Cisco Introduces New Catalyst Switches for Access and Aggregation

Cisco Systems introduced new versions of its Catalyst 3750 and Catalyst 2970 switch families aimed at access and aggregation applications.

• The new Catalyst 3750G-12S switch offers 12 SFP Gigabit ports and delivers 32 Gbps of performance. It also features Cisco's StackWise technology. List price is $7,995.


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  The new Catalyst 2970G-24TS Series switch is aimed at small and medium businesses and enterprise branch offices. It features 24 10/100/1000 ports and four small form-factor pluggable (SFP) uplinks. List price is $5,495

To date, Cisco has shipped more than one million Gigabit Ethernet ports to its Catalyst switching customers.
http://www.cisco.com

• In April 2003, Cisco Systems introduced a new stackable switch platform featuring greater resiliency and Gigabit Ethernet performance. The Cisco Catalyst 3750 Series uses a new “Cisco StackWise�? architecture that provides a 32 Gbps stack interconnect for unifying up to nine individual switches. The interconnected switches behave as a single, logical, convergence-optimized unit. The Catalyst 3750 provides stackable resiliency through advanced failover in hardware and software; unified services with distributed forwarding and QoS; automated configuration; performance to handle Gigabit Ethernet connectivity; and IPv6 readiness in hardware.

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Optical Solutions Launches BPON and GPON Compliant FTTP

Optical Solutions introduced a new FiberPath 500 fiber to the premises (FTTP) system that uses either BPON (ITU G.983, 622 Mbps downstream/155 Mbps upstream) or GPON (ITU G.984, 1.2 Gbps downstream/622 Mbps upstream) standards. The network protocol is software selectable.


Optical Solutions' FiberPath 500 architecture is based on a central office (CO) FiberDrive Optical Line Terminal (OLT), and features an integrated GR-303/TR-08 voice gateway for interface directly to all the commonly deployed Class 5 switches. The FiberDrive OLT has an aggregate capacity exceeding 9 Gbps. A passive optical network (PON) is used to drive the FiberPoint Optical Network Terminal (ONT) unit installed at the subscriber's residence or business.


Optical Solutions is offering five different versions of its customer premise device, the FiberPath 500 ONT. The line-up offers a choice of either two or four POTS lines, one 10/100 BaseT port and 1 CATV port. All models support switched digital video services, while two of the models support RF video overlay services. Using a standard FSAN single-fiber network design, the FiberPath 500 fully supports RF video deployments including those with RF return set top boxes. RF performance exceeds 48 dB carrier-to-noise ratio at 20 kilometers/12 miles on a fully loaded PON.


A business version of the FiberPoint ONT provides 20 POTS lines, 4 10/100 BaseT Ethernet, 8 T1s and 4 CATV ports. All ONT models are powered by 120 volt, 60 Hz AC power via an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS). They also provide battery backup for 8 hours after disruption of local AC power. Battery charge and end-of-life are monitored and reported through the FiberPoint ONT to the management system.
http://www.opticalsolutions.com

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Mexico's Avantel Selects Alcatel's Softswitch Solution

Avantel, an independent Mexican telecom carrier owned by Grupo Financiero Banamex and MCI, selected the Alcatel 5020 NGN Softswitch solution, the Alcatel 7505 Media Gateway and Alcatel's network management to enhance its current IP network. The equipment will be used for new IP telephony, video telephony, IP Centrex, voice VPN and other such premium services. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.alcatel.com

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Loral Confirms EchoStar Acquisition Offer

EchoStar Communications has submitted a bid to acquire Loral's six North American satellites, as well as the balance of Loral's FSS fleet and its satellite manufacturing assets. In a press statement, Loral confirmed that it had received the EchoStar offer and that it would evaluate the bid consistent with the procedures of the U.S. bankruptcy court overseeing its Chapter 11 proceedings.
http://www.loral.com

• In July, Loral Space & Communications and certain of its subsidiaries filed voluntary Chapter 11 petitions. In a related transaction, Loral agreed to sell six satellites and the rights to their orbital locations to Intelsat for up to $1 billion. Intelsat said the proposed acquisition of the Loral assets would complement the Intelsat global network, which includes capacity on 26 satellites. The Loral satellites would add complete coverage of the North American market and increase Intelsat's customer base in the cable television and broadcasting segments. Of the six satellites to be purchased, four are operational, serving cable television, broadcast and private data network customers in North America. Two satellites are currently under construction and are scheduled to be launched into North American orbital locations in the coming year. Intelsat would assume responsibility for launch and insurance-related costs for one of the satellites currently under construction and would make a $100 million secured down payment on a future satellite to be built by Space Systems/Loral to Intelsat's specifications.

