Avaya and IBM Expand Relationship With Focus on Unified Communications

Avaya and IBM announced an expansion of their alliance to deliver unified communications solutions backed by newly Avaya certified security products for enterprise clients and government organizations worldwide.
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The two companies also plan to focus support on Avaya Aura -- Avaya's new unified communications architecture -- by incorporating Avaya Aura into existing IBM converged communications services.


In addition, Avaya has certified the IBM Internet Security Systems' Proventia GX 5208 and Proventia Management SiteProtector SP1001 as compliant with IP telephony solutions from Avaya, enabling IBM to offer comprehensive intrusion protection for Avaya Aura's communication system.


"As more and more companies move toward unified communications, it's important that they take a holistic approach to security that encompasses multi-vendor applications in mobile and virtual environments," said Dan Powers, vice president of brand, strategy, marketing and business development at IBM ISS. "Individual workers will assume security comes from the core, but they can be one of the most vulnerable points of entry if it does not. IBM has created solutions in our Intrusion Prevention Systems designed to help prevent current and emerging threats and help keep unified communications deployments secure."


"IBM and Avaya have had a strong alliance for more than eight years, and with this expansion, we can offer a breadth of business communications solutions and truly complimentary portfolios designed to meet client demands around the globe," said Laurence Guihard-Joly, vice-president of Integrated Communications Services, IBM. "Together, IBM and Avaya offer robust and security rich mission critical solutions while adopting industry protocols and open standards."http://www.ibm.com
http://www.avaya.com

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U.S. Completes Historic Transition to DTV

On June 11, the United States completed its technological transition from analog to digital television. On June 12, all full-power television stations in the United States are required to stop analog TV broadcast service and transmit only digital signals.


The digital TV (DTV) transition, which was first proposed and mapped out two decades ago, clears valuable airwaves for new advanced wireless services, including first-responder radio.


Earlier this week, the Nielsen Company reported that 2.8 million U.S. households, or 2.5% of the television market, are completely unready for the transition. That represents about a 50%
improvement in readiness levels since the decision was made in February to delay the DTV transition.


"In any change this big, there are going to be disruptions," said FCC Acting Chairman Michael J. Copps. "We are trying our best to provide people, especially those who are most at risk,
with the help they need to make the switch as smoothly as possible. And we're going to keep offering it after June 12, so people should call us at 1-888-CALL-FCC."http://www.fcc.gov

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UTStarcom Cuts Jobs by 50%, Narrows Focus to China, India

UTStarcom announced a broad corporate restructuring under which it will reduce employment levels by 50% and focus its remaining resources on the products and regions likely to drive revenue growth and where it holds a competitive advantage. The company's initiatives will bring its annualized operating expenses below $100 million representing a greater than 50% reduction from current levels.


By the end of this year, UTStarcom will reduce the employee headcount to less than 2,000 marking a greater than 50% reduction from the current level. The company expects the majority of these measures will be initiated in the third quarter of 2009 and will be completed by the end of the fourth quarter 2009.


UTStarcom will also outsource its manufacturing operation to benefit from a variable cost business model and improve the company's cash flow cycles.


The company plans to optimize its R&D spending by focusing on selected products. R&D remains a strategic priority for UTStarcom and it will continue to invest in products with technological differentiation likely to drive revenue growth and improved gross margins.


The company plans to aggressively rationalize its facility locations and general administrative costs while maintaining a strategic presence in the most attractive markets.


"Today's announcement represents a significant change in our business model. Collectively, these initiatives are aimed at returning UTStarcom to profitability as quickly as possible," said Peter Blackmore, UTStarcom's CEO and president. "However, it does not fundamentally change our strategy which continues to focus on IP-based products in our major markets of China and India. We remain committed to maintaining our essential R&D and sales capabilities to help us achieve growth in our IP-based infrastructure products."http://www.utstar.com

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Fujitsu Develops 10 Gbps Impulse-Radio Millimeter-band Transceiver

Researchers at Fujitsu Laboratories have developed an impulse radio-based high-capacity wireless transmission system based on millimeter-band transmissions in the 70-100 gigahertz (70-100 GHz) range band. The technology has been demonstrated in kilometer-range wireless transmissions. Fujitsu claims the technology can achieve throughput exceeding 10 Gbps.


Potential applications include ultra-fast wireless LANs and for high-capacity trunk lines in places where fiber lines would be difficult to lay, such as last mile connections.


Fujitsu said its innovation dispenses with the oscillators and other components that have been required in conventional wireless transmission technologies, enabling compact and inexpensive millimeter-band transmission equipment.


