08/20/08 ~ Converge! Network Digest

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Ekinops Debuts Dynamic Multi-Reach Metro, Regional and Long Haul System

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Optical

Ekinops, a start-up headquartered in Lannion, France, introduced a long-haul optical transport platform that can carry 80 WDM channels a distance of 2,000 kilometers.

The foundation of the Ekinops 360 platform is its firmware programmable T-Chip. The new long haul solution also uses Ekinops' "DynaFEC" forward error correction technology, which boosts performance, enabling longer transmission distances with lower-power transmitters and amplifiers. DynaFEC offers a number of FEC options that can be programmatically made available to Ekinops line cards allowing for up to a 10 to 12 dB gain, enabling the longest transmission distances between amplifiers. Ekinops can transmit 300 kilometers without any in-line amplification, with full channel counts and its new FEC capabilities significantly reduce the number of in-line amplifiers needed for long reach routes up to 2,000 km.

Ekinops said its 360 transport platform is capable of aggregating and transporting Ethernet (LAN Phy, WAN Phy), Fibre Channel, SONET/SDH, Escon, HD-SDI video, SD-SDI video, and ASI video client protocols. The new client protocol could also be supported thanks to the dynamic firmware programmable T-Chip.http://www.ekinops.net

In October 2007, Ekinops announced 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.

Ekinops' technical team is led by Jean-Luc Pamart, an FEC expert who has been awarded 7 patents in optical transmission. Before joining Ekinops, Mr. Pamart was Director of Hardware Development at Corvis-Algety in Lannion, France. Previous to that, he held various R&D positions at Alcatel within its Submarine and Terrestrial Division, and Optical Network Transmission business unit.

Nortel Acquires DiamondWare for Positional Voice Technology

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 PacketVoice

Nortel has acquired DiamondWare, a start-up software developer specializing in high-definition, proximity-based 3D positional voice technology, for approximately $7 million in cash, plus up to an additional $3 million to DiamondWare security holders based on achievement of future business milestones over the next 40 months.

DiamondWare uses wideband, stereo capability and custom spatial positioning to make audio conferences more realistic. The technology has been deployed in gaming environments and in U.S. military tactical intercom systems, and by a broad range of carriers and equipment manufacturers.

Nortel said the acquisition furthers its drive to transform communications to allow people to collaborate in more interactive and immersive ways.

DiamondWare is based in Mesa, Arizona.http://www.nortel.comhttp://www.dw.com

Nth Air Deploys WiMAX Network in Denver with Fujitsu

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 BroadbandWireless

Nth Air, a wireless broadband service provider planning a nationwide WiMAX network, has launched a wireless broadband solution across Denver in time for next week's Democratic National Convention. The WiMAX network is available for the 5,000 delegates and more than 15,000 members of the media expected to attend the political event.

The fixed point-to-multipoint network will provide broadband wireless Internet data, VoIP and video services for businesses and municipalities who can subscribe to the service during the convention and not be locked into a long-term contract. WiMAX-compliant point-to-point connectivity is also available to connect users staying at different hotels in wide area network configurations.

Nth Air provides completely integrated, end-to-end wireless broadband solutions from business-class connectivity to transport access, disaster recovery, professional services, and managed services. Up to 1 Gbps symmetrical, dedicated, scalable services are delivered to support subscriber needs. Nth Air is committed to extending the network reach of individuals and businesses that need to be connected any time, any place and anywhere.

Fujitsu Network Communications delivered the fixed and mobile WiMAX equipment for Nth Air. The Fujitsu WiMAX solution that Nth Air purchased operates in the 3.65 GHz spectrum, which is ideal for quickly deploying wireless broadband services to rural or underserved markets.

Fujitsu has an alliance with Airspan Networks to market and support their portfolio of WiMAX solutions, including FCC-certified 3.65 GHz macrocells, picocells and customer premise equipment. This alliance is an extension of the co-development agreement in place to bring high powered mobile WiMAX base stations to the global market.

