SingTel Offers Global VPN Performance Monitoring

Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel) has launched a Global Delivery Platform (GDP) that provides full end-to-end network performance monitoring for corporate VPNs across multiple partners' networks.


SingTel's GDP delivers network performance assurances and faster fault restoration, as well as real-time network performance statistics via an online portal. SingTel said it is able to provide end-to-end network visibility into many Asian, European and US cities by leveraging its ConnectPlus IP VPN network's interconnections with more than 15 leading IP VPN service providers around the globe.


"Most service providers today deploy IP nodes only in a few ‘gateway cities' in a country and do not provide network visibility beyond these locations. SingTel GDP provides in-depth access like never before with coverage that includes lesser known cities. This is extremely useful for customers that have businesses in multiple cities within a large country," Bill Chang, said SingTel's Executive Vice President of Business.http://www.singtel.com

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Foundry Issues Preliminary Results, Cites Macroeconomics

Foundry Networks announced preliminary results for Q1 2008, saying it now expects revenue to range between $148.0 million and $150.0 million, compared to $135.8 million in the first quarter of 2007. GAAP net income is expected to range between $13.0 million and $14.0 million, or $0.08 and $0.09 per diluted share including approximately $8.5 million of tax-effected stock-based compensation, compared to $9.1 million or $0.06 per diluted share in the first quarter 2007, including $5.8 million of tax-effected stock-based compensation.


"Entering the quarter we expressed our view that Foundry would experience typical seasonality, however during the first quarter a more challenging macroeconomic environment evolved from the financial market crises which we believe led some customers to delay their purchase decisions," said Bobby Johnson, President and CEO of Foundry Networks. "While business activity remained robust, order closure rates in most geographies fell below our expectations. We believe the recent investments we've made in our sales organization have strengthened our capabilities and together with our strong product portfolio will have a potentially positive impact particularly as the macroeconomic environment becomes more settled."http://www.foundrynet.com

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Macau's CTM Selects Nortel Microsoft Alliance

Companhia de Telecomuniçães de Macau (CTM), the only full telecom service provider in Macau (China), is offering a unified communications solution from the Nortel Microsoft Innovative Communications Alliance. The solution provides business customers with integrated voice, email, conferencing, video, and instant messaging .


The Nortel Microsoft unified communications solution implemented by CTM combines Nortel Communication Server 1000 (CS 1000) and Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 to provide one-click access to a broad range of collaboration capabilities


Since the formation of the alliance in July 2006, the companies said they have accumulated more than 600 wins for the unified communications solution.


http://www.nortel.com

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Nortel Introduces SIP-centric Unified Communications for SMBs

Nortel is introducing a SIP-centric unified communications solution for small and medium businesses (SMBs) based on open source technology and complete with presence/instant messaging, IP telephony, conferencing, and other advanced applications.


The Nortel Software Communication System (SCS) 500, which targets SMBs with 30 to 500+ employees, is a software-based solution available on industry-leading hardware systems through Nortel's collaborations with IBM and Dell. These include the Dell OptiPlex 755 and later the PowerEdge R300 server, along with the IBM System i platform. Going forward, Nortel said it plans to integrate SCS500 with more of IBM's SMB server portfolio, including Power Systems, System x, and Blades.


Nortel's SCS500 was developed within the SIPfoundry project, sipXecs, and represents more than 250 contributions from Nortel leveraging its expertise in telephony, data and multimedia applications.

http://www.nortel.com

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Huawei Signs 14 HSPA/WCDMA Contracts in Q1

Huawei Technologies announced that it won 14 HSPA/WCDMA contracts in Q1 2008, and its total number of HSPA/WCDMA contracts has exceeded 100 to date. In Q1 2008, Huawei won a number of large HSPA/WCDMA deals with carriers in Europe, Latin America and Asia Pacific and its GSM unit shipments increased by 20%.

http://www.huawei.com

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Etisalat Selects Huawei for FTTH in UAE

Etisalat has selected Huawei Technologies

to build a large-scale commercial Fiber to the Home (FTTH) network using GPON in the United Arab Emirates. Huawei will supply its optical line terminal (OLT) and optical network terminals (ONT). By the end of 2008, Etisalat expects its customer base with direct access to FTTH to be in the hundreds of thousands. Financial terms were not disclosed.http://www.huawei.com

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SES AMERICOM Declares AMC-14 a Total Loss

SES declared its new AMC-14 a total loss for insurance purposes. The company said that while an initial assessment of the available options to reposition the satellite appeared encouraging, more detailed examinations by SES and Lockheed Martin engineers determined that the various scenarios could not provide a reasonable chance of success. While AMC-14 is currently in a stable orbit, SES is exploring plans to retire the satellite.


