China's Zhejiang Telecom Selects Alcatel for Metro Optical

Zhejiang Telecom, a subsidiary of China Telecom, selected Alcatel Shanghai Bell to supply 10 Gbps optical metro transport networks in the provincial cities of Wenzhou and Jiaxin, in eastern China. The equipment will be used for enterprise Ethernet services, particularly in vertical markets such as the financial sector. The deployment, which includes Alcatel's next-generation data-aware SDH Optical Multi-Service Node systems, is expected to be completed in September 2004. http://www.alcatel.com

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Amedia Expands its FTTP Licensing Agreement with Lucent

Amedia Networks, formerly TTR Technologies, has expanded its technology licensing agreement with Lucent Technologies concerning active Ethernet-based FTTP access solutions. Lucent has also delivered to Amedia Networks several Bell Labs-developed technology designs for Amedia Networks PG1000 (Premises Gateway) and the AS5000 (Aggregator Switch).



In support of this ongoing strategy, Amedia Networks has entered into a supplemental agreement with Lucent, who will provide additional technology designs for further product enhancements for the PG1000 and AS5000. This work is expected to be completed by the fourth quarter of 2004. http://www.amedianetworks.com

• In June 2004, Amedia Networks, formerly TTR Technologies, unveiled an active Ethernet-based Fiber-to-the-Premises (FTTP) access solution. The company's Ethernet Switched Optical Network (ESON) technology, which was licensed from and jointly developed with Lucent Bell Labs, provides QoS mechanisms for delivering triple play services at up to 100 Mbps bandwidth per subscriber. The Amedia portfolio includes:
  
  
  
  The PG1000 Premises Gateway: customer premises equipment located at the subscriber's home or business to enable ultra-broadband high QoS access, wirelessly or using traditional wiring.
  
  
  The AS5000 Aggregation Switch: a hardened distribution switch located between the Central Office/Head End and the end-user location.
  The CS1200: Core Switch: an Ethernet and MPLS switch located at the Central Office/Head End of the service provider network.
  
  
  The Director: a simple network management protocol (SNMP) based full fault, configuration, accounting, provisioning and security (FCAPS) Network Management System proving remote, end-to-end single person network operations

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Sprint Expands Wholesale VoIP Initiatives with Cable Operators

USA Companies, a cable and Internet service provider based in Nebraska, awarded a 5-year contract to Sprint to provide voice services to its subscribers in California, Montana and Nebraska. Using the Sprint services, USA Companies can now offer VoIP service to the 62,000 consumers in its territories. Financial terms were not disclosed.



Sprint said the agreement marks its continued expansion into partnerships with cable providers. Sprint offers wholesale telecom services to domestic cable operators making it possible for them to broaden their bundled consumer offerings to include voice telephony solutions, data services over Sprint's Tier 1 Internet backbone and advanced wireless services.



"Sprint's network, scale and expertise allow cable companies to get to market sooner than they would if they launched voice services on their own and avoid the expense of building a stand-alone infrastructure, said Ralph Hodge, senior vice president -- Cable Solutions, Sprint. http://www.sprint.com

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DIRECTV to Acquire Pegasus Satellite, Targeting Rural America

The DIRECTV Group will pay $875 million in cash for the primary direct broadcast satellite assets of Pegasus Satellite Television, including rights to all DIRECTV subscribers activated through Pegasus. Pegasus provides DIRECTV programming to rural areas in 41 states nationwide. DIRECTV expects to complete the migration of Pegasus customers to DIRECTV within 30 to 45 days thereafter. Pegasus had approximately 1.08 million customers as of June 1, 2004. http://www.directv.com

• Pegasus filed a voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition in June 2004.

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Mirage Networks Secures $13M for Network Security

Mirage Networks, a start-up based in Austin, Texas, closed $13 million in its Series B round of funding for its security solutions for "Interior Network Defense." Mirage Networks offers an Inverted Firewall appliance designed specifically to protect internal networks. The out-of-band appliance identifies, slows and isolates malicious traffic without interrupting normal business communications. The company has applied for seven patents around its unique out-of-band threat detection, attack intervention and mitigation technologies.



The new funding was led by Trinity Ventures. Current investors Adams Capital Management and CenterPoint Ventures also participated in the round. http://www.miragenetworks.com

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Cox Enterprises Bids to Privatize its Cable Operations

Cox Enterprises announced a $7.9 billion bid for the 38% it doesn't already own in Cox Communications, the third largest cable operator in the U.S. The bid represented a 16% premium over the closing price for Cox Communications on 30-July-2004.



The company said a private corporate structure would provide it with greater flexibility given the increasingly competitive nature of the cable business.



Citigroup Global Markets and Lehman Brothers, Inc. are serving as CEI's financial advisors in the transaction and have committed to provide $7.9 billion to fund the tender offer and merger, as well as related fees and expenses, under a $10 billion total funding commitment.