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Lucent Awarded $80 Million CDMA2000 1xEV-DO Contract in Korea

KTF, a leading Korean wireless service provider with over ten million subscribers, awarded a US$80 million contract to Lucent Technologies to supply a 1xEV-DO network that will cover Korea's second largest metropolitan area, Busan, and most of Kyungnam province including Ulsan city. This network will enable KTF to offer enhanced voice services and super-fast data services to businesses and consumers at speeds of up to 2.4 Mbps. Under the contract, Lucent will provide Flexent Modular Cell 4.0 base stations, mobile switching centers and related software. Additionally, Lucent Worldwide Services will provide a variety of professional services such as installation, integration and system quality assurance to KTF.
http://www.lucent.com

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TeliaSonera Deploys BroadVision Customer Support Portal

TeliaSonera is using BroadVision's commerce solution to provide personalized sales, marketing, service and support to its customers. BroadVision's portal helps reduce call center customer support costs. BroadVision claims 40 other telco service provider customers.
http://www.broadvision.com

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Aegis Announces Multi-Cavity Tunable Thin Film Filter Chip

Aegis Semiconductor announced a low-cost, multi-cavity tunable thin film filter chip that could be used in reconfigurable networks. The filter, tunable over the 35 nm of the C-band, was built using the Active Thin Films technology platform developed by Aegis -- a platform that enables the manufacturing of tunable components at the size, reliability, and price of passive components. Aegis predicts that equipment vendors will be able to use the technology to build a reconfiguarable, optical add/drop multiplexer (ROADM) at a price similar to that of a fixed OADM.
http://www.aegis-semi.com

• In March 2003, Aegis announced the first product in its Active Thin Films platform -- the 'mosquito' Optical Channel Monitor (OCM). The device comes from application of a single cavity, Fabry-Perot, Active Thin Films filter stack.

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Sage Telecom, a CLEC, Reaches 500,000 UNE-P Residential Lines

Sage Telecom, a CLEC based in Allen, Texas, surpassed the milestone of 500,000 access lines in service. Sage is focused entirely on the residential and small business market in rural and suburban communities outside major metropolitan areas. Sage provisions service through a combination of proprietary operations support systems (OSS), electronic data interfaces (EDI bonding) and unbundled network elements (UNEs). The CLEC, which is privately-held, said it is profitable.
http://www.sagetelecom.net

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Level 3 to Sell Midwest Fiber to CenturyTel

Level 3 Communications agreed to sell the Midwest Fiber Optic Network (MFON), a regional communications system it acquired through its recent transaction with Genuity, to CenturyTel. MFONserves as a regional backbone for a number of carriers, including CenturyTel itself, in Arkansas, Missouri and Illinois. The purchase price is approximately $17 million in cash. Level 3 said there was no practical way to integrate the MFON operations into the Level 3 network.


CenturyTel ranks as the 8th largest local exchange telephone company in the U.S. based on access lines. It currently serves 3 million customers in 22 states.
http://www.level3.com
http://www.centurytel.com

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Paradyne Receives Spectral Approval for ReachDSL in Japan

Paradyne Networks' ReachDSL system received classification by the Telecommunication Technology Committee (TTC) in Japan for the JJ100 Spectrum Management Specification. Paradyne's ReachDSL is designed for long or impaired copper loops. The TTC's classification of ReachDSL for deployments will allow Paradyne's Japanese service provider customers to continue their deployment of ReachDSL V2 implementations. Paradyne said its ReachDSL is already in use with multiple service providers in Japan, including Softbank BB with its Yahoo! BB service. The company has shipped over 240 thousand ports of its ReachDSL solution to Japan.
http://www.paradyne.com
http://www.ttc.or.jp

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TRICOM Replaces Existing DSLAMs with AFC's Telliant

TRICOM, the Dominican Republic's largest alternative full-service provider, has replaced several of its existing central office DSLAMs with Advanced Fibre Communications' (AFC's) Telliant platform. TRICOM said the upgrade to the Telliant platform enabled it to alleviate traffic congestion caused by the rapid growth of DSL services in Santo Domingo. Beyond the initial deployment, TRICOM can migrate additional data traffic onto its Telliant systems, as well as move IP capabilities into the central office -- closer to their subscribers. Specifically, the Telliant platform provides B-RAS (broadband remote access server) functionality that could be used to offload subscriber terminations from existing subscriber management systems, preparing TRICOM's network for evolution to new IP-based services, such as video over broadband, gaming and VPNs. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.afc.com
http://www.tricom.net

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General Bandwidth Provides Voice Services in FTTP Network

Dalton Utilities, a public utility serving small cities in the state of Georgia, selected General Bandwidth's G6 platform to deliver full feature voice services over their new Fiber to the Premises (FTTP) network. Dalton Utilities' OptiLink service delivers voice, video and high-speed data over an all-fiber access network. Financial terms were not disclosed. The General Bandwidth G6 platform is a carrier class, VoATM and VoIP access/media gateway supporting multiple signaling protocols such as GR-303/TR-08, TGCP/MGCP and SIP/PRI.
http://www.genband.com

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ECtel Receives Order for its Packet Data Legal Intercept Solution

ECtel announced that a major U.S. carrier has ordered its new lawful interception solution for packet data networks. ECtel did not disclosed the carrier's name, but said the contract was a strategic win.
http://www.ectel.com

