World Wide Packets has received approval from the Rural Utilities Service. 

The technical acceptance, granted by the United States Department of Agriculture, authorizes independent telephone and utility companies to purchase World Wide Packets equipment with the assistance of funds from RUS grants and loans which, for many service providers, improves ROI possibilities.

WWP is a maker of Active Ethernet gear for access deployments. Would there be a market for Active Ethernet from rural telco’s, a market which Optical Solutions dominates with GPON gear?  PON would seem to have a natural advantage for a highly dispersed deployment while Active Ethernet would seem to do well in high density deployments.