Cox Enterprises is one of the nation's leading diversified media companies. http://www.coxenterprises.comhttp://www.cox.com

• As of the end of Q2 2004, Cox had approximately 6.6 million total customer relationships, including 6.3 million basic video customers, 2.3 million digital cable customers, 1.1 million circuit-switched cable telephony customers, and 2.2 million high-speed Internet customers.

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Pakistan's Warid Telecom Selects Nortel Networks VoIP

Warid Telecom awarded a four year contract to Nortel Networks to build a next generation VoIP network in Pakistan. Specifically, Warid Telecom will deploy Nortel Networks VoIP Long Distance Solution, which includes Nortel Networks Succession Communication Server (CS) 2000-Compact and Nortel Networks Passport Packet Voice Gateway (PVG), to deliver full-featured, carrier-grade telephony and data services.



The network will be based on two Nortel Networks Succession Communication Server (CS) 2000-Compact superclass softswitches, 15 Passport PVGs -- including one in the United Kingdom to serve as Warid's first international POP (point of presence) gateway -- and a Nortel Networks Periphonics Pre-paid Services Platform to provide a pre-paid calling solution capable of supporting unique value added services. Financial terms were not disclosed. http://www.nortelnetworks.com

• Warid Telecom is privately owned company backed by a group of UAE based investors. Recently, Warid Telecom was awarded a license to launch a new GSM mobile telephone service in Pakistan, and is currently bidding for a domestic local loop (LL) licenses besides LDI.

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Pronto and Tropos Partner for Metro-Scale Wi-Fi

Pronto Networks and Tropos Networks announced a strategic partnership aimed at metro scale Wi-Fi hot zone deployments. The joint solution enables Wi-Fi system integrators to quickly deploy large scale Wi-Fi hot zones, enabling subscriber management, multiple service plans and authentication methods for different types of users in the hot zone. The solution consists of Pronto's carrier-grade Operations Support System (OSS) Tropos Networks' Wi-Fi mesh technology.



The two companies have enabled metro-scale broadband service in two municipalities to date: Chaska, MN and Cerritos, CA. http://www.prontonetworks.comhttp://www.tropos.com

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CommPartners Outlines Super-POP VoIP Architecture

CommPartners, which describes itself as a "next-generation VoIP Facilitator," announced its plans for a proprietary network for the transport of VoIP calls across the U.S. Currently, CommPartners' offers an "NFL city footprint" to its hosted VoIP customers. The company is deploying a "Super POP" network architecture with four strategically placed nodes containing routers, softswitching equipment, and session border controllers. The Company has chosen technology vendors Telica and BroadSoft to provide Class 4/5 switching and routing as well as advanced VoIP applications such as IP Centrex, hosted PBX and Conferencing. The Company also operates a Syndeo Syion softswitch that is PacketCable-compliant for the cable market. Acme Packet has been chosen to provide the session border control functionality in the network.



CommPartners will utilize Internap to carry its VoIP traffic between broadband end-users and CommPartners' Super POPs, where the determination is made as to whether to convert into traditional voice protocol or remain in VoIP format for delivery to the called party.



Because of Internap's multi-homed architecture, CommPartners said it has been able to engineer its network to avoid traversing public Internet peering points, which are inherent "log jams," placing traffic to the CommPartners network only one hop away from every major Internet backbone carrier. This proximity will eliminate the majority of the latency and jitter associated with calls moving across the public Internet.



By mid-2005, CommPartners will cover substantially all tier-1 through tier-4 population centers in the country, including Alaska and Hawaii, enabling access to over 8,500 local calling rate centers across the country. The company is filing for CLEC status in all fifty states. http://www.commpartners.us

• CommPartners is based in Las Vegas. The company is headed by David Clark, who previously served as an early member of the MGC Communications executive team (the predecessor to Mpower Communications).

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Siemens Mobile Adds BlackBerry Functionality

Siemens introduced its first mobile phone with full BlackBerry functionality. The new tri-band SK 65 offers e-mail management in combination with either MS Outlook or Lotus Notes through BlackBerry. The keyboard can be twisted out into a cross-like form so that the user can type on each side of the display.



Lothar Pauly, CEO of Siemens' new Communications Group, which will begin operating on October 1, said the new device is indicative of "the new trend of convergence between what have up until now been separate network and access technologies."http://www.siemens.com

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Eurotel Launches CDMA 450 EV-DO Network in Czech Republic

EURtel Praha, the largest provider of wireless voice and data services in the Czech Republic, has launched the industry's first CDMA2000 1xEV-DO network operating in the 450 MHz radio spectrum. The network, which was deployed across the Czech Republic in four months, offers advanced data services for broadband Internet access under the umbrella of "EURtel Data Express." The company is targeting both residential and selected business customers. Nortel Networks supplied the CDMA 450 equipment. CDMA 450 is a standard for use in countries transitioning to digital wireless service from Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT) 450 analogue service, and in countries advocating universal access for voice and data. Financial terms were not disclosed. http://www.nortelnetworks.com

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SANRAD Secures $8 Million for iSCSI

SANRAD, a start-up developing and delivering intelligent iSCSI IP SAN solutions, closed a funding round of $8 million with Sequoia Capital as the principal investor. Also participating in this latest round of funding is the RAD Group, which previously led two private series with the company. SANRAD's will use the funding to expand sales, marketing and support efforts worldwide. SANRAD will also use a portion of the funds to open its worldwide headquarters in California's Silicon Valley.



