Arista's 7150 Switch Focuses on Low-Latency, Virtualized Data Centers

Arista Networks unveiled a new low-latency data center switch family designed for software-defined networking (SDN) in Big Data, Cloud Networks, Financial Trading, HPC and Web 2.0 environments. The new switches are designed to interoperate with SDN controllers for network-wide virtualization, virtual machine(VM) mobility and network services.

The new Arista 7150 Series offers up to 64 wire-speed 1/10 GbE ports or 16 40GbE ports.  Notably, the 7150 Series supports VXLAN tunnels at wire-speed, supporting workload mobility between physical and virtual machines.

In terms of performance, Arista achieves 40GbE port-to-port latency of 350 nanoseconds for Layer 2/3 forwarding. The switches support advanced network services, such as Network Address Translation, IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol, and congestion management.

Arista said the wire speed Network Address Translation (NAT) capabilities eliminate 100s of microseconds of forwarding delay in HPC and financial trading architectures. The advanced Latency Analyzer (LANZ+) functions provide application-level microburst detection, congestion monitoring and analysis essential to optimize big data and other performance-sensitive applications. The flexible forwarding path enables new packet formats to be parsed and forwarded with deterministic performance and provides investment protection. Along with open EOS APIs the 7150 Series offers monitoring, analysis and forensic capabilities for both coarse and fine-grained views of data flows and network activities; including stateless load balancing and network analyzer functionality. Additional AgilePort capability allows four individual 10Gb ports to be combined into a single 40Gb ports for further scale and simple network migrations.

"We are excited to collaborate with Arista on the 7150 Series, designed with the Intel® Ethernet Switch FM6000 silicon for flexible forwarding. Together with Programmable Arista EOS, new SDN functionality can be achieved with a common platform. Such versatility is a breakthrough innovation in the industry and a testament to the world-class design achieved by Arista and Intel working together," said Diane Bryant, Vice President and General Manager, Datacenter Group at Intel.

"Arista has combined a flexible forwarding data path with the Arista EOS (Extensible Operating System) to deliver breakthrough latency, power, density and advanced SDN features in a compact 1U form-factor. The Arista 7150 is truly the first next generation SDN switch for virtualized data centers,” stated Andy Bechtolsheim, CDO and Chairman of Arista Networks.

http://www.aristanetworks.com

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Broadcom Powers Next Gen 10G EPON

Broadcom introduced a new family of high-density dual, quad and octal port single-chip 10G-EPON Optical Line Terminals (OLTs) that will pave the way for next-generation FTTX access networks.

The new BCM5553x family offers support for both 10 Gbps (10G) symmetric and asymmetric data rates combined with 1 Gpbs (1G)-EPON co-existence on a single fiber, while enabling 3G/LTE mobile backhaul and enterprise business services on a common fiber access network.  

Key Features

• IEEE 802.3av, SIEPON P1904.1/D3.0, China Telecom 3.0, and Cable Labs DPoE  compliant
• Simultaneous 10G symmetric and asymmetric operation with 1.25 Gbps/2.5 Gbps co-existence
• 8x 10G IEEE 803.3av-compatible MACs with integrated 10G and 1G Burst-mode OLT SerDes
• Supports up to 512 subscribers per 10G port with up to four classes of service per subscriber
• Network Synchronization support for Mobile Backhaul over PON (1588 v2, ToD/1PPS, SyncE)
• Support for extended-reach PON up to 100 km
• Support for DOCSIS Mediation Layer (DML) middleware for Cable MSO applications

The new BCM5553x 10G EPON OLT chips can be matched with Broadcom's BCM88350 family of integrated single-chip traffic manager/packet processors and BCM55030 optical network unit (ONU) SoCs for a complete end-to-end solution set.

http://www.broadcom.com

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Broadcom Samples Universal Digital Front End for Base Stations

Broadcom introduced a Universal Digital Front End chip for wireless base stations and emerging HetNet radio applications.  

The BCM51030, which is now sampling, offers the full functionality of a digital front end (DFE) platform on a single chip with up to 10x wider bandwidth support to address fragmented spectrum.  The chip leverages Broadcom's VersaLine Digital Pre-Distortion (DPD) technology to adapt in real time to any combination of wireless protocols, including 2G, 3G and 4G signal combinations, power amplifiers and frequency bands. 

http://www.broadcom.com

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Cisco's Nexus 3548 Low Latency Switch Targets High Frequency Trading

Cisco introduced its lowest latency data center switch to date -- the Cisco Nexus 3548 with Algorithm Boost (Algo Boost). The Cisco Nexus 3548, which promises network-access performance as low as 190 nanoseconds (ns), is specifically optimized for high performance computing, high performance trading, and big data environments.

Specifically, the Nexus 3548 one-rack-unit (1RU) 10 GB Ethernet switch running in "warp mode" offers latencies as low as 190 ns in those environments with small to medium Layer 2 and Layer 3 scaling requirements. This makes it the fastest full-featured Ethernet switch on the market, according to the company.

Cisco's Algo Boost technology is integrated in the ASIC switching silicon to provide granular visibility into how the switch is performing. The switch leverages Precision Time Protocol to keep the entire infrastructure highly synchronized, enabling trading firms to correlate network events and better achieve regulatory compliance and digital forensics. Active Buffer Monitoring proactively monitors and alerts users to congestion points that could be occurring and may negatively impact application performance.

Cisco is also supporting Intelligent Traffic Mirroring, which consists of filtering and nanosecond time-stamping of captured traffic. This can help traders gain greater visibility into why gapping, slippage and slow order situations occur, correlating these trends with analytics tools to help enable smarter trading decisions.