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Bell Canada, BellSouth, SBC and Verizon Support DSLHome Iniative

Bell Canada, BellSouth, SBC Communications and Verizon announced their support for the DSLHome initiative, an industry effort to spur the adoption of DSL-based home networks that will deliver advanced voice, video and data services. The DSLHome initiative, which is being led by the DSL Forum, aims to provide an industry accepted networking architecture that will support fast, reliable and secure connections to the Web and/or virtual private networks by multiple users inside the home. Bell Canada, BellSouth, SBC and Verizon will work with global service providers, vendors and other prominent organizations to share best practices and infrastructure requirements to meet the home networking challenge. The four carriers will present a proposal for a home networking architecture at the upcoming DSL Forum meeting in Boston (September 2-5, 2003). In Q1 2004, the companies also will present a joint contribution defining ADSL Residential Gateway requirements.
http://www.dslforum.org

• In June 2003, The DSL Forum launched a new initiative aimed at extending broadband services past DSL modems and into other devices inside the home. The aim of the new DSLHome initiative is to create an architecture that extends QoS and management requirements into a home network for supporting multimedia applications. Key requirements include simultaneous multi-user, multi-destination support; bandwidth options to suit various usage requirements, specific service levels for video, voice, music and gaming applications; security; and a choice of CPE with simplified installation. The DSLHome initiative has two components: new technical work and market promotion. The new technical work includes: 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  • LAN side DSL customer premise equipment (CPE) configuration specifications 
  
  
  • Dual port router requirements 
  
  
  • WAN-side DSL CPE management specifications 
  
  
  • Interface & System configuration for ADSL on customer premises 
  
  
  • Privacy and Protection Security 
  
  
  • Technical documents are currently circulating among DSL Forum members. In addition to this technical work, the DSL Forum will be launching programs to improve users' knowledge of DSL powered home networks. The first outcome of this effort is a pair of home networking user guides, currently under development and scheduled to be released in Q4 2003. 
  
  
  • Other supporters of the DSLHome initiative include the Wi-Fi Alliance, the HomePlug Association, the Home Phoneline Networking Alliance (HomePNA), the BCD Forum, the Consumer Electronics Association and others.
  
  
  
  

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DIRECTV Takes Top Ranking in J.D. Power Customer Satisfaction

For the second consecutive year, DIRECTV ranked "#1 in Customer Satisfaction Among Satellite/Cable TV Subscribers" according to J.D. Power and Associates. DIRECTV received a customer satisfaction score of 118, while the average for cable television providers was 94.
http://www.DIRECTV.com

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Spirent Communications Rolls out 10 New Products

Spirent Communications rolled out a host of new products, upgrades and enhancements for its performance analysis platforms. Among these are the following:

• For broadband access, a new PPPoX Emulation capability for RPT lets uses define 32,000 subscribers on a single AX/4000 port or 256,000 subscribers on a single chassis. Users also can emulate real-world traffic loads as subscribers log-in and log-out as well as test session capacity and rates to determine the performance limits of an aggregation device.


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  Also for broadband access, a new SmartBits TeraMetrics ATM Interface module enables testing of next generation DSLAM, metro edge and core router solutions. The new ATM module supports hundreds of routing sessions, more than 8,000 virtual circuits per port and two ports per module.


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  For enterprise security, the Avalanche/SmartBits Layer 2-7 performance analysis platform now supports testing for distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks inline with real multi-protocol traffic and significantly increases Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) performance. The upgrade also provides increased media streaming performance.


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  For IP Telephony testing, a new upgrade for Spirent's Abacus platform provides enhanced user flexibility and functionality for testing TDM and VoIP. The new release also adds fax bypass capabilities to facilitate testing of Fax over IP applications.


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  For router testing using Spirent's AX/4000, new capabilities have been added for evaluating complex Layer 2 and Layer 3 MPLS VPN PE router implementations. The release includes three sub-applications, one for each of the major MPLS VPN technologies (2547, Martini & VPLS).


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  A new software tool enables all Spirent SmartBits users to develop tests over multiple protocols including ATM, Multicast, MPLS and IPv6. In addition to an Application Programming Interface (API), a Script Automation Interface (SAI) allows non-programmers to automate testing using the SmartBits.

http://www.spirentcom.com

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LSI Logic Offers New HomeBASE ADSL Chipset

LSI Logic announced enhancements to its line of HomeBASE ADSL Ethernet chipsets for the customer premise equipment (CPE) market. The new offering features LSI Logic's fifth-generation SpeedREACH ADSL analog front-end (AFE), a network processor with glueless interface to 802.11 WLAN and a combination USB/Ethernet 10/100 PHY chip that supports the simultaneous operation of both functions. The three chips are incorporated into a HomeBASE modem that is available as a manufacturing kit to CPE manufacturers. LSI Logic's HomeBASE solution includes all the hardware and software needed for bridge, router or access point mode operations.
http://www.lsilogic.com

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