Ekinops Raises $20 Million for Optical Transport

Ekinops, a start-up headquartered in Lannion, France, raised US$20 million in venture capital for its optical transport and DWDM solutions.



Ekinops offers optical transport, WDM and aggregation solutions for service providers and enterprise networks. It uses TDM technology to enable the wire-speed aggregation and transport of multiple high-speed data channels over standard 2.5G and 10G wavelengths. Ekinops' carrier-grade solutions leverage expertise in 10G transmission, aggregation, and Forward Error Correction.

http://www.ekinops.net

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Motorola introduces ADSL2+ Gateway by Netopia

Motorola introduced its Netopia 2210 ADSL2/2+ Gateway, featuring small size (under one pound) and ease of use. On first connection to the network, the 2210 gateway "phones home" to the service provider's hosted NBBS broadband server, enabling automated service provisioning, software updates, and service activation, all without subscriber intervention.



An integrated Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) client further reduces operational costs by eliminating additional software licensing costs. The gateway is powered by an Infineon Technologies AR7 ADSL 2/2+ System on Chip. It also supports TR-101, the DSL Forum's network protocol specification, which allows a single device to receive multiple services.

http://www.motorola.com

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Bolloré Télécom Selects Motorola for WiMAX Pilot in France

Bolloré Télécom, which holds 12 WiMAX licenses in France, selected Motorola for a pilot deployment in Paris. Complying with the IEEE standard 802.16e-2005 and operating in the 3.5 GHz band, the nomadic WiMAX network is already live on two of Bolloré's sites in Paris. For the trial, Motorola is providing deployment, integration and support services to Bolloré Télécom in addition to WiMAX equipment such as WiMAX access points, Customer Premises Equipment and PC cards.http;//www.motorola.com

http://www.bolloretelecom.eu/

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BT Plans Wind Farms to Generate 25% of Electricity by 2016

BT plans to develop wind farms aimed at generating up to 25% of its existing UK electricity requirements by 2016. The company expects to invest up to £250m in the project.



BT is one of Britain's biggest consumers of electricity, with an annual requirement of around 0.7% of the UK's entire consumption. The company said its wind farms could generate a total of 250MW of electricity -- enough to meet the power needs of 122,000 homes or a city the size of Coventry.



BT is currently identifying high wind-yield sites on or adjacent to BT-owned land for development with the aim of generating power from 2012 onwards.

http://www.btplc.com

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Akamai's CDN to Support iTunes/Starbucks Content Deal

Akamai will serve as the exclusive content distribution provider in the U.S. for the unique partnership announced last month between Apple and Starbucks. The deal will see the deployment of Akamai-enabled content delivery servers within thousands of Starbucks stores to provide fast and reliable wireless delivery of digital music.

http://www.akamai.com

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Zhone Posts Q3 Revenue of $41.6 million

Zhone Technologies reported Q3 revenue of $41.6 million compared with $44.1 million for the second quarter of 2007 and $43.1 million for the third quarter of 2006. Net loss (GAAP) was $1.5 million or $0.01 per share compared with a net loss of $4.6 million or $0.03 per share for the second quarter of 2007, and a net loss of $121.0 million or $0.81 per share for the third quarter of 2006.



"As expected, revenues declined due to the divestiture of one of our legacy product lines and the seasonally slow international market," said Mory Ejabat, chairman and chief executive officer of Zhone Technologies, Inc. "Despite this decline, we are encouraged by the long-term prospects of our business as evidenced by significant new customer wins and continued interest in our next generation technologies."http://www.zhone.com

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PMC-Sierra Reports Q3 Revenue of $118 Million

PMC-Sierra reported Q3 net revenue of $117.5 million, compared with $104.7 million in the second quarter of 2007, and $116.5 million in the third quarter of the prior year. Net loss (GAAP) was $5.9 million or a loss per share of $0.03, compared with GAAP net loss of $22.3 million or a loss per share of $0.10 in the second quarter of 2007.



"In the third quarter, we experienced strong growth in our telecom business, particularly in Asia, as well as positive trends in our enterprise storage business," said Bob Bailey, chairman and chief executive officer of PMC-Sierra. "Our summer bookings were strong, and our operating performance increased in the quarter as a result of the combination of top-line growth and expense reductions."http://www.pmc-sierra.com

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PMC-Sierra's Bob Bailey to Step Down as CEO

Bob Bailey will be retiring as PMC-Sierra's president and CEO once a replacement has been named. A search for a replacement is underway. Bailey will continue to serve as chairman of the board through his current term. Bailey joined PMC-Sierra in 1993 and has served as the company's president and CEO since July 1997. He's been chairman of the board since May 2005 to now, and also served as chairman from February 2000 until February 2003.

http://www.pmc-sierra.com

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Integra5 Cites "Stickiness" of TV Caller ID for Customer Loyalty

TV Caller ID plays a significant role in subscriber retention and positively influences subscribers' overall perception of their service provider, according Integra5, which supplies a Converged Services Platform for carriers.



A survey of some 3,500 residential subscribers of Comporium, a South Carolina-based quintuple play provider, polled subscribers who are already using a converged service.

Respondents ranked interest in future real-time converged communications and content services that incorporate advanced interactivity, personalization and user management capabilities. Below are the top five, in order of interest:



1. 90% - Ability to manage which TVs and PCs display Caller ID



2. 81% - Personalization features, such as the ability to add pictures and photos to TV and PC Caller ID and to a network address book



3. 81% - Content alerts, which incorporate RSS and Web-based technology to display banners with local, national and international news, weather, sports and other information on TVs and PCs



4. 80% - "Click-to-call," which enables users to place calls from the TV network address book and call/voicemail logs via the TV remote control



5. 77% - Voicemail alerts and playback, which notify users - via TV/PC
banner alerts - of landline or mobile phone voicemails. Users can also view a voicemail log and play voicemails on their TVs/PCs

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Agito Develops Location-Aware Enterprise FMC Platform

Agito Networks, a start-up based in Sunnyvale, California, unveiled its "RoamAnywhere" Mobility Router, an enterprise-class platform that uses RF-based, location-aware technologies to better mobilize voice and data applications, while remaining agnostic to enterprise customers' choices of mobile carriers and equipment vendors.