SANRAD said its iSCSI V-Switch 2000 enables simplified SAN deployment while allowing departments and mid-sized businesses to use existing storage resources as shared storage on the iSCSI SAN. http://www.sanrad.com

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BT Selects Alvarion's Broadband Wireless Equipment

BT successfully completed its Radio Broadband trial using Alvarion's broadband wireless access technology and is moving ahead with commercial deployment. An initial order has already been placed by BT for equipment to be deployed at sites in Northern Ireland. Financial terms were not disclosed.



BT has previously announced its intention to provide 100% broadband coverage in Northern Ireland by December 2005. Radio Broadband will be an integral part of this total coverage solution. The companies said radio broadband would play a key part in addressing those 565 exchanges across the UK where ADSL is not commercially viable. http://www.bt.comhttp://www.alvarion.com

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Microsoft Extends Pact with Thomson on MSN Set-tops

Microsoft and Thomson are developing a broadband home-network-enabled version of Microsoft's MSN TV Internet receiver. The new system is a complete overhaul of the existing device and service based on Microsoft technologies and incorporates new advanced technology from Thomson. The product will be available through major retailers in time for the 2004 holiday shopping season. http://www.msntv.com/http://www.thomson.net

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SupportSoft Introduces ServiceVerify for Broadband Operators

SupportSoft introduced a new software solution that enables digital service providers to automatically verify the successful installation and activation of VoIP, video over DSL and high-speed data service to homes or small businesses. SupportSoft's ServiceVerify software solution provides automated confirmation that services are live and operational. The software also reduces unnecessary service provider truck-rolls to the customer's premises by putting service automation technology and best practice resolutions at the fingertips of customer service representatives (CSRs) within the call center, as well as dispatchers and technicians in the field. Customer-facing personnel can receive and act on diagnostics information from a number of key data sources -- spanning from the customer premises equipment (CPE) to the network -- via a PC or handheld device. The software can pinpoint potential problems, whether with wiring, VoIP hardware (MTAs) and high-speed data modems for either cable or DSL. http://www.support.com/

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EarthLink Increases Use of Level 3 Colocation Space

EarthLink has purchased additional colocation services from Level 3 Communications. The new agreement significantly expands the amount of colocation space that EarthLink occupies in multiple Level 3 facilities throughout the U.S. EarthLink, which has more than five million subscribers, purchased approximately 2,400 square feet of (3)Center Colocation space, where EarthLink will install its own servers and other network equipment. In addition to colocation services, Level 3 supplies EarthLink with managed modem, private line, wavelength and high-speed Internet access services.



Level 3 operates more than 70 data centers across the United States and Europe. http://www.level3.com/

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Motorola Completes Acquisition of Force Computers

Motorola completed its acquisition of Force Computers from Solectron Corporation. Force employees worldwide will be integrated with the Motorola Computer Group, and the two combined entities have been renamed the Embedded Communications Computing Group. Both Force and Motorola are global providers of embedded computing systems for original equipment manufacturers. Motorola is not disclosing the terms of the agreement.



Wendy Vittori, corporate vice president and general manager of Motorola's Embedded Communications Computing Group, said the acquisition supports Motorola's Seamless Mobility strategy, which encompasses connections and communications in the home, work, auto and out in the world. The Embedded Communications Computing Group workforce that has been part of Motorola consists of about 1,000 employees worldwide. It is headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, with major operations in Southborough, Mass.; Loughborough, UK; Hyderabad, India; and Shanghai, China.



The Embedded Communications Computing Group workforce that was previously with Force consists of about 500 employees worldwide, with major operations in Fremont, California, Munich, Germany; Bangalore, India; and Irvine, Scotland. http://www.motorola.com/computer

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Chelsio Offers 10GigE NIC Priced at $1,995

Chelsio Communications, a start-up based in Sunnyvale, California, introduced a 10 Gbps Ethernet NIC priced at $1,995. The new half-size PCI-X card is a streamlined version of Chelsio's T110 host bus adapter, which achieves high-performance and low-latency by providing protocol off-load in silicon. Chelsio also leverages a VLIW (very long instruction word) "Terminator" ASIC that can handle more than one million concurrent sessions, enabling the T110 cards to support up to 64,000 simultaneous connections.



Chelsio said that in comparative performance testing verified by independent testing lab VeriTest, the testing division of Lionbridge, its N110 and T110 consistently delivered higher throughput (up to 52%) and lower latency (as low as 31%) of comparable adapters from Intel and S2io Inc.



The T110, with TCP and iSCSI offload, serves CPU-intensive applications while the N110 is designed strictly for applications that require raw performance capabilities. Both devices will be showcased this week at the LinuxWorld conference and exposition in San Francisco. http://www.chelsio.com

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