Cisco said these capabilities in the new Nexus 3548 can give traders a competitive advantage in globally interconnected financial markets.

"Today, Cisco has leapfrogged our competitors in delivering a full featured switch that offers the lowest latency Ethernet in the networking industry. The Nexus 3548 with the unique Cisco Algo Boost technology implemented in ASIC provides a robust feature set to give financial traders more control over their sophisticated trading algorithms and respond more quickly to the changes in the market. In addition to the performance, this unique ultra-low-latency Ethernet technology is part of the unified data center fabric and offers strong total cost of ownership for commercial high-performance computing and big data environments as well as scale-out storage topologies," stated David Yen, senior vice president of Data Center Group at Cisco.

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Huawei Looks to Bring SDN to IP Core, Aggregation and Access Infrastructure

Huawei has begun supporting Software Defined Network (SDN) capabilities on its Service Provider routers. The company said its SDN solution is based on its high-performance, large-capacity hardware platform and fully distributed "VRP" software, which enables a centralized control plane and a software-defined forwarding plane.

Huawei will support Openflow for decoupling of hardware and software. By abstracting the control layer and the orchestration layer, Huawei said its SDN Enabled router enables carriers to rapidly deploy new services without having to change the forwarding hardware.  Another advantage of SDN, according to Huawei, is that end-to-end path calculation based on routing policies is possible with a centralized controller.  The SDN Enabled router is also expected to simplify IP network management.

For IP core networks, Huawei said its SDN Enabled router can realize control plane distribution and virtualization across chassis and across devices while achieving >99.999% reliability. At the metro convergence layer, Huawei will offer an SDN Enabled broadband network gate (BNG), while at the access layer it will also support a series of network virtualization solutions.

Gai Gang, President of Huawei's Carrier IP Product Line, said: "Huawei’s SDN Enabled router can help carriers cut OPEX significantly and alleviate impacts on networks caused by service changes through network virtualization and programmability. In addition, the network openness enables carries to continuously create value from existing resources. Huawei's NE40E high-end router already supports Openflow1.2 protocol, and has tested for interoperability at the Open Network Forum (ONF) this year."


http://www.huawei.com/en/about-huawei/newsroom/press-release/hw-193038-sdnip.htm

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T-Mobile USA Appoints John Legere as CEO - former Global Crossing Exec

Deutsche Telekom has appointed John Legere as CEO of T-Mobile USA, replacing Jim Alling, who will return to his position of Chief Operating Officer.

Legere, a 32-year veteran of the U.S. and global telecommunications and technology industries, is the former CEO of Global Crossing, where he successfully transformed the company to become a leading provider of IP services worldwide. Prior to joining Global Crossing, Mr. Legere was CEO of Asia Global Crossing, a Microsoft, Softbank and Global Crossing joint venture. Before that, Mr. Legere served as Senior Vice President of Dell Computer Corporation, where he was President of the Company’s operations in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, as well as in the Asia-Pacific region.

http://www.t-mobile.com/

• In October 2011, Level 3 Communications completed its acquisition of Global Crossing Limited. The merger combines Level 3's U.S. and European footprint with Global Crossing's extensive international, intercity network. Level 3 now will operate a services platform for medium to large enterprise, wholesale, content and government customers, anchored by extensive owned fiber networks on three continents in more than 45 countries as well as substantial undersea facilities. The combined business had pro forma 2010 revenues of $6.2 billion and pro forma 2010 Adjusted EBITDA of $1.3 billion before synergies and $1.6 billion after expected synergies. Corporate headquarters will remain in Broomfield, Colorado. James Q. Crowe is CEO of the company.

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Verizon and Union Reach Labor Agreement

Verizon Communications Inc. and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) reached an agreement on new, three-year contracts for about 43,000 East wireline associates.  The deal will be submitted to union members for a vote.

"We believe this is a fair and balanced agreement that is good for our employees as well as for the future of the Wireline business," said Marc Reed, Verizon's chief administrative officer. "It provides competitive wages, valuable benefits and affordable quality health care while giving the company new flexibility to better serve customers and become more efficient."

http://www.verizon.com

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BLiNQ Raises $10 Million for Wireless Backhaul

BLiNQ Networks, a start-up based in Plano, Texas, raised an additional $10 million in funding for its intelligent wireless backhaul solutions.

BLiNQ Networks was founded in June 2010 after the acquisition of intellectual property and wireless assets from Nortel Networks.  BLiNQ's solutions use sub-6 GHz TDD spectrum and unique and patent-pending Managed Adaptive Resource Allocation (MARA) technology to provide network-level intelligence, self-organizing network capabilities, and eliminates interference challenges to maximize spectral efficiency. The company has development facilities in Ottawa, Canada.

The non line of site (NLOS) backhaul technology is specifically designed for small cell transport.  The company says its solutions can be deployed anywhere in minutes with one truck roll and one technician. The solution is self-organizing and continually self-optimizes to adapt to the changing environment.

The new funding came from BDC Venture Capital, New Venture Partners and Summerhill Venture Partners.

http://www.blinqnetworks.com

• BLiNQ is headed by Carleton (Mickey) Miller, who previously was President, Wireless Network Solutions Group of Andrew Corporation.

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Gigamon Names Director of Service Provider Marketing

Gigamon, which provides Traffic Visibility Networking solutions, named Andy Huckridge as Director of Service Provider Marketing.  Huckridge joins Gigamon from VSS Monitoring, where he was Senior Director of Telecom Strategy and Marketing. Previously, he was Director of Marketing at Spirent Communications, and Director of Product Management at 8×8 Inc.

http://www.gigamon.com

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