This research was conducted as part of the Research and Development Project for Expansion of Radio Spectrum Resources sponsored by Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications.
http://www.fujitsu.com

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Huawei Offers WiMAX Distributed Base Station

Huawei Technologies introduced the first commercial WiMAX distributed base station (DBS) with 4T4R (four transmitters and four receivers).


The technology enables operators will to reduce the number of base station sites in certain areas while increasing operator efficiency by supporting multi-standard convergence. The design, which can also be configured into two 2T2R base stations, is based on Huawei' s fourth-generation base station platform, and also incorporates green technologies such as natural cooling and a high efficiency power amplifier. .


As of the first quarter of 2009, Huawei has been awarded 41 commercial WiMAX 802.16e contracts worldwide including Globe in the Philippines, STC in Saudi Arabia, Mobilink and Augere in Pakistan, and Méditel in Morocco.
http://www.huawei.com

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Deutsche Telekom to offer Microsoft Office on a Monthly Plan

Deutsche Telekom will become the first telecommunications provider to offer Microsoft Office to customers on monthly payment plan.


T-Mobile and Deutsche Telekom's business division will offer the latest version of Microsoft Office on a monthly payment plan to their customers. The PC-based offer will be available to T-Mobile Austria mobile broadband customers and fixed broadband business customers in Germany from Q3 2009. The offering will extend to other countries -- including the UK -- in the future.


"We are excited to be the first telecommunications provider to offer our customers Microsoft Office on a monthly payment plan." said Rainer Deutschmann, Senior Vice-President Mobile Internet ofhttp://www.telekom.de

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Monster Introduces “SuperThin Cable" for HDMI

Monster, which supplies cables, AV accessories, and power conditioning products, introduced new line of "Powered" SuperThin Cables for HDMI. The cables are designed for use with a wide variety of electronics devices, ranging from super-slim flat-panel TVs to digital video cameras, home theater systems, gaming systems or portable computers.


The new products are the first fruits of a recently announced collaboration with RedMere, a leader in advanced silicon chip development. The key innovation that made the thin cables possible is the RedMere MagnifEye Active technology. Requiring no external power supply the technology enables high data speeds by boosting the HD signals directly in the SuperThin cable itself. This eliminates the need for heavy-gauge copper, making the cables extremely light, thin and portable. SuperThin cables measure 3.5 mm in diameter, approximately 65% thinner than normal HDMI cables.


Monster Super Thin Cable for HDMI products will be available in 4-, 8-, and 16-foot versions.
http://www.monstercable.com
http://www.redmere.comNew capabilities are being built into the High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) specification, including networking capabilities with Ethernet connectivity and an Audio Return Channel to enable upstream audio connections via the HDMI cable. Specifically, these enhancements will include:


HDMI Ethernet Channel -- the HDMI 1.4 specification will add a data channel to the HDMI cable and will enable high-speed bi-directional communication. Connected devices that include this feature will be able to send and receive data via 100 Mb/sec Ethernet, making them instantly ready for any IP-based application. The HDMI Ethernet Channel will allow an Internet-enabled HDMI device to share its Internet connection with other HDMI devices without the need for a separate Ethernet cable. The new feature will also provide the connection platform to allow HDMI-enabled devices to share content between devices.

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Mformation Publishes Survey Finds Mobile Users Worried about Loss and Mobile Fraud

A survey of 4,000 mobile users in the U.S. and the U.K. has found that 40% of people would rather lose their wallet than their mobile device. A significant amount of information is now stored on mobile devices. 94% of users surveyed store telephone numbers while 65% also store address and other contact information on their phones; 83% have digital photos,51% have videos, 48% have calendar information and 40% have music downloads. With ever-increasing phone and network capabilities, this trend of using the phone to store valuable and sensitive data from every aspect of life is set to continue.


Mformation, which supplies mobile device management (MDM) solutions for network operators, said that one consequence of using the phone as a method for creating and storing data and information is that people must now worry about this material if the phone is lost or stolen -- 82% of people fear that if their phones were lost or stolen, someone would use the information stored on them for fraudulent means. 90% of those questioned are worried about the loss of their personal data if a mobile device were to go missing, with 72% admitting that the personal information stored on their devices would be difficult to replace. In addition, 40% of respondents even said that losing a mobile would be worse than losing their wallet.


"Operators need to step up to the mark to make sure that their customers are getting the service they expect in terms of security, data recovery and phone setup," said Matt Bancroft, Vice President, Mformation. "As people continue to increase their reliance on mobile phones for everyday actions, operators have to make sure that they are ready to support this increased commitment by the user. More extensive use of the device is great, but the mobile operators need to underpin this activity by offering capabilities to protect and manage users' data if things go wrong."


