Orange Business Services Offers International Ethernet Link

Orange Business Services launched International Ethernet Link, a new network solution available in 14 countries and intended for businesses with international subsidiaries and for multinational companies.



International Ethernet Link is now available in three continents:

• Europe: France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, the United Kingdom, Italy and Spain



• North America: the United States



• Asia-Pacific: Australia, Hong Kong and Singapore.

International Ethernet Link comes as an addition to the worldwide IP VPN MPLS service of Orange Business Services and its Small Office Solutions and Ethernet Access services. Small Office Solutions is intended for branches and outlets of businesses equipped with DSL, while Ethernet Access targets large multinational sites equipped with fiber optics.



International Ethernet Link's worldwide coverage will be expanded to Nordics countries, Eastern Europe (Poland in particular), Turkey, India and Japan in 2008.

http://www.orange-business.com

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RCN Enters indefeasible right of use (IRU) Deal with Verizon

U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan has approved the Department of Justice's 2005 Verizon/MCI merger consent decree, giving the go-ahead for iRCN Business Solutions to begin a ten-year indefeasible right of use (IRU) agreement with Verizon.



RCN Business Solutions, a transport, Internet, bulk video and voice service provider to the carrier and enterprise business communities, will increase its fiber footprint in the Greater Boston Area, as well expand into the Portland, ME and Richmond, VA markets.



In the Greater Boston Area, RCN will offer its Ethernet service (1.5 Mbps up to 10 Gbps), voice/video/data packages, Sonet, and dedicated IP internet access to tenants in commercial Boston buildings where service was previously unavailable. In the Portland and Richmond markets, RCN will provide its IP service as well as Ethernet and Sonet transport services. These additional markets will tie back into the existing RCN Washington, D.C. and Boston networks, respectively, with bandwidth provided by Verizon.

http://www.rcn.com

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Information/Communication Drives 50% of EU growth

Public and private information and communication technology (ICT) continues to grow faster than Europe's overall economy, and contributed nearly 50% of EU productivity growth between 2000 and 2004. Software and IT services are currently the most dynamic growth area (5.9% for 2006-2007).



The European Commission's annual progress report on i2010 shows that Europeans are quickly embracing new online services. This is supported by a record number of new broadband connections: 20.1 million new broadband lines, connected in the year to October 2006, with high broadband penetration rates in The Netherlands (30%) and the Nordic Countries (25-29%). The online content market is forecast to grow rapidly for the next five years, as already seen with the explosive growth of online music sales and user-created content.



At a national level, the report reveals that Italy leads in 3G mobile phone and fibre development while the most households with digital TV are in the UK. Six countries -- Denmark, The Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, the UK and Belgium -- all have higher broadband penetration rates than the US and Japan. Such broadband penetration levels have positive knock-on effects. For example ICT-deployment in Danish schools is the highest in the Europe, and Danish businesses are the EU's most advanced Internet and eBusiness users; the British and Swedish workforce are the most skilled in ICT; the Dutch are the most avid consumers of games and music online; and Finland has Europe's highest use of public access points and invests the most in ICT research (64.3% of its R&D business expenditure) -- Sweden and Finland also spend 3.9% and 3.5% of their GDP on research, this being over the EU's 3% target.

http://www.europa.eu

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Australia's PowerTel Installs Nortel's Common Photonic Layer

Australia's PowerTel has deployed a 400 Gbps long-haul and metro network using Nortel's Optical Multiservice Edge 6500 and Optical Metro 5200 platforms. The newly deployed optical network will consolidate PowerTel's east coast infrastructure between Melbourne, Canberra, Sydney and Brisbane. Financial terms were not disclosed.



PowerTel is basing the network Nortel's Common Photonic Layer (CPL) technology, which delivers optical network intelligence through software monitoring and self optimization. Along with CPL, the long-haul and metro DWDM solution comprises Nortel's Optical Multiservice Edge 6500 platform, providing PowerTel with intelligent electronic dispersion compensation (eDCO). Nortel said this technology enables service providers and cable operators to deploy systems that span in excess of 2,000 kilometers while eliminating the need for additional signal amplification. The combination of CPL and eDCO allows PowerTel to consolidate multiple legacy long-haul systems onto a single platform and increase its available network capacity up to 400 Gbps between capital cities.



PowerTel will also deploy Nortel's Optical Metro 5200 in the Sydney Central Business District to provide a high capacity metro optical core for a range of business critical services.

http://www.nortel.com

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Hibernia Atlantic Adds POPs in Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Brussels and Paris

Hibernia Atlantic, which operates a high-capacity, undersea cable system linking North America and Europe, has established network Points of Presence (PoPs) in the following locations: TelecityRedbus in Amsterdam, Tollaan 994 St. Stevans in Brussels, Paris Telehouse II, and Interxion in Frankfurt. These new PoPs are in addition to Hibernia Atlantic's existing network presence in the U.S., Canada, Ireland and the UK. The total cable length now owned and operated by Hibernia Atlantic is 24,520 kilometers; in comparison, this length is almost two and a half times the circumference of the moon.


HTTP://www.hiberniaatlantic.com

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Turkcell Selects Ericsson for Expansion

Turkcell, which is Turkey's leading operator with over 32 million subscribers, selected Ericsson to expand its network. Turkcell currently operates more than 12,000 base stations, and provides network coverage to 97.2 percent of the nation's population. Ericsson has been a long-term supplier to Turkcell. Financial terms were not disclosed.

http://www.ericsson.com

http://www.turkcell.com.tr

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BigBand Supplies Systems for China's Xiamen CATC

Xiamen CATV, which serves more than 400,000 subscribers in southeastern China's Fujian province, is using BigBand Networks' Cuda cable modem termination system (CMTS) and FastFlow Broadband Provisioning Management software to deliver high-speed data and IP video.



BigBand said Xiamen selected Cuda in part for its support for key Ethernet functions--such as virtual local area networks (VLAN) and point-to-point protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE)--that are designed to allow the CMTS to interoperate with the Fujian operator's other network equipment. The operator added BigBand's FastFlow software to configure its IP services for multiple subscriber profiles and devices.



BigBand also noted that t six Chinese cable operators are deploying the company's Broadband Multimedia Services Router (BMR) to process and deliver digital video. The operators are Wuxi Cable TV and Changshu Cable TV in Jiangsu province; Jieyang Cable TV and Qingyuan Cable TV in Guangdong province; and Hefei Cable TV and Huaibei Cable TV in Anhui province.

http://www.bigbandnet.com

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Siemens Networks to Resell Nominum's IP Routing Directory

Siemens Networks will resell Nominum's Navitas as part of the Siemens VoIP and IMS solutions. The joint solution combines the strengths of Siemens SURPASS hiQ 8000 soft switches and the CFX-5000 Multimedia Session Controllers with Nominum's Navitas ENUM-based IP-application Routing Directory (IPRD).



VoIP Peering allows Voice over Internet Protocol traffic to travel over an all IP network by inter-connecting separate VoIP islands. Converged architectures are required to deliver high quality, low cost advanced services over all-IP networks as well as increase the speed and flexibility of deployments.



The companies said their combined solution fills an essential role in emerging VoIP peering architectures and IMS and delivers an all-IP end-to-end environment with high performance, low latency and lower operating expenses for communication providers.

http://www.nominum.com

http://www.siemens.com/networks

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Motorola Completes Tut Systems Acquisition for $39 Million

Motorola completed its acquisition of Tut Systems for approximately $39 million on a fully diluted basis.



Tut Systems provides carrier-class end-to-end digital video encoding, processing and distribution products. Their solutions support MPEG-2 and MPEG- 4 AVC video compression, local ad insertion, forward error correction, and real-time conditioning of video and audio. Tut Systems' customer list includes more than 160 service providers worldwide.



Tut Systems' "Astria" content processor (CP) is an IPTV headend solution supporting various access networks, including ADSL, VDSL, fiber to the home (FTTH) and hybrid-fiber coax (HFC), all within a single chassis. Protocol support includes ATM, pure-IP, IP over ATM and native MTS. Astria CPs support physical interface requirements including Gig-E, OC-3, DVB-ASI.



The deal was first announced on 21-Dec-2006.

http://www.motorola.com

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Verizon Sells Stake in Puerto Rico Telephone

Verizon closed on the sale of its 52% interest in Telecomunicaciones de Puerto Rico (TELPRI) to a subsidiary of America Movil. The buyer purchased 100% percent of TELPRI, including the other shares held by the Puerto Rico Telephone Authority, which owned 28 percent; Popular,13 percent; and the company's employee stock ownership plan, 7 percent.



PRT provides telecommunications services to more than 1 million residential and business customers and to more than 550,000 wireless customers under the Verizon Wireless brand.
http://www.verizon.com

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