Swedish Post and Telecom Agency Awards Spectrum Licenses

The Swedish Post and Telecom Agency announced five winning bidders in its auction of spectrum auction in the 2.6 GHz band. The total amount for all assigned licenses is SEK 2,099,450,000 (approximately EUR 226 millions). The auction involved 112 rounds of bidding over 16 days. The money will go to Sweden's national treasury.


The licenses in the 2.6 GHz band are technology and service neutral and may be used for, e.g., mobile telephony or wireless broadband.


http://www.pts.se

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TELE Greenland Deploys Cisco ASR 1000

TELE Greenland A/S, the telecommunications, and postal services provider for Greenland, is transforming its data network into an Internet Protocol Next-Generation Network (IP NGN) to deliver broadband Internet access, telephone and video entertainment services to more than 24,000 subscribers. The deployment includes the new Cisco ASR 1000 Series router. The network transformation will be implemented by NetDesign, a Cisco Gold Certified Partner.


http://www.cisco.com

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Occam Networks Posts Q1 Revenue of $19.7 Million

Occam Networks reported Q1 2008 revenue of $19.7 million, up 4 percent from the same quarter last year and down 8 percent compared with the prior quarter, reflecting first-quarter seasonality. Net loss (GAAP), was $4.5 million, or a loss of $0.23 per basic share, compared with a $4.6 million net loss or $0.23 per basic share for the fourth quarter of 2007 and with net income of $29,000, or $0.00 per basic share, for the first quarter of 2007. The GAAP net loss for the first quarter of 2008 included a write-down of $0.9 million for the divestiture of certain legacy activities associated with the company's purchase of certain Terawave assets during the fourth quarter of 2007.


"We continued to focus on our strategic goals during Q1, chief among these is returning to profitability," said Bob Howard-Anderson, president and CEO of Occam Networks. "An important strategic development for Occam during the first quarter was the announcement that FairPoint Communications, the eighth largest telco in the U.S., has selected Occam to be its lead access-equipment provider for a major broadband initiative in northern New England. "http://www.occamnetworks.com

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DT Reports Increased Profit, Fixed Line Losses, Mobile Gains, More Competition

Deutsche Telekom reported net revenue of EUR 15.0 billion for Q1 2008, representing a year-on-year decrease of 3.1 percent, impacted by the decline in revenue in the Broadband/Fixed Network and Business Customers segments due to conventional line losses, the move to flat-rate plans and increased price competition for broadband services. Domestic revenues decreased by 6.1 percent. Adjusted EBITDA of the Group remained stable at EUR 4.7 billion, as the company trimmed its capital expenditures by 11% compared to a year earlier. Adjusted to exclude exchange rate fluctuations, it increased by 3.1 percent. Reported EBITDA of EUR 5.0 billion came in 9.1 percent above the previous year's figure. The proportion of net revenue generated outside Germany increased slightly to 51.6 percent.


In a conference call, Deutsche Telekom officials discussed the possibility of further acquisitions of mobile operators abroad, but did not confirm rumours of a possible bid for Sprint Nextel.


Some highlights from the quarterly report.


Mobile Communications

• T-Mobile Deutschland strengthened its position in the domestic market, which was dominated by fierce price wars. Although T-Mobile Deutschland reported a 3.4 percent decline in revenue to EUR 1.9 billion, the efficiency gains had a significant positive effect. Adjusted EBITDA decreased only slightly year-on-year by 1.1 percent, totaling EUR 692 million. The EBITDA margin improved by 0.8 percentage points to 36.7 percent.



• New calling plans launched at CeBIT 2008 have generated strong demand, especially MyFaves and Max. New data plans, including cell phone and laptop flat rates, along with cooperation with Yahoo! have also improved competitiveness in the field of mobile Internet usage. Growth also continued in this lucrative segment with the addition of 210,000 new fixed-term contract customers in the first quarter. T Mobile's customer base in Germany increased year-on-year by 12.3 percent to 37.1 million.



• T-Mobile USA posted 981,000 net additions in q1, three quarters of which were fixed-term contract customers. 1.1 million SunCom customers were also added as SunCom was consolidated on February 22. This took T-Mobile USA past the 30 million customer mark, with 4.8 million net additions compared with the first quarter of 2007, bringing the total to 30.8 million customers.



• Data revenue for mobile communications, excluding messaging services, increased by 28.0 percent in the first quarter to EUR 0.5 billion. Growth in Europe totaled 41.5 percent, rising to EUR 0.3 billion. In the United States, revenue in dollars increased by 30.7 percent to just under USD 0.4 billion.

Broadband / Fixed Network

• In the domestic market, T-Home's sales of DSL lines for new customers remained high in the first quarter of 2008, totaling 539,000. Deutsche Telekom now accounts for around 43 percent of growth in the entire German broadband market.



• In Germany, T-Home's revenue decreased year-on-year by 6.1 percent to EUR 4.8 billion, which is in line with expectations.



• The marketing of T-Home Complete packages in Germany continued to deliver solid results. The number of broadband lines increased by 1.9 million compared with the first quarter of 2007 to 13.0 million. The number of customers with Complete packages increased by 5.4 million to 11.1 million.



• Line losses amounted to 120,000, primarily due to the increasing availability of all-IP lines, essentially as resale competitors switched their business models. As a result of the corresponding fall in demand for DSL resale products in new business, the number of DSL resale lines fell to 3.4 million. Between 0.8 and 1.1 million line losses are forecast for the full year due to all-IP migration.



