: By leveraging capabilities such as rapid service provisioning and automated fault self-healing, this pillar boosts O&M efficiency and network robustness to support digital and intelligent transformation.

Backbone Network: Extending Optical Connectivity to Every Island

To meet Indonesia's intensifying demand for better network services, FiberStar partnered with Huawei to upgrade its core backbone network as their starting point. They deployed 400G backbone, 800G metro, and 1.2T DCI network solutions to create a high-bandwidth, reliable, and scalable IP+optical converged transport network. This multi-service network not only strengthens basic transmission but also provides a flexible architecture to support a wide range of home broadband and enterprise network services.

Since 2016, the two companies have built a Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) backbone network connecting Jakarta and Surabaya. Stretching over 3,000 kilometers and with a capacity of 27.6T, the network adopts an Automatically Switched Optical Network (ASON) design with both submarine and terrestrial cables to provide the ultimate protection for service paths. Latency across the network is visualized through a latency map. The network stays up even in the face of frequent fiber cuts in Indonesia, laying a solid foundation for rolling out various services in the future.

Building on this backbone, FiberStar has expanded coverage to more than 142 cities, enabling seamless information flows across the nation's core economic zones. The optical network has truly become the beating heart of Indonesia's digital economy.

Enterprise Network Services: Intelligent, Resilient, Reliable Connectivity Driving Transformation

As cloud adoption, AI, and mobile office applications become widespread, companies demand more agile and reliable networks. To meet these needs, FiberStar and Huawei developed an intelligent managed network service platform based on SD-WAN, which delivers large capacity, high reliability, and automated O&M.

With iMaster NCE-Campus providing centralized management and intelligent O&M, and SRv6 enabling flexible, programmable connectivity, the platform features high security, full visualization, and elastic scalability. Thanks to comprehensive upgrades from 10GE to 100GE in the IP metro network and from 100GE to 400GE in the core network, enterprise users now enjoy a dramatically improved network experience.

FiberStar has been driving digital and intelligent transformation across industries using this solution.

For retail chains, SD-WAN enables rapid service provisioning no matter which island a store is on, while allowing the headquarters to centrally manage everything and flexibly allocate bandwidth. This has resulted in incredible reductions in network deployment and O&M costs.

For financial institutions, the SD-WAN solution ensures smooth data communication between branches and data centers, providing digital banking services that are responsive, secure, and reliable.

For small- and medium-sized enterprises, iMaster NCE-Campus provides a network digital map that, combined with SRv6, enables rapid service provisioning within minutes. This allows businesses to dynamically adjust bandwidth and policies for efficient operations at low costs.

In addition, FiberStar has deeply integrated its open architecture with Huawei's SD-WAN, powering efficient collaboration with telecom operators, cloud service providers, and Internet companies. Together, they provide enterprise customers with one-stop solutions for data communication, cloud access, and collaborative office services. To date, the collaboration has empowered more than 500 financial institutions and over 1,000 retail companies in Indonesia to upgrade their operations into digital and intelligent models, laying a solid network foundation that fuels the nation's digital economy.

Gigabit Home Broadband: Fast, Stable, Inclusive Connectivity for a Digital Life

On top of its optical backbone network, FiberStar introduced Huawei's Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) solution to reshape home broadband experiences, turning the vision of fast, stable, and inclusive connectivity into reality. Leveraging FTTH features like all-optical connectivity, high bandwidth, and low latency, FiberStar brings gigabit speeds to every household, enabling families to load High-Definition (HD) content in seconds and enjoy smooth cloud gaming without interruptions or delays.

Thanks to Huawei's technical support, FiberStar has been able to extend its FTTH network faster and deeper into remote areas, efficiently connecting rural families to high-speed optical networks and giving them the same access to online education, entertainment, and other digital services as those in cities.

Looking Ahead: Paving the Way for AI

Indonesia's digital transformation is advancing at an astonishing pace, driving exponential growth in bandwidth demand. Through its partnership with Huawei, FiberStar has established a submarine-terrestrial integrated network that delivers stable, fast, agile, and intelligent connectivity to support enterprise digitalization and the widespread application of smart home technologies.

"This collaboration gives us the confidence to connect thousands of islands, empower millions of people, and build a digitally connected Indonesia, paving the way for a brighter and smarter future," said Sugiharto Darmakusuma, President Director of FiberStar.

With continued investment in backbone and data center networks, the two partners are set to expand coverage, introduce cutting-edge technologies, and unlock new service scenarios. Together, they are building a more intelligent and resilient network system that will narrow the digital divide and light up every corner for a digital Indonesia.