Agito Networks' RoamAnywhere is an enterprise mobility solution delivered on a network appliance and mobile client for Nokia/Symbian and Windows Mobile dual mode phones that enables organizations to mobilize their voice and data applications. The Agito RoamAnywhere Mobility Router is delivered in a hardened, turn-key appliance. The Agito RoamAnywhere Client, which supports multiple mobile phone operating systems, has a small footprint that is installed over the air. RoamAnywhere's hybrid architecture separates the voice control traffic from data traffic, reducing appliance load, response time, and overhead.



Agito said its goal is to provide enterprises with cellular cost savings, IT control and visibility over mobile devices and usage, robust in-building wireless coverage and productivity benefits.

http://www.agitonetworks.com/

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Microsoft's Popfly Builds on Silverlight for Media Mashups

Microsoft released the beta version of Popfly, a tool built on Microsoft Silverlight media streaming technology. Popfly provides a way to build and share "mashups," gadgets, Web pages and applications. For instance, it could be used to spice up a Facebook profile, blog or personal Web page by adding games, slide shows, "Halo 3" stats or eBay auctions.



Microsoft also announced that its Silverlight initiative continues to grow -- it now has over 50 partners.

http://www.microsoft.com

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Alcatel-Lucent and Sagem Communications Team on Fax/IP

Alcatel-Lucent and Sagem Communications launched an embedded version of Sagem-Interstar's Fax over IP server technology within the Alcatel-Lucent OmniTouch Unified Communication suite. This enables users to send/receive faxes directly from their email client. http://www.alcatel-lucent.com

http://www.sagem.com

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Alcatel-Lucent Contributes Voice Quality Algorithm to ATIS Standard

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) has approved a new voice quality monitoring standard based on Alcatel-Lucent algorithm. This new ATIS standard (ANSI ATIS 0100005-2006) addresses the challenge of how to implement a non- intrusive speech quality test that can be done in live networks in real time without requiring human listeners and that will not interrupt actual calls.



Alcatel-Lucent's ANIQUE+ (Auditory Non-Intrusive QUality Estimation Plus), which is machine based, overcomes the challenges present in today's subjective approaches to monitoring speech quality where people are used to evaluate speech quality of telephone networks and codecs by listening to audio signals and using tools such as the Mean Opinion Score (MOS) to define the network's audio quality. Subjective measurements of this sort are not viable for today's real-time, heterogeneous networks due to costs and scalability.
http://www.alcatel-lucent.com/

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Avaya Posts Q4 Sales of $1.429 Billion, Confirms Pending Privatization

Avaya's Q4 2007 revenues increased 4.8 percent to $1.429 billion compared to $1.364 billion in the same period last year. Net income was $35 million and earnings per share of 8 cents for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2007 on a GAAP basis.



Avaya shipped a record number of IP lines and over one million IP lines for the sixth consecutive quarter. Sales of products increased 7.8 percent, including a 9.5 percent increase in converged voice applications revenues. Services revenues increased 5.4 percent and rental and managed services revenues declined 10.6 percent. U.S. revenues declined by 1.6 percent.



Avaya also confirmed today that the acquisition of the company by affiliates of Silver Lake Partners and TPG Capital is scheduled to close by the end of October.

http://www.avaya.com

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Nokia Posts Q3 Sales of EUR 12.9 Billion

Nokia Q3 net sales increased 28% to EUR 12.9 billion, compared with EUR 10.1 billion in the third quarter 2006. At constant currency, group net sales would have increased 32%. Q3 operating profit grew 69% to EUR 1.9 billion (including the EUR 26 million net negative impact of special items), compared with EUR 1.1 billion in the third quarter 2006 (including the negative impact of the EUR 128 million special item).

Some highlights:

• Operating margin of 14.6%, up sequentially from 11.0% in Q2 2007, excluding special items.



• Nokia device volumes reached 111.7 million units, up 11% sequentially and up 26% year on year. Estimated industry device volumes for Q3 were 286 million units, up 9% sequentially and up 17% year on year. This gives Nokia an estimated device market share of 39%, up from 38% in Q2 2007 and up from 36% in Q3 2006.



• The proportion of devices Nokia sold in the under EUR 30 category increased significantly, both sequentially and year on year.



• Mobile phone net sales in Q3 grew 3% to EUR 6.1 billion, compared with EUR 5.9 billion in the third quarter 2006. Strong overall volume growth was partially offset by a significant ASP decline year on year, driven primarily by a higher proportion of entry-level sales. Net sales year on year growth was strongest in Asia-Pacific and Middle East & Africa, followed by China. Net sales were down significantly in North America, and to a lesser degree in Latin America and Europe year on year.



• Nokia Enterprise Solution sales increased 105% to EUR 526 million, compared with EUR 257 million in the third quarter 2006. Net sales were up significantly year on year in all regions except North America. Net sales were driven primarily by strong volume growth in Enterprise Solutions device business, especially the Nokia E65, compared to the third quarter 2006.



• Nokia Siemens Networks posted Q3 net sales of EUR 3.7 billion.



• Nokia Siemens Networks operating margin, excluding special items, was -1.0% and was a positive 3.0%, excluding special items and Purchase Price Accounting related items. The company said it is on track to achieve the earlier announced cost synergy targets, including the planned personnel reductions.

http://www.nokia.com

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