• Another approximately 460,000 are line losses in the true sense of the word, with the forecast for the full year of some 1.7 to 1.9 million losses in this category remaining unchanged. Overall, including the migration to all-IP lines -- an effect that didn't happen in the previous year -- the number of fixed lines in Germany decreased by 582,000 in the first quarter. The number of leased unbundled local loop lines, in other words the last mile to the customer, increased accordingly to 7.0 million.



• International business of the Broadband/Fixed Network operating segment posted revenue of EUR 0.6 billion; the decrease of 19.2 percent year-on-year is essentially down to the deconsolidation of the companies



• The broadband market outside Germany also continued on a growth course in the first quarter of 2008. With a total of 1.5 million broadband lines including resale products, the Broadband/Fixed Network segment recorded an increase of around 34.8 percent year-on-year outside Germany.

T-Systems

T-Systems modified its reporting structure to reflect its operational realignment starting in the first quarter of 2008. As a result, reporting will no longer show Enterprise and Business Services. The previous Business Services unit is now fully integrated in Telecommunications. The two other units, Computing & Desktop Services and Systems Integration, have been retained and are not affected by this measure.

Business outside Germany grew by 3 percent to EUR 593 million in the first quarter of 2008. By contrast, revenue in Germany decreased by 13.7 percent to EUR 2.0 billion. As such, the Business Customers segment posted an overall decrease of 10.4 percent to EUR 2.6 billion. This is mainly the result of the reassignment of Active Billing to T-Home and the deconsolidation of Media & Broadcast. Another factor was the reduction in intra-group revenue, which fell 20.1 percent year-on-year. This decrease illustrates T-Systems' substantial contribution to Deutsche Telekom's cost-cutting program. Organically, i.e. adjusted for the 2007 revenue from Media & Broadcast and Active Billing, revenue decreased by 5.2 percent in the first quarter of 2008.

http://www.telekom.com

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Korea Telecom Selects Tektronix's GeoProbe Network Assurance

Korea Telecom (KT) has selected Tektronix Communications' GeoProbe Network Assurance solution to test the deployment of new call-related services on their intelligent network. Specifically, GeoProbe will be used by KT to proactively monitor, manage, diagnose and troubleshoot issues before, during and after the launch of new services over their intelligent network. GeoProbe's real-time and historical multi-protocol call trace and online analytical processing report features will provide KT an end-to-end monitoring approach, allowing them to view multiple sessions in real-time. Financial terms were not disclosed.http://www.tek.com/geoprobe

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Marvell Settles Stock Option Case with the SEC

Marvell reached a settlement with the Securities & Exchange Commission ("SEC") in connection with its past stock option granting process. Without admitting or denying the allegations in the SEC's complaint, the company agreed to settle the charges by consenting to a permanent injunction against any future violations of various provisions of the federal securities laws. Marvell will also pay a civil penalty of $10 million in connection with the settlement.


In a related agreement, Weili Dai, one of the company's co-founders, also entered into a settlement with the SEC. Without admitting or denying the allegations in the SEC's complaint, Ms. Dai consented to a permanent injunction against any future violations of various provisions of the federal securities laws, agreed not to serve as a director or officer of a public company for a period of five years, and will pay a civil penalty of $500,000.http://www.marvell.com

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Vonage Reports Q1 Growth, Teams with Covad

Vonage's Q1 revenue grew to a record $225 million, up 15% from $196 million in the first quarter 2007 and up 4% sequentially, driven by an increase in subscriber lines and higher average revenue per user. There was a GAAP net loss of $9 million or $0.06 per share, down from a loss of $72 million or $0.47 per share reported in the first quarter 2007.


Some highlights:

• Average monthly revenue per line in the first quarter 2008 was $28.85, up from $28.31 in the year-ago quarter and $28.19 reported in the fourth quarter 2007. Average monthly telephony services revenue per line for the quarter increased to $27.87, up from $27.36 reported a year ago and up from $27.42 sequentially.



• Marketing expense for the quarter was $61 million, or 27% of revenue, down sharply from $91 million, or 46% of revenue, a year ago, and down from $63 million, or 29% of revenue, sequentially. Marketing cost per gross subscriber line addition ("SLAC") was $216 in the first quarter 2008, down from $273 in the year-ago quarter and $223 sequentially. The company expects SLAC to increase in the second quarter, consistent with prior year seasonal trends. Vonage expects to gradually increase marketing expenditures in the second half of 2008 to accelerate growth but continues to expect the cost of acquisition to fall within $225-$250 for the full year 2008.



• Vonage added 30,000 net subscriber lines in the first quarter 2008 and finished the quarter with more than 2.6 million lines in service.



• Average monthly customer churn increased to 3.3% in the first quarter 2008 from 3.0% in the fourth quarter 2007.



• Vonage announced a relationship with Covad whereby Vonage will offer a DSL service to both residential and small business customers. The company expects this new service, called Vonage Broadband, to be available to customers by the end of the year.

http://www.vonage.com

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Sonus Posts Q1 Revenue of $74.0 Million

Sonus Networks reported Q1 2008 revenue of $74.0 million, compared with $97.1 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2007 and $71.1 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2007. Net income on a GAAP basis for the first quarter of 2008 was $0.6 million, or $0.00 per diluted share, compared to GAAP net income of $14.1 million, or $0.05 per diluted share, for the fourth quarter of 2007, and a GAAP net loss of $4.0 million, or $0.02 per share, for the first quarter of 2007.


"Our first quarter results demonstrate the diversity of our business and a solid global environment for IP communications," said Hassan Ahmed, chairman and CEO of Sonus Networks.http://www.sonusnet.com

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