"The loss of any satellite is a disappointment, and the failure of AMC-14 means there will be no revenues to come from this programme. However, SES is fully insured for its investment, and there will be no negative P&L impact from the accelerated write-down of AMC-14. We expect to receive the insurance proceeds of approximately USD 150 million in the next few months, thereby enhancing our cash position. The rest of our business in North America and worldwide has no connection with, and is unaffected by, this launch failure," commented Mark Rigolle, Chief Financial Officer of SES.http://www.ses-americom.com

• On March 15, SES AMERICOM's AMC-14 satellite failed to reach its intended orbit following its launch on board a Russian Proton Breeze-M launch vehicle on March 15. An anomaly during the second burn of the fourth stage of the rocket resulted in the satellite being placed short of the planned geostationary transfer orbit. The spacecraft is entirely contracted by EchoStar.

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TPACK Enhances PBB-TE/T-MPLS/VPLS Carrier Packet Engine

TPACK introduced an upgraded version of its PBB-TE/T-MPLS/VPLS Carrier Packet Engine, which is a commercial chip solution based on an Altera Stratix III FPGA, designed for Carrier Ethernet gateway devices. The TPX3103 device can provide a maximum non-blocking, full duplex switching capacity of 52 Gbps, allowing a maximum of 48x 1 Gigabit or 4x 10 Gigabit Ethernet ports. TPACK said the advantage of its chip is that it allows rapid updates in response to changes in PBB-TE, T-MPLS and VPLS standards, which are likely to occur over the coming years.


TPACK's TPX3103 device provides support for PBB-TE and T-MPLS OAM, allowing protection switching times well within the 50msec carrier grade specification. In addition, the TPX3103 provides extended security control with Access Control Lists, more RMON monitoring capabilities and enhanced ingress flow control mechanisms making the TPX3103 suitable for application in a number of platforms including Carrier Ethernet Switches, MSPPs and Packet Optical Transport Platforms.
http://www.TPACK.com

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Australia Issues National Broadband Network RFP

The government of Australia issued an invitation for proposals to build a National Broadband Network. The announcement was made by the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Stephen Conroy.


The RFP details the scope of the National Broadband Network, which will:

• deliver minimum download speeds of 12 Mbps to 98% of Australian homes and businesses;


• have the network rolled out and made operational progressively over five years using fibre-to-the-node or fibre-to-the-premises technology;


• support high quality voice, data and video services including symmetric applications such as high-definition video-conferencing;
  
• earn the Commonwealth a return on its investment;


• facilitate competition in the telecommunications sector through open access arrangements that allow all service providers access to the network on equivalent terms; and


• enable uniform and affordable retail prices to consumers, no matter where they live.

The RFP documentation is available on the AusTender website. Proposals must be received by 25-July-2008.


The government said it is prepared to invest up to $4.7 billion in the project.


Industry and public interest groups are also being encouraged to provide submissions on regulatory issues associated with the National Broadband Network.http://www.minister.dbcde.gov.au/

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Pingdom: Map of Google Data Centers Worldwide

Pingdom, which tracks the performance of websites and servers, published a map of what it believes are Google's primary data centers worldwide. Google does not publicly disclose the location of its facilities. According to Pingdom, Google has 19 locations in the US where they operate data centers, 12 in Europe, one in Russia, one in South America, and three in Asia.http://royal.pingdom.com/?p=276

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U.S. Court of Appeals Denies EchoStar's Petition for Rehearing

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C. denied EchoStar's request for a rehearing en banc in its patent dispute with TiVo.


TiVo expressed its satisfaction with the decision saying it hoped the decision brings a resolution to the case, along with full award of damages and an order for the injunction to be reinstated.http://www.tivo.com

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