The research was undertaken by independent research house Coleman Parkes, which asked 4,000 people in the UK and US about problems related to mobile usage.
http://www.mformation.com

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Empirix Launches Hammer SIP Trunk Tester

Empirix released a tool for automated testing and verification of enterprise SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) trunking services. The Hammer SIP Trunk Tester system offers service providers an automated tool that verifies media quality, provisioned capacity and other Quality-of-Service (QoS) metrics during service turn-up. The Hammer SIP Trunk Tester is a software-based test application that measures connectivity, voice quality and other QoS metrics, while isolating the SIP trunks from the enterprise infrastructure. It is also fully scalable and can verify everything from a single SIP call to the provisioned bandwidth capacity for an enterprise dial plan -- unlike handheld VoIP test solutions. It can also fully emulate real-world scenarios, including enterprise-to-enterprise tests, different traffic profiles and looping multiple test cases in parallel.
http://www.empirix.com/hammersiptt

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Qualcomm Raises Financial Guidance Citing Increased Demand for High-End Chipsets

Qualcomm raised its financial guidance for the third fiscal quarter ending June 28, 2009. The new outlook includes:

• Revenues: estimated to be $2.67 to $2.77 billion compared to a prior guidance range of $2.40 to $2.60 billion.



• Operating income: estimated to be $1.06 to $1.11 billion pro forma, compared to our prior guidance range of $800 to $900 million; and estimated to be $830 to $880 million (GAAP), compared to prior guidance range of $550 to $650 million.



• CDMA-based Mobile Station Modem (MSM) shipments: estimated to be 94 to 95 million units compared to our prior guidance range of 87 to 92 million units.



• March quarter CDMA-based device shipments: estimated to be 109 to 111 million CDMA units (CDMA2000 and WCDMA), compared to our prior guidance of range of 107 to 112 million units; the CDMA unit average selling price is now estimated to be approximately $191, compared to our prior estimate of approximately $196.

"We are very pleased to raise our fiscal third quarter guidance, reflecting the strong worldwide demand for wireless broadband powered by 3G CDMA," said Dr. Paul E. Jacobs, chairman and CEO of Qualcomm. "Our increased guidance reflects stronger than expected demand for more data-capable chipsets and increased licensing revenues driven in part by advanced 3G network upgrades. While some chipset demand for developing markets has shifted to the fourth fiscal quarter and demand remains generally strong, due to the current economic environment we remain cautious and currently project a modest sequential decrease in chipset shipments."http://www.qualcomm.com

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Intelsat Plans 11 New Satellite Launches Through 2012

Intelsat expects to launch 11 satellites between now and the end of 2012, five of which will provide new or replacement capacity in the Asia-Pacific region. The Asia-Pacific build includes the acceleration of replacement satellites for two core roles and one new satellite that increases capacity for media and networking customers and addresses defense-related opportunities in the region. These include:


The Intelsat 17 satellite, to be located at 66º E, will provide higher-performing capacity across Europe, the Middle East, Russia and Asia, as well as expand Intelsat's C-band video distribution community in the Indian Ocean region. The Intelsat 17 satellite will replace the Intelsat 702 satellite.


The Intelsat 18 satellite, to be located at 180º E, will provide continuity and enhanced performance in C- and Ku-band for network, voice and video services to the Pacific Islands and offer connectivity to the Western United States. The Intelsat 18 satellite will replace the Intelsat 701 satellite.


The Intelsat 19 satellite, to be located at 166º E, will feature increased Ku-band capacity optimized for Direct-to-Home (DTH) and network services applications in Australia. The satellite's C-band capacity will provide enhanced performance capacity for distribution of international video content throughout Asia-Pacific with reach to the Western United States. The Ku-band payload will also support demand for mobility and enterprise network applications across the region. The Intelsat 19 satellite will replace the Intelsat 8 satellite.


The Intelsat 20 satellite will replace the Intelsat 10 and Intelsat 7 satellites, which are co-located at 68.5º E today, one of the most successful cable distribution neighborhoods serving the Asia-Pacific region. This satellite will provide regional and international programmers with ideal C-band penetration of the South Asian cable communities. The Intelsat 20 satellite also will carry a Ku-band payload, which will provide services into Asia, Africa and the Middle East for enterprise networks and DTH services.


Intelsat intends to increase its C- and Ku-band capacity in the region with the launch of the Intelsat 22 satellite, to be located at 72º E, addressing the growing opportunities for enterprise networks, mobility and defense-related applications. In April, Intelsat announced that the Australian Defence Force agreed to purchase a specialized UHF communications payload aboard the Intelsat 22 satellite to provide communications for its military.


Intelsat is also upgrading its Paumalu Teleport in Hawaii with improved fiber diversity and upgraded antenna facilities. Intelsat also expanded its GlobalConnex Network Broadband Managed services, adding hubs at KT Corporation's teleport facilities in South Korea.
http://www.intelsat.com

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