Nth Air is headquartered in San Jose, Calif., with network capabilities in the greater San Francisco Bay area, Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Denver.
.http://us.fujitsu.com/telecomhttp://www.nthair.com

Dell'Oro: CDMA Market Takes a Plunge

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 BroadbandWireless

The worldwide CDMA infrastructure market declined over 25 percent from the year ago quarter, according to the Dell'Oro Group.

With North America being the predominant CDMA market, significant declines in spending by the two largest CDMA operators in the region had a major impact on the contraction of the worldwide market. The significant contraction in North America was partially offset by the CDMA growth in the Asia Pacific region.

"In addition to Verizon Wireless' CAPEX being down approximately $150 million, Sprint's CAPEX was down nearly $1 billion," commented Scott Siegler, Analyst of Mobility Infrastructure research at Dell'Oro Group. "As a result of this contraction in North America, North America's share of the CDMA market fell to approximately two-thirds share, from over three-quarters share in the second quarter last year. Growth in Asia Pacific, particularly in India, helped to offset these declines. In the quarter, Reliance, Tata and BSNL continued to see solid CDMA subscriber growth and continued to invest in the growth of their CDMA networks. However, we believe the region will experience declines in the second half of the year, as we expect all three operators to begin to focus more capital towards their GSM networks," Siegler continued.

The report also shows that the declines in the CDMA market were offset by the GSM market having another solid quarter, with revenue growing both sequentially and year-over-year.http://www.delloro.com

Ipanema Unveils New WAN Optimization Devices

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Packet Systems

Ipanema Technologies introduced a new generation of integrated WAN optimization devices.

The Ipanema Autonomic Networking System is built out of central software cooperating devices (called ip|engines). The ip|engines are typically positioned inline between the CPE router and the LAN in data-centers and branch office locations. The ip|engines perform a complete range of application traffic management functions including visibility, optimization and acceleration.

Ipanema's new generation of ip|engines offer greater performance as well as new innovative auxiliary ports for system extension.

The ip|e 5ax is a compact device that handles WAN traffic of up to 8 Mbps for both download and upload and 20/2 Mbps for download and upload. The ip|e 5ax sports an 80GB disk for improved caching capabilities. The device specification makes it ideal for branches fitted with modern ADSL2+ or SDSL links.

The ip|e 1800ax is a carrier grade device able to manage up to 1Gbps WAN traffic. It includes redundant power supply and three hot swap disks of 750GB with RAID capabilities. The new range also includes the ip|e 120ax, ip|e 140ax and ip|e 1000ax models to cope with the variety of WAN access bandwidths.

The new auxiliary ports are designed to attach external devices to the ip|engines. The ip|engines are able to selectively divert a part of the WAN traffic to the ports for external processing. The diverted flows are ensured to be individually monitored and optimized by the ip|engines before and after their transformation.

The new ip|engine line is available immediately. The ip|e 5ax price begins at $3,150. The ip|e 1800ax price begins at $51,000.http://www.ipanematech.com

Earlier this month, Ipanema Technologies announced $7 million in new financing to expand its global geographic coverage and grow its R&D staffing.

Zarlink Releases Newest Access Chipset

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Silicon

Zarlink Semiconductor announced availability of its new VoiceEdge VE792 Next Generation Carrier Chipset (NGCC), expanding its VoiceEdge family of highly-programmable integrated voice silicon solutions. The VE792 is a 3 chipset features support for simultaneous high speed video and voice, carrier grade line testing, and the lowest power usage and highest density on the market. It also integrates widely supported system interfaces.

The VoiceEdge VE792 chipset includes an octal Subscriber Line Audio-Processing Circuit (SLAC), with integrated carrier grade line test toolbox and DTMF detection, Single Channel Subscriber Line Interface Circuit (SLIC) and a multi-port Voice Control Processor (VCP), providing up to 72 channels of real time call control function, as well as full carrier grade line test, when enabled with the Zarlink LineCare software suite. The chipset supports a centralized architecture, capable of interfacing all system on chip voice packet processors and network processors, giving end users full scalability and software compatibility with their favorite architecture.

