Thursday, April 12, 2007

AT&T Launches Operations in India in Partnership with Mahindra

AT&T Global Network Services India (AT&T India), a joint venture between AT&T and Mahindra Telecommunications Investment Private Ltd., launched commercial operations.



In November 2006, AT&T became the first foreign telecom operator to secure new telecommunications licenses under the Indian government's revised policy on foreign direct investment (FDI) which allows up to 74 percent foreign ownership.



AT&T said it now has access to MPLS-based IP services in 137 countries. In addition to obtaining telecommunications licenses in India in 2006, AT&T is expanding its global network reach further with the addition of network nodes in Malaysia, Vietnam, Pakistan, Cyprus, Dubai and Saudi Arabia, as well as new network interconnections giving greater reach to the Nordics, Russia, Brazil, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

http://www.att.com

Tektronix Adds IP, RF and Enhanced H.264 Analysis Capabilities

Tektronix has enhanced its MTS400 Series MPEG Test Systems, including enhanced support for IPTV, VoIP and DTV development and deployment.



Tektronix said its MTS400 Series provides first line diagnostics with integrated cross layer fault analysis and error logging. Time to problem insight is reduced by informing the user whether root cause of video problems is at the Transmission, Transport Stream or Elementary Stream layer. The MTS400 Series offers support for the development and deployment of new services and technologies including distribution of Video over IP, IPTV, DTV RF Transmission and H.264 compression, for cable, satellite, terrestrial, fixed and mobile networks.



Enhancements to the MTS400 Series includes a new Optical and Electrical Gigabit Ethernet Interface providing Line Rate IP connectivity and analysis capabilities including Packet Loss, Sequence Errors, MDI Statistics, Packet Inter-arrival Time Histograms and Deep Packet Inspection to enable rapid network fault isolation. The Parametric IP Playout capability allows the generation of IP multi-session traffic including the simulation of network errors including packet loss, sequence errors and jitter as well as the ability to edit IP packet headers to simulate different IPTV environments.



The new Terrestrial (COFDM and 8-VSB), Cable (QAM) and Satellite (8PSK/QPSK) RF measurement interfaces provide RF performance measurements and trends for critical metrics including MER, EVM and BER. Dual IP and RF inputs enable simultaneous measurements of inputs and outputs of ingest, headend or edge devices.



H.264 enhancements include Video Thumbnail decode, T-STD Buffer Analysis and H.264 Multiplexing. This industry-best support for H.264 makes the MTS400 series the solution of choice for use in the transition to next generation compressed video.

http://www.tektronix.com/

Orange Signs Distribution Deal with Paramount Pictures

Orange has signed a deal with Paramount Pictures covering distribution of content for its Internet and TV Video-on-Demand viewers in France. Paramount is the latest partner to join Orange "24/24 Video" service, which offers a wide variety of films from major film studios as well as independent French and international productions.

http://www.francetelecom.com

Broadcom Files New Suit Against QUALCOMM

Broadcom filed a new lawsuit against Qualcomm asserting that Qualcomm's conduct before prominent industry standards organizations violates California law. In a 37-page complaint filed in California Superior Court, Broadcom asserts that Qualcomm's misconduct before standards setting bodies includes improperly concealing its patents, reneging on licensing obligations, and exerting dominance through hidden affiliations. http://www.broadcom.com