Sampling is underway.http://www.zarlink.com

Ericsson Deploys Solar-powered Cell Site in Cambodia for Star-Cell

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 BroadbandWireless

Ericsson announced the first deployment of a solar-powered GSM base station with satellite backhaul for Star-Cell, a Cambodian mobile operator. The satellite transmission feature provides affordable mobile-network coverage in remote areas where other transmission solutions are unavailable. About 80 percent of the Cambodian population lives outside the main urban centers.

Ericsson said the GSM main-remote solution has a lower environmental impact than standard base stations, consuming up to 50 percent less energy, while helping lower total cost of ownership by reducing operating costs.

Star-Cell has selected Ericsson's solution to expand network coverage and introduce EDGE-based applications to enable mobile health and educational services for rural communities.

Ericsson noted that it has delivered more than 200 solar-powered cell sites in Africa, Southeast Asia and the Americas.http://www.ericsson.com

Global Crossing Provides Core Capacity Ethersphere's ADSL2+ in UK

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Service Providers

Global Crossing is providing core network capacity for Entanet International Ltd.'s new wholesale ADSL2+ broadband service in the UK. Global Crossing is supplying core network connectivity from Entanet's central network nodes to BT Wholesale Broadband Connect (WBC) aggregation points in London and around the U.K.

Entanet is a leading communications provider of business-class voice and data connectivity solutions and delivers its services via a partner channel. In 2007, Entanet was selected to be the only non-BT company to participate in the BT 21st Century Network (21CN) WBC trial, with Global Crossing providing connectivity.

http://www.globalcrossing.comhttp://www.enta.net/

WiMAX Forum Opens Software Testing Simulator

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Service Providers

The WiMAX Forum is making its its open source system level simulator available to its members.

The simulator can be used to characterize applications over WiMAX networks. Specifically, the NS-2 based testing application tool provides a unified simulation tool based on the WiMAX Forum's system profiles and facilitates sharing of results and publication of technical papers. For example, the WiMAX Forum NS-2 Simulator could be used to test VoIP performance over WiMAX networks. The simulator will help vendors evaluate scheduler algorithms and technical solutions, in addition to helping service providers perform network planning, capacity evaluation and product evaluation.

The NS-2 Simulator can port a user specific scheduler, evaluate end-to-end performance and conduct network and capacity planning to identify the best deployment strategy and practices. More than 200 users pre-registered for access to the application.http://www.wimaxforum.org

ShoreTel Reports Quarterly Revenue of $35 Million

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Financial

ShoreTel reported revenue for its fourth fiscal quarter, ended June 30, 2008, of $34.7 million, an increase of 10 percent over the third fiscal quarter and an increase of 20 percent over the fourth quarter of 2007. GAAP gross margin for the fourth quarter of 2008 improved to 62.5 percent from 62.0 percent in the third quarter. GAAP net loss was $47,000, or $(0.00) per share, in the fourth quarter of 2008 compared to a loss of $1.7 million, or $(0.04) per share, in the third quarter and net income of $1.9 million, or $0.05 per diluted share, in the fourth quarter of 2007. GAAP results in the fourth quarter of 2008 included $2.0 million in stock-based compensation expenses, compared to $633,000 in the fourth quarter of 2007.

"We are pleased to have delivered solid fiscal year growth of 32 percent over last year and to have ended our fiscal year with record fourth quarter revenue that grew by 10 percent sequentially," said John W. Combs, chairman and CEO of ShoreTel. http://www.shoretel.com

AT&T Launches In-Home ConnecTech Service

Wednesday, August 20, 2008 Last Mille

AT&T is launching a nationwide, "ConnecTech" in-home technical support service for both AT&T and non-AT&T residential customers.

AT&T ConnecTech provides a full suite of in-home services for virtually all technical support needs, including television and home theater installation and personal computer and home network setup/maintenance/repair.

AT&T ConnecTech provides a customized portfolio for virtually all consumer services in all 50 states. Specifically, AT&T ConnecTech provides in-home and over-the-phone support services -- including next-day service installation, seven days a week -- for a broad range of TV and PC needs, including: