Huawei: SDN and the Future of Networking

In this video interview, Jane Li, Chief Operating Officer, Huawei Enterprise, discusses cloud networking and SDN as key trends reshaping the industry and leading to new opportunities for companies with a broad range of integration expertise.

00:08 - Where are the big opportunities in networking today?

01:21 - How is Huawei positioned to deal with the transition to SDN in enterprise and data center networks?

02:32 - Where is SDN in the market today?

03:19 - Is SDN just another marketing game or will the concept of openness really take hold?

05:40 - What elements does Huawei need in its portfolio to succeed in SDN?

Ajay Gupta, Director of Marketing, Huawei, comments on the following:

07:34 - Will bare metal servers/switches based on commodity silicon come to dominate the networks of tomorrow?

08:59 - Will the transition to SDN be about building overlays on top of conventional networks?

09:50 - What are the market drivers for SDN?

10:35 - From an SDN point of view, how does Huawei approach security?

11:21 - What is the best thing about SDN?

See video: http://youtu.be/QsZT0yjXRN0

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Red Hat to Acquire Inktank, Provider of Ceph Scale-Out Storage

Red Hat agreed to acquire Inktank, a leading provider of scale-out, open source storage systems, for approximately $175 million in cash.

Founded in 2012, Inktank’s main objective has been to drive the widespread adoption of Ceph, a scalable, open source, software-defined storage system that runs on commodity hardware.   The company's flagship technology, Inktank Ceph Enterprise, delivers object and block storage software to enterprises deploying public or private clouds, including many early adopters of OpenStack clouds. Ceph was developed by Inktank’s founder and chief technology officer, Sage Weil, and is a replacement for legacy storage systems and provides a unified solution for cloud computing environments. Inktank’s customers include Cisco, CERN and Deutsche Telekom, and its partners include Alcatel-Lucent and Dell. The company has offices in Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Red Hat said the Ceph technology will be combined with its own existing GlusterFS-based storage offering, thus positioning Red Hat as the leading provider of open software-defined storage across object, block and file system storage.

http://www.redhat.com
http://www.inktank.com

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Equinix Cloud Exchange Simplifies Direct Connects to Public Clouds

Equinix launched its new Cloud Exchange, an advanced interconnection solution that enables seamless, on-demand and direct access to multiple clouds and multiple networks.  The goal is to give enterprises direct access to services for building sophisticated hybrid cloud solutions inside Equinix International Business Exchange (IBX) data centers.

With the Equinix Cloud Exchange customers can connect to Microsoft Azure ExpressRoute in Silicon Valley, Washington, D.C. and London with planned expansions into 13 additional markets by the end of 2014.  Customers can also access Amazon Web Services via the Equinix Cloud Exchange in Silicon Valley, Washington, D.C. and London. In addition, Equinix is working with other key cloud and network service providers to provide access to their services via the Cloud Exchange. Equinix provides a Cloud Exchange Portal and APIs to simplify the process of managing connections to multiple cloud services. Businesses can use the Portal and APIs to allocate, monitor and provision virtual circuits in near real-time with the provisioning of those circuits automated end-to-end from the Cloud Exchange to the service provider.

Equinix expects to be serving a total of 19 markets by the end of 2014 with its Cloud Exchange.

"Just as it was with the Internet, the key to realizing the business benefits of the cloud is how well connected it is," said Ihab Tarazi, chief technology officer at Equinix. "But companies are recognizing that the Internet has security and performance limitations, given that it is inherently open and shared publicly. By utilizing direct access via the Equinix Cloud Exchange, businesses no longer have to compromise on these essential requirements when accessing cloud providers."

http://www.equinix.com
http://www.ciena.com

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Riverbed Intros Virtual Cascade Express for Performance Monitoring

Riverbed Technology introduced a virtual version of its Cascade Express 460, which provides visibility into private cloud or software-defined data center environments running virtualized networks.

The Cascade Express 460 Virtual Edition network performance monitoring solution combines monitoring of traditional and virtualized network environments in a single virtual appliance that can be deployed easily into any type of environment.

“Software-defined data centers built on private cloud technology offer tremendous savings and flexibility, so businesses are increasingly adopting this approach to provision new services on demand,” said Dimitri Vlachos, vice president of marketing and products for Riverbed. “Cascade Express Virtual Edition enables customers to leverage powerful compute and network virtualization platforms while providing advanced application-aware network performance management. Customers gain a holistic view of their virtual and physical infrastructure, allowing them to have complete insight into application performance regardless of where the application is hosted and how it is delivered.”

Riverbed Cascade Express Virtual Edition runs on VMware vSphere.  Key capabilities:

• End-to-end monitoring, analytics and reporting. Avoid impact to the business from bad apps with advanced analytics that automatically detect, isolate and pinpoint changes in performance. Map cloud application dependencies to accelerate troubleshooting across complex application ecosystems.
• High-speed packet capture and storage with deep packet inspection of more than 1,000 popular applications combined with robust flow collection and deduplication for automated traffic and performance analysis.
• A concurrent user license of Riverbed Cascade Pilot for graphically analyzing traffic data on the Cascade Express appliance without having to transfer large trace files across the network.
• Support for network virtualization and overlay networks, such as VMware NSXTM, to give operations teams a unified view of network and application performance across the physical and virtual infrastructure.

http://www.riverbed.com

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SanDisk Readies Lightning Gen. II 12Gb/s SAS SSDs

SanDisk has begun sampling its Lightning Gen. II family of enterprise-class 12Gb/s Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) solid state drives (SSDs) for mixed-use, read- and write-intensive application workloads common in data centers.

The new Lightning Gen. II SSD product family doubles interface speeds over previously available 6Gb/s SSDs, providing the highest performance possible for mission-critical and virtualized data center application workloads. SanDisk also highlighted error correction and detection technology, full data path protection, instant secure erase, thermal monitoring, and die fail recovery capabilities of the new drives.

“Business data needs are becoming so performance-intensive that even applications that are already using SSDs need an additional boost,” said John Scaramuzzo, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Enterprise Storage Solutions at SanDisk. “The Lightning Gen. II SAS SSDs deliver double the throughput to each slot, empowering organizations to quickly and easily scale their performance infrastructure to meet this growing need.”

http://www.sandisk.com

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Integra Upgrades with Ciena's WaveLogic Photonics

Integra, an operator serving the western United States with a 6,400-mile long-haul fiber-optic network, 3,000 miles of metropolitan fiber and a nationwide IP/MPLS network, has deployed Ciena's converged packet optical to enhance a route that connects Salt Lake City to Sacramento.

With high-performance capacity of 100G per wavelength, this route is supported by Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform, including WaveLogic 3 Coherent Optical Processors and Smart Raman with PinPoint advanced fiber analytics software. Ciena’s WaveLogic Photonics capabilities allow Integra to simply and quickly deploy high-capacity services across the 1400 km route without regeneration, bypassing numerous huts while reducing latency, power, and space requirements.

To monitor its network, Integra will utilize both Ciena’s Smart Raman with PinPoint software and OneControl Unified Management System. Through the use of integrated OTDR traces, PinPoint enables quick and controlled service turn-up of photonic services and precise localization of fiber faults, which accelerates repair time from days to hours. OneControl will be used for full service lifecycle management from low-touch service activation and end-to-end visibility for comprehensive service assurance to ensure that Integra can efficiently meet all end-customer service level agreements (SLAs). Financial terms were not disclosed.

http://www.ciena.com

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Ericsson Names Rima Qureshi to be Chief Strategy Officer

Ericsson named Rima Qureshi as its new Chief Strategy Officer, a position in which she will drive the company's mergers and acquisitions (M&A) strategy and activities. In addition, she will serve as Chairman of Business Unit Modems.

Hans Vestberg, President and CEO of Ericsson, said: "I am very pleased with this appointment. Rima's comprehensive experience in driving both business and M&A's, along with a solid track record in strategy development and execution, makes her ideal for the job. Rima successfully led the integration of the CDMA and LTE assets of the former Nortel Networks Corporation and ran the business unit CDMA Mobile Systems during the years 2010-2012."

Rima Qureshi has been Senior Vice President and part of Ericsson's Executive Leadership Team since 2010.

Rima Qureshi joined Ericsson in 1993, and prior to running Business Unit CDMA Mobile Systems, her career spanned leadership roles in R&D, sales, and Services, including managing Global Service Delivery Centers in Canada, the US, Mexico and Brazil.

http://www.ericsson.com

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Edgewater Raises $5 Million to Expand Portfolio

Edgewater Networks, which supplies Enterprise Session Border Controllers, secured $5 million in debt financing to develop new products that leverage SDN and NFV.

Edgewater said it now has more than 240,000 Edgewater Enterprise Session Border Controllers (ESBCs) currently deployed by leading service providers and integrators, including one of the two largest U.S. carriers and three of the top five U.S. cable operators.

“We believe that SDN and NFV are driving significant transformation in service provider networks and opening new avenues for service delivery,” said Dave Norman, CEO of Edgewater Networks. “We are excited about the expansion of our product portfolio and how it will help our customers to easily deliver a new class of profitable business services.”

The new funding was secured from Eastward Capital and brings the total debt and equity funding raised by Edgewater Networks to date to $36 million.

http://www.edgewaternetworks.com

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IBM Awarded Patent for Job Scheduling in Clouds

IBM was awarded a patent for a method of managing how resources are used and work is done within a cloud by distributing control throughout the interconnected systems.

IBM said this latest cloud computing invention, U.S. Patent #8645745: Distributed Job Scheduling In A Multi-Nodal Environment, was originally designed to help manage resources in high performance computing systems used for government and academic research. These systems consist of hundreds or thousands of computing resources that are connected to perform complex tasks where demands for system resources can rise and fall dynamically -- similar to the model for cloud computing. The job scheduling function is broken up into pieces and distributed throughout the system, with a job scheduler assigned to each node of a system or cloud. Each job scheduler can manage resources and prioritize requests within its own node. But if it determines that it needs more resources it can dynamically join with other nodes. One of the nodes becomes the primary node, controlling the shared resources within the node group.

"Try to imagine the tens of thousands of airplanes that fly across the United States each day being managed by a single air traffic controller, who must keep track of each one and determine what runways, gates, maintenance facilities, etc. are available at every airport across the country," said IBM inventor Eric Barsness. "The best way to complete that task efficiently and effectively is to break it up to thousands of air traffic controllers, each of which has a view of all resources available and can prioritize and direct traffic accordingly. That's effectively what this invention can do within a cloud computing environment."

http://www.ibm.com

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Cavium Posts 20% YoY Growth for Q1

Cavium reported Q1 2014 revnue of $83.2 million, a 2.5% sequential increase from the $81.1 million reported in the fourth quarter of 2013 and a 19.7% year-over-year increase from the $69.5 million reported in the first quarter of 2013. Net income (GAAP) was $2.3 million, or $0.04 per diluted share, compared to $0.2 million, or $0.00 per diluted share in the fourth quarter of 2013. Gross margins were 63.5% in the first quarter of 2014 compared to 64.2% in the fourth quarter of 2013. Total cash and cash equivalents were $124.1 million at March 31, 2014.

http://www.cavium.com

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Level 3 Partners with Digital Realty for Direct Connects to AWS, Microsoft Azure

Level 3 and Digital Realty, which owns 131 data centers in major cities worldwide, announced a partnership to deliver direct cloud services to co-location customers.  The initial rollout targets 14 markets in the U.S. and Europe and will include Amazon Web Services (AWS Direct Connect) and Microsoft Azure (ExpressRoute).

Digital Realty said a hybrid cloud environment offers its customers the ability to centralize IT management and also gain the flexibility to respond to changing business needs as a result of data and storage growth. For example, leveraging Level 3's virtual private network services, Digital Realty customers can dynamically scale their bandwidth and only pay for what they consume as demand for computing capacity spikes, say during the holiday shopping season. In a hybrid environment, transferring large data sets is expedited with greater bandwidth capacity, which also improves the performance of real-time voice and data feeds.

"This relationship with Level 3 enables us to facilitate connections for our clients to AWS or Azure globally with Level 3 Cloud Connect Solutions in a seamless and highly secure manner," said Digital Realty Interim CEO, Bill Stein. "As our clients' capacity and connectivity needs grow, it's our goal to facilitate their easy access to a broad range of solution providers. Our alliance with Level 3 and their growing cloud ecosystem play a key role in the breadth of support we can extend to our clients."

http://www.level3.com/en/products-and-services/cloud-and-it/cloud-services/

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Zayo to Acquire Neo Telecoms for Paris Fiber Network

Zayo agreed to acquire Neo Telecoms (Neo) for its fiber network in Paris.  Financial terms were not disclosed.

The acquisition adds 350 metro route miles in Paris and more than 500 on-net buildings to Zayo’s network. Neo also operates 9 colocation centers across France, offering more than 36,000 square feet of data center space. The Paris and regional network throughout France will be integrated into Zayo’s existing European network connecting London, Frankfurt and Amsterdam and the U.S.

Neo, which was founded in 2003, provides dark fiber, IP, Ethernet, wavelength and colocation services to high-bandwidth companies in continental Europe and serves more than 600 carrier and enterprise customers, primarily concentrated in the technology, media, telecom, and finance sectors.

“Neo has established a strong Bandwidth Infrastructure presence in France and we believe this acquisition will enable growth through our combined fiber footprint for end-to-end solutions,” said Dan Caruso, President and CEO of Zayo Group. “While we will bring a much expanded capability to the table, we also respect the importance of local relationships and expertise. The two principal founders of Neo, Didier Soucheyre and Florian du Boys, will stay with the combined companies and lead Zayo France, a new business unit focused on that market.”

http://www.zayo.com
http://www.neotelecoms.com/

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365 DataCenters: Co-location and Cloud Services for SMBs

365 DataCenters, which was previously known as 365 Main, announced a corporate rebranding as it focuses on colocation services for small and medium enterprises.  The company operates in sixteen markets across the U.S.

In this video interview, John Scanlon looks at the colocation opportunity with small to medium-sized businesses especially as they make the transition from on-premise infrastructure to hybrid cloud solutions. The company's goal is to make data centers more accessible to small customers by eliminating long-term commitments.


See video:  http://youtu.be/p_E1AhL4iRE

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CableWiFi Alliance Tops 250,000 WiFi Hotspots

The CableWiFi Alliance hit a significant milestone:  more than 250,000 hotspots are now available at no additional charge to qualified customers of participating companies including Cablevision, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cox Communications and Bright House Networks. Major areas of deployment include New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Orlando, Tampa, Kansas City, Austin, and Charlotte.

"In today's hyper-connected world, WiFi hotspots have become one of the most important and fastest growing technologies of the Internet era," said Michael Powell, National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) President & CEO. "With 250,000 WiFi hotspots now available to millions of cable broadband customers at no additional charge, the value and reach of cable's robust Internet service increases significantly. The cable industry is committed to providing American consumers with the best Internet experience and the growth of the CableWiFi Alliance is delivering on that promise."

http://www.comcast.com

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Infonetics: Small Cell Market to Hit $2.5 Billion in 2018

The small cell market saw significant growth in 2013 as the total number of small cell units shipped hit 642,000, a 143% spike from 2012, according to a new report from Infonetics Research.  Over half of these units are of the 3G variety, and Infonetics predicts that 4G metrocells will close the gap with 3G this year, becoming the main growth engine.

“As we anticipated, the great small cell ramp did not happen in 2013 as many in the industry had hoped. Testing activity remained solid, but actual deployments were modest. Small cell revenue was just $771 million last year, a sharp contrast to the $24 billion 2G/3G RAN market,” reports Stéphane Téral, principal analyst for mobile infrastructure and carrier economics at Infonetics Research.

Some additional highlights:

• As mobile operators have to approach a “critical mass” of data traffic before small cells even become a consideration, it is the developed countries (Japan, South Korea, the UK and US) that are driving early adoption
• Backhaul is no longer a major inhibitor to small cell deployment, but it will remain an issue for some mobile operators due to the locations in which they operate
• 5G is coming, fully loaded with small cells: NTT DOCOMO in Japan plans to have 5G commercially available in 2020, in time for the Tokyo Olympics.

http://www.infonetics.com

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Orange LTE Rollout Reaches 58% Population Coverage in France

As of the end of Q1 2014, Orange was serving over 239.4 million customer accesses across all of its global properties, up 4% from a year ago.  During Q1, Orange added 84,000 fixed line broadband customer in Spain and 31,000 in France. In terms of post-paid wireless customers, Orange added 114K in Poland, 86K in France and 73K in Spain.

Consolidated revenues were 9.804 billion euros, a 3.8% decrease on a comparable basis. Excluding the impact of regulatory measures, the decrease was 3.0%, an improvement of 0.8 percentage points compared to the 4th quarter 2013 figure, which primarily related to France and the Enterprise segment. In France, the revenue decline slowed to 4.9% after falling 6.2% in the 4th quarter of 2013 (+1.3 percentage points). The improvement was related to both fixed and mobile services.

“Orange’s first quarter 2014 performance was very satisfactory, aided in large part by the continued strong commercial momentum in our core countries. Orange benefits from the efficient segmentation of its offers as well as its investment in very high-speed broadband – fibre and 4G – which enable the Group to differentiate itself from the competition," stated Stéphane Richard, Chairman and CEO of the Orange Group.

Some other indicators:

• In France, the FTTH network added 47K customers.  The 4G network now cover 58% of the population with 5,400 LTE-enabled base stations.  A total of 1,180 4G sites were activated in Q1.  There are 1.4 million LTE subscribers.
• In Spain, the 4G network now has over 2,400 base stations enabled, covering 50% of the population.

http://www.orange.com/en/finance/nbsp2/investors-and-analysts/latest-consolidated-results

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Sprint's LTE Footprint Now Covers 225 Million POPs

Sprint's LTE network now covers more than 225 million people and remains on track to cover 250 million by mid-year.

The company also announced availability of Sprint Spark, its enhanced LTE service delivering peak wireless speeds of 60 Mbps on capable devices, in six new cities:  Newark, N.J.; Oakland, California; Orlando, Florida; Tacoma, Washington; Waukegan, Illinois; and West Palm Beach, Florida.

Sprint Spark is expected to cover 100 million people by year-end.

In its quarterly financial report report released on Tuesday, Sprint noted a loss of a net loss of 231,000 Sprint platform postpaid customers during the quarter largely due to expected elevated churn levels related to service disruption associated with the company’s ongoing network overhaul. Sprint platform prepaid net loss of 364,000 customers was primarily caused by changes in the Lifeline program recertification process that impacted its "Assurance Wireless" subscriber base. Sprint added 212,000 wholesale and affiliate customers during the quarter. At the end of the quarter, Sprint was serving a total of about 54 million subscribers.

 “In the quarter, operating revenue and Adjusted EBITDA* both grew year-over-year even as investments in our network improvements continued,” said Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO. “With the expected mid-year completion of the rip and replacement of our core 3G and voice network, the ongoing roll-out of Sprint SparkTM, and the evolution of Sprint FramilySM, we plan to build the best customer experience in the industry,” stated Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO.

http://www.sprint.com

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Apigee Raises $60 Million for Predictive Analytics

Apigee, a start-up based in San Jose, California, raised $60 million in venture financing for its API platform for enabling predictive analytics in digital interactions.

The company's Apigee Edge API platform helps enterprises to build mobile and digital initiatives using APIs, apps and data. Apigee Insights delivers big data predictive analytics. Apigee says that when used together, its APIs and predictive analytics can create an adaptive cycle of continuous improvement – and the faster an enterprise goes through this cycle, the faster it can innovate, adapt and accelerate its digital business.

Pine River Capital Management and Wellington Management Company participated as new investors in this round, along with current Apigee investors Norwest Venture Partners (NVP), Bay Partners, Third Point LLC, SAP Ventures, funds managed by BlackRock, Focus Ventures, and Accenture. With this financing, Apigee has raised $171 million to date.

Apigee will use the funds to accelerate across all areas of its business to keep up with demand for APIs and big data analytics, as enterprises increasingly embrace these technologies for digital business.

http://apigee.com/

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Nokia appoints Rajeev Suri as President and CEO

Following the completion of the sale of its Devices & Services business to Microsoft, Nokia unveiled its new corporate strategy and named Rajeev Suri as President and CEO.

Nokia's overall vision is to leverage its three strong businesses in networks, location and technologies to be a leader in technologies important in a connected world.

• Through its Networks business (formerly Nokia Solutions and Networks, or NSN), Nokia will invest in the innovative products and services needed by telecoms operators to manage the increase in wireless data traffic which is more than doubling every year.
  
• Through its HERE business, Nokia will invest to further develop its location cloud to make it the leading source of location intelligence and experiences across many different operating systems, platforms and screens. Three target areas: 1) technology for smart, connected cars; 2) cloud-based services for personal mobility and location intelligence, including for the growing segment of wearables and special purpose devices; and 3) location-based analytics for better business decisions.
  
• Through its Technologies business, Nokia will invest in the further development of its industry-leading innovation portfolio. This will include 1) expanding the company's intellectual property licensing program; 2) helping other companies and organizations benefit from breakthrough innovations through technology licensing; and 3) exploring new technologies for use in potential future products and services.

"As Nokia opens this new chapter, the Nokia Board and I are confident that Rajeev is the right person to lead the company forward," said Risto Siilasmaa, Chairman of the Nokia Board of Directors. "He has a proven ability to create strategic clarity, drive innovation and growth, ensure disciplined execution, and deliver results. We believe that his passion for technology will help ensure that Nokia continues to deliver innovations that have a positive impact on people's lives."

Suri joined Nokia in 1995 and has held a wide range of leadership positions in the company. Since October of 2009, he has served as CEO of NSN.  Risto Siilasmaa, who has also been serving as an interim CEO of Nokia, will return to focusing exclusively on his role as Chairman of Nokia's Board of Directors as of May 1, 2014.

Nokia also announced its dividend schedule for distributing capital from the Microsoft deal to its shareholders.

http://www.nokia.com

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Riverbed Posts 8% YoY Growth for Q1

Riverbed reported Q1 2014 revenue of $265 million, up 8% compared to the first quarter of 2013 (Q1’13). GAAP net income for Q1’14 was $3.3 million, or $0.02 per diluted share. This compares to a net loss of $8.1 million, or ($0.05) per diluted share, in Q1’13.

“Our first quarter results are a strong proof point supporting our strategy to bring value to our customers by optimizing the delivery of applications and data on a global scale and to deliver profitable returns to our shareholders,” said Jerry M. Kennelly, chairman and CEO. “Year-over-year revenue growth was led by WAN optimization and strength in enterprise and international sales. We are also very encouraged by our performance management business with increasing revenue from channel partners and significant growth in Europe.”

http://www.riverbed.com

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Overture Debuts Ensemble Service Orchestrator and Ensemble Network Controller

Overture is stepping up its game in software defined networking (SDN) and network functions virtualization (NFV) with the commercial availability of its Ensemble Service Orchestrator (ESO) and Ensemble Network Controller (ENC), two key pieces of its open architecture for service automation.

Overture said its goal is to bring together open automation and management of both the physical Carrier Ethernet and virtual infrastructure.  The will use open APIs for deployment into third-party infrastructure.any service provider architecture, Ensemble Service Orchestrator and Ensemble Network Controller may be deployed together as a system or integrated independently.

·       The Ensemble Service Orchestrator is an open, extensible carrier-class NFV service lifecycle management and orchestration system that coordinates virtual resources and physical network elements to create, activate and assure services using one or more virtual network functions. ESO uses the OpenStack™ cloud controller – bundled with ESO – to manage the virtual compute environment, including virtual machines, virtual switches and top-of-rack datacenter switches. For management of the physical wide area network traffic flows, ESO leverages Overture’s Ensemble Network Controller but can also be integrated with other third-party network controllers.
·       The Ensemble Network Controller is a service-aware network controller and management system for the Carrier Ethernet metro service edge. With native support for all Overture network elements, ENC is extensible to support third-party network elements and automates service creation, service activation, device detection, fault management and performance monitoring. By presenting a complete network picture, ENC helps service providers add new services and virtualized network functions without compromising existing network operations.

Overture has a number of field trials and proofs of concept underway.

“The automation and virtualization challenges at the metro service edge differ greatly from those in the data center, which led us to create a true carrier-class orchestration and control solution specifically focused on the part of the network where services are actually delivered,” said Mike Aquino, president and CEO, Overture. “Service providers need to be able to automate and orchestrate the complete service lifecycle across both the virtual and physical metro edge domains. We have been extremely pleased with the response that Ensemble OSA continues to receive from our service provider customers.”

http://www.overturenetworks.com

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Overture's vE-CPE bundles Virtual Branch Office Router, Firewall, VPN

Overture introduced a turnkey network functions virtualization (NFV) solution for virtual managed enterprise CPE (vE-CPE).

The pre-tested, integrated solution bundles third-party virtual branch office router, firewall, and VPN functions with Overture’s Ensemble OSA software and enablement services. Additional pre-integrated virtual network functions (VNFs)are available as options. Through the Overture Ensemble orchestration and control software, the vE-CPE functions can be deployed in a centralized environment, such as a datacenter or central office, or may be distributed out to virtualization platforms on the customer premise.

Overture said this solution combines its strength in Carrier Ethernet 2.0, its new Ensemble OSA NFV orchestration and control software, a set of third-party VNFs, Overture enablement services, and technical support to create a fully integrated solution.

“In a growing ecosystem of independent software vendors, communications service providers (CSPs) that want to explore modern virtualization options may be resource-constrained to adequately evaluate all of the choices as well as perform all the required system integration work,” said Mike Aquino, president and CEO, Overture. “The Overture vE-CPE Ensemble Solution Pack provides an open, pre-integrated, fully-supported NFV solution to help them accelerate their enterprise service deployments.”

http://www.overturenetworks.com

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IBM Opens its Cloud Marketplace and BlueMix Garage in SF's SOMA

IBM launched a new cloud marketplace that provides gateway for the company's extensive global business partner ecosystem to tap into the growing $250B cloud market opportunity.

Clients can access a full suite of IBM-as-a-Service with 100 SaaS applications, IBM's Bluemix platform-as-a-service with composable services, the powerful SoftLayer infrastructure-as-a-service and third party cloud services.

"Increasingly cloud users from business, IT and development across the enterprise are looking for easy access to a wide range of services to address new business models and shifting market conditions," said Robert LeBlanc, Senior Vice President, IBM Software & Cloud Solutions. "IBM Cloud marketplace puts Big Data and Analytics, mobile, social, commerce, integration ---- the full power of IBM-as-a-Service and our ecosystem --- at our clients' fingertips to help them quickly deliver innovative services to their constituents."

Initial third-party cloud providers in the marketplace include SendGrid, Zend, Redis Labs, Sonian, Flow Search Corp, Deep DB, M2Mi and Ustream.

In addition, IBM added 30 additional cloud services to BlueMix, its Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) to help developers quickly integrate applications and speed deployment of new cloud services.  Additionally, IBM is launching BlueMix Garages, collaborative locations where developers can create new apps on BlueMix, learn new development skills, and access IBM's developer ecosystem. The first such faclity is in San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood.

IBM is leveraging BlueMix's foundation on SoftLayer. The goal is to combine  IBM's middleware software with third-party and open technologies to create an integrated development experience in the cloud.

http://www.ibm.com/cloud-computing/us/en/

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Virtus Data Centres Adds Microsoft Azure Direct Connection in London

Virtus Data Centres began offering the availability of direct, private connections to Microsoft Azure from its data center in London.  The connection is provided Level 3’s network from Virtus Data Centres.

Virtus already offered direct connection into AWS, also provided over Level 3.

http://blog.virtusdatacentres.com/

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Microsoft Bumps OneDrive Cloud Storage from 25GB to 1TB

Microsoft is increasing OneDrive for Business storage from 25GB to 1TB per user.  The boost affects all Office 365 ProPlus subscribers.  Microsoft is also developing tools to help businesses to migrate their content to OneDrive.

https://onedrive.live.com/about/en-us/

• In its latest quarterly report released last week, Microsoft stated that Office 365 revenue grew over 100% year-over-year, and commercial seats nearly doubled, demonstrating strong enterprise momentum for Microsoft’s cloud productivity solutions.

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AT&T Eyes Air-to-Ground LTE In-Flight Service

AT&T is looking to launch an LTE-based in-flight connectivity service for airlines and passengers in commercial, business and general aviation over the continental United States.

AT&T said it is working with Honeywell to provide hardware and service capabilities to deliver the in-flight connectivity solution. The companies did not disclose which spectrum bands already owned by AT&T they would use or how the new air-to-ground network would be configured.  They expect in-flight broadband performance will exceed current offerings and that the service could be available as soon as late 2015.
“Everyone wants access to high-speed, reliable mobile Internet wherever they are, including at 35,000 feet,” said John Stankey, Chief Strategy Officer at AT&T. “We are building on AT&T’s significant strengths to develop in-flight connectivity technology unlike any other that exists today, based on 4G LTE standards. We believe this will enable airlines and passengers to benefit from reliable high speeds and a better experience. We expect this service to transform connectivity in the aviation industry – we are truly mobilizing the sky.”

http://about.att.com/story/mobilizing_the_sky_att_building_4g_lte_in_flight_connectivity_service.html

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HP Fortifies its Mission-Critical Cloud Platform

HP announced performance and reliability enhancements to the HP-UX operating environment and HP CloudSystem Matrix with HP-UX, as well as new HP Integrity NonStop entry-class servers.

The latest HP-UX 11i v3 solution reduces planned downtime for maintenance and upgrades while increasing capacity and performance. With this release, customers can now:

• Perform zero-downtime platform upgrades of virtualized applications btween HP Integrity i2 and HP Integrity i4 servers.
• Virtualize larger workloads, with double the virtual machine capacity from previous versions, now with up to 32 processor cores and 256 GB memory.
• Reduce reboot times by up to 50 percent with Soft Reboot, available now for HP Integrity i4 server blades.
• Reconfigure virtualized I/O without system downtime.

With enhancement to HP CloudSystem Matrix with HP-UX, customers can improve efficiency and service level agreement (SLA) performance with:

• Larger private cloud deployments to enable better performance and flexibility, by provisioning workloads running vPars (v6), or with direct I/O networking.
• Lowered entry cost of HP-UX private cloud deployments with new two socket license bundles.
• Increased data center processing capacity by identifying inefficient server processes, so they can be eliminated and resources can be made available for key workloads.

“Enterprises everywhere are required to handle significant data volume while providing customers continuous access and availability to their mission-critical workloads,” said Ric Lewis, vice president and general manager, Enterprise Servers Business, HP. “The latest enhancements to our HP Integrity solutions demonstrate HP’s commitment to provide customers with purpose-built, highly-available infrastructure capabilities for their most critical applications.”

http://www8.hp.com/us/en/hp-news/press-release.html?id=1631138#.U18m0vldWP0

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Fujitsu+Panasonic Silicon Venture Gets Funded

Fujitsu Semiconductor and Panasonic received funding support from Development Bank of Japan for a new venture that would combine certain semiconductor assets from each company.

Based on the agreement reached so far, Fujitsu, Panasonic and DBJ have agreed that DBJ will make a maximum investment of 20.0 billion yen in equity capital in the new company and will provide a maximum credit line of 10.0 billion yen to the new company. As a result, at the time of the business integration, it is expected that the ratio of voting rights held in the new company by Fujitsu, Panasonic and DBJ will be 40%, 20%, and 40%, respectively. The new company will operate independently.

http://www.fujitsu.com/global/news/pr/archives/month/2014/20140423-01.html

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NTT Develops Long-lived Quantum Memory

NTT, in partnership with Japan's National Institute of Informatics and Osaka University, announced a new approach in the development of a long-lived quantum memory that could be used in quantum computing.

The research involves a superconductor diamond quantum hybrid system in which a dark state was shown to be 150 ns, an order of magnitude longer than previous attempts to hold state. By using a gap-tunable superconducting flux qubit, the researchers were able to change the energy without decreasing the lifetime of the memory.

http://www.ntt.co.jp/news2014/1404e/140408a.html

In November 2013, NTT announced a quantum buffer on an optical waveguide that takes advantage of the "slow light effect:, where the propagation speed of a pulsed light in a special optical waveguide slows significantly compared with the speed of light in vacuum.

The company said this innovation facilitates the precise synchronization of photons, thereby creating a buffer that could be used to create quantum computers.  Experiments have shown that the buffer can slow down the speed of pulsed photons to 1/60 of the speed of light in vacuum while faithfully preserving its quantum state. The device used for this demonstration was created by NTT Basic Research Laboratories fabricated by coupling nanocavities with a total length of 840 μm using a silicon photonic crystal.

The research was published in the UK science journal “Nature Communications”.

http://www.ntt.co.jp/news2013/1311e/131112a.html

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Toshiba Research, BT and ADVA Test ‘Quantum Leap’ Encryption

Toshiba Research Europe, BT, ADVA Optical Networking and the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), the UK’s National Measurement Institute, have tested Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) technology over a live fibre network.

BT said the idea behind the trial is to leverage the principles of quantum mechanics in transmitting encryption key information. Any attempt to intercept the key can be identified, as it introduces anomalies which can be detected. If this occurs, the ‘transaction’ can be aborted, and a new key sent automatically. By sending multiple quantum keys every second, the security of a fibre line can be constantly monitored and attempts to ‘tap’ the signal can be instantly identified.

The test was conducted using quantum equipment developed by Toshiba, measured and evaluated by the Quantum Detection Group at NPL, and running in conjunction with ADVA Optical Networking’s encryption equipment over a live BT fibre link between Adastral Park, BT’s technology research campus in Suffolk, and another BT site in Ipswich.

"The first field trial of QKD on lit fibre marks an importance advance for the technology. Using techniques to filter out noise from the very weak quantum signals, we’ve shown that QKD can be operated on optical fibres installed in the ground and carrying conventional data signals," stated Andrew Shields from Toshiba Research Europe in Cambridge.

This means QKD can be implemented without the need for additional ‘dark fibre’ that is often unavailable or prohibitively expensive.”

http://www.btplc.com/News/Articles/ShowArticle.cfm?ArticleID=05C86FD3-A148-443C-AF60-00F3C6E60B53

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Huawei Saw a 21% Jump in its Services Business Last Year

As a follow-up to its 2013 financial report issued last month, Huawei provided additional detail on its services business:  2013 sales from services amounted to US$8.59 billion, a YoY increase of 21.3%, accounting for 31% of the total Carrier Network Business Group (CNBG) revenue, making it the fastest-growing business for the group.

Huawei said its services group saw traction from End-to-End (E2E) Network Planning and Evolution, Managed Services, and Customer Experience Management (CEM) solutions.

Mr. David Leizhankui, Senior Vice President of Huawei Global Technical Service, said: "By enabling network and service evolution, Huawei Service has worked closely with carriers on their day-to-day operations, giving us deep insights and understanding into carriers' networks, services and customer experience. In fact, Services have become indispensable for meeting carrier demands."

http://pr.huawei.com/en/news/hw-333405-services.htm#.U13YkfldWP0

On 31-Mar-2014, Huawei reported 2013 sales revenues of CNY239 billion (US$38.45 billion), up 8.5% year-on-year (11.6% YOY growth in USD), and net profit of CNY21 billion (US$3.38 billion).  In its newly released annual report, the privately-held company said financial performance was strong across all business areas.

Some 2013 highlights:

• Huawei's carrier network business achieved CNY166.5 billion in sales revenue, up 4.0% year-on-year. 
• Enterprise and consumer businesses revenue increased by 32.4% and 17.8% to CNY15.2 billion and CNY57.0 billion, respectively. 
• Huawei earned 65% of its revenue from markets outside of China in 2013.
• In the Chinese market, Huawei achieved CNY84 billion in sales revenues, up 14.2% year-on-year.
• Huawei invested CNY30.7 billion (~5.06 USD billion) into R&D, which is about 12.8% of its sales revenue. 
• 150,000 employees

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Exar to Acquire Taiwan's iML for Flat Panel Silicon

Exar Corporation, which supplies analog mixed-signal, video and data management solutions, agreed to acquire Integrated Memory Logic Limited (iML), a provider of analog mixed-signal solutions for the flat panel display market.  Exar will pay acquire all of the outstanding shares of iML for NT$91.00 (approximately US$3.00) per iML share in cash and acquire any remaining shares at NT$91.00 per share pursuant to a follow-on merger. The gross transaction value will be NT$6.8 billion (approximately US$223 million), or NT$3.1 billion (approximately US$94 million), net of cash acquired.

Exar said the iML acquisition supports Exar's strategy of building a large scale diversified analog mixed-signal business.

"The acquisition of iML will increase the diversity of the markets we serve and add highly differentiated analog mixed-signal and power management products to our portfolio. iML is a leading provider of power management and color calibration solutions for large and medium-sized flat panel displays in the LED television market as well as high-resolution tablets. The company serves customers in Korea, Taiwan, Japan and China, which will enhance Exar's existing presence in these markets.  Additionally, iML has demonstrated consistent profitability and gross margins that reflect the value of the company's differentiated products," said Louis DiNardo, Exar President and CEO.

http://www.exar.com
http://www.iml.com

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Samsung Boosts Data Center SSDs to 960GB

Samsung Electronics began mass producing the industry’s first high-performance, three-bit-NAND-based SSD for servers and data centers.

The new PM853T SSD, available in densities of 240GB, 480GB and 960GB, offers high levels of random IOPS (inputs/output per second) performance and quality of service (QoS).

Samsung said the new SSDs will allow data centers to better manage workloads related to social networking, web browsing and email, and enhance operation efficiency. Installations of the 3-bit MLC (multi-level-cell) NAND SSDs, initially in large-scale data centers, are expected to begin later this quarter.

“Following the last year’s introduction of 3-bit NAND-based SSDs for PC markets, our new 3-bit SSD for data centers will help considerably in expanding the market base for SSDs,” said Young-Hyun Jun, executive vice president, memory sales and marketing, Samsung Electronics. “We expect SSD market growth will gain momentum as this new SSD delivers significant improvements in data center investment efficiency, leading to full-fledged commercialization of SSDs in IT systems later this year.”

http://www.samsung.com

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Infonetics: Mobile Device Security Software to Hit $3.4 Billion in '18

Worldwide revenue for mobile device security client software is up 10% sequentially in 4Q13, to $385 million, and is projected to continue to grow rapidly in coming years, according to a new report from Infonetics Research.

“The triple threat of bring-your-own-device (BYOD) as a dominant enterprise trend, an increasingly hostile threat environment, and the deluge of frightening revelations about privacy courtesy of the NSA is forcing enterprises and consumers to invest real money in mobile device security. The mobile device security software market grew 40% to cross the billion-dollar mark in 2013 and we expect it to grow to $3.4 billion in 2018,” says Jeff Wilson, principal analyst for security at Infonetics Research.

Some additional highlights of the report:

• Asia Pacific accounted for 34% of security client revenue in 2013, followed closely by North America (32%) and EMEA (31%); Latin America came in a very distant fourth
• Though North America greatly lags behind EMEA and Asia Pacific in total smartphone shipments, it has strong security client adoption relative to the other regions
• In 2013, enterprise mobile clients comprised 51% of the total security client market, while consumer mobile security clients made up 49%.

http://www.infonetics.com

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Movistar TV Spain Signs On for UEFA Euro 2016 and 2018 FIFA World Cup

Telefónica Movistar TV acquired exclusive broadcast rights for the Spanish market for the 546 official matches between European teams in the qualifying stages for UEFA EURO 2016 and the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Movistar TV already had rights for the main club competitions.

In addition, the new Movistar TV channel dedicated to international football means an expansion of self-produced programming on the television platform.

http://pressoffice.telefonica.com/

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Freescale Posts Q1 Sales of $1.13 Billion

Freescale Semiconductor reported Q1 2014 sales of $1.13 billion, compared to $1.08 billion in the fourth quarter of 2013 and $981 million in the first quarter of 2013. Net loss for the first quarter was $23 million, or $0.08 per share, compared to a net loss of $118 million, or $0.46 per share, in the fourth quarter of 2013 and a net loss of $48 million, or $0.19 per share in the first quarter of 2013.

“We continue to see solid progress on our initiatives to increase revenue and improve gross margin,” said Gregg Lowe, president and CEO. “All five product groups generated revenue growth sequentially and year over year. With a 15 percent year-over-year growth in revenue, the company continues to make strides in gaining market share.

The company’s net sales figures for the first quarter of 2014 were as follows:

• Microcontroller net sales were $223 million, compared to $220 million in the fourth quarter of 2013 and $177 million in the first quarter of last year. On a year-over-year basis, Microcontroller revenues benefited from increased sales into distribution and higher sales of applications processors into the automotive market.
• Digital Networking net sales were $249 million, compared to $246 million in the fourth quarter of 2013 and $202 million in the first quarter of last year. Year-over-year networking sales growth was broad based across service provider, enterprise and general embedded segments. Sequentially, the networking business benefited from higher sales of service provider equipment, including wireless base stations in China.
• Automotive Microcontroller net sales were $304 million, compared to $267 million in the fourth quarter of 2013 and $254 million in the first quarter of last year. Automotive Microcontroller sales benefited from growth in all key geographies and in distribution due to growth in semiconductor content and higher automotive production levels.
• Analog and Sensor net sales were $198 million, compared to $190 million in the fourth quarter of 2013 and $177 million in the first quarter of last year. Analog and Sensor sales benefited on a sequential and year-over-year basis from higher sales into the growing worldwide automotive market.
• RF net sales, which include sales of power amplifiers to the wireless infrastructure market, were $113 million, compared to $96 million in the fourth quarter of 2013 and $86 million in the first quarter of last year. On a sequential and year-over-year basis, RF sales increased due to increased spending on 3G and 4G wireless networks, particularly in China.

http://www.freescale.com

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Core Infrastructure Initiative Brings Support to Key Projects

In the wake of the Heartbleed OpenSSL crisis, a new Core Infrastructure Initiative backed by leading technology companies has been established to fund and support critical elements of the global information infrastructure.

The multi-million dollar Core Infrastructure Initiative, which is managed by The Linux Foundation, will provide assistance to open source projects  that are in the critical path for core computing and Internet functions.

The first project under consideration to receive funds from the Initiative will be OpenSSL, which could receive fellowship funding for key developers as well as other resources to assist the project in improving its security, enabling outside reviews, and improving responsiveness to patch requests.

Founding backers of the Initiative include Amazon Web Services, Cisco, Dell, Facebook, Fujitsu, Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NetApp, Rackspace, VMware and The Linux Foundation.

“We are expanding the work we already do for the Linux kernel to other projects that may need support,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director of The Linux Foundation. “Our global economy is built on top of many open source projects. Just as The Linux Foundation has funded Linus Torvalds to be able to focus 100% on Linux development, we will now be able to support additional developers and maintainers to work full-time supporting other essential open source projects. We are thankful for these industry leaders’ commitment to ensuring the continued growth and reliability of critical open source projects such as OpenSSL.”

"Maintaining the health of the community projects that produce software critical to the security and safety of Internet commerce is in everyone's interest," said Professor Eben Moglen of Columbia Law School, Founding Director of the Software Freedom Law Center. "The Linux Foundation, and the companies joining this Initiative, are enabling these dedicated programmers to continue maintaining and improving the free and open source software that makes the Net work safely for us all. This is business and community collaboration in the public interest, and we should all be grateful to The Linux Foundation for making it happen."

http://www.linuxfoundation.org/programs/core-infrastructure-initiative

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Dell Taps Big Switch for SDN-Enabled Fabric Monitoring

Dell announced a reseller agreement with Big Switch Networks targeting next-generation SDN fabric monitoring.

Specifically, Dell will offer Big Switch Networks’ Switch Light OS on Dell Networking’s Ethernet switching portfolio, starting with the S4810 and S6000 series. Dell will also offer Big Switch Networks’ production-ready SDN controller applications starting with the Big Tap Monitoring – an innovative new SDN-based network monitoring solution unlocking hidden customer value and helping solve an age-old, costly networking challenge.

Dell said the deal extends its vision of a new, disaggregated model for networking hardware and software. The Big Switch Big Tap Monitoring provides an SDN-enabled fabric monitoring solution that empowers tapping network traffic everywhere and delivering it to security and other appliances to:
expand choice and capabilities for customers looking for best-of-breed Ethernet switch hardware, OS and SDN apps;
enable a range of next-generation SDN solutions; and
realize operational simplification for management, control and policies.

“Dell’s push into open networking, and this announcement with Big Switch and other vendors, are great examples of original thinking and innovation coming from the new Dell, “said Tom Burns, vice president and general manager, Dell Networking. “We’re seeing tremendous initial customer interest, especially among certain verticals such as large financials, Web 2.0 and mobile service providers. It’s drawing Dell Networking into additional business discussions where many customers may not have considered Dell before.”

“The early adopters of SDN were largely the hyper scale players. But with the advent of initiatives such as Open Networking from Dell, the path for all enterprises to enjoy the benefits of SDN is getting easier,” said Douglas Murray, CEO of Big Switch Networks. “The joint solutions coming from the Dell and Big Switch partnership will bring hyperscale data center design and choice to a broader audience.”

http://www.dell.com/learn/us/en/uscorp1/secure/2014-04-24-dell-sdn-network-monitoring-big-switch
http://bigswitch.com/bigswitch-dell-partnership-announcement

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FCC Chairman Comments on New Open Internet Rules

In response to published reports that of new rules that would limit or do away with the principles of Net Neutrality, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler confirmed that he is circulating a proposal but that it is not his intention to limit the openness of the Internet.  In a blog posting, Wheeler confirms that he is looking to have new enforceable rules in place by the end of the year.

Wheeler states that the key elements of his proposal are:

• That all ISPs must transparently disclose to their subscribers and users all relevant information as to the policies that govern their network;
• That no legal content may be blocked; and
• That ISPs may not act in a commercially unreasonable manner to harm the Internet, including favoring the traffic from an affiliated entity.

The actual proposal has not yet been published.  The FCC will consider Wheeler's proposal on May 15.  The commission has also established an email inbox for public comment on the matter.

Public comment to: openinternet@fcc.gov
http://www.fcc.gov/blog/setting-record-straight-fcc-s-open-internet-rules

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Equinix to Offer ExpressRoute to Microsoft Azure

Equinix announced plans to offer high-performance, private connections from its International Business Exchange data centers to Microsoft Azure.

Specifically, Equinix will enable customers to directly connect to Azure in Equinix IBX data centers across five continents including: North America, South America, Asia, Europe and Australia.  Microsoft’s physical infrastructure for Azure ExpressRoute resides in Equinix data centers and is available via an Equinix switching fabric that provides secure connectivity and real-time provisioning.

Equinix is currently previewing the service from data centers in Silicon Valley, Washington, D.C. and London.

"Enterprises are drawn to hybrid cloud to benefit from cloud computing efficiencies, while maximizing their existing infrastructure. With 57 percent of Fortune 500 companies already using Microsoft Azure combined with Equinix’s global data center footprint, we look forward to working together to help customers bridge their cloud and on-premises technology to build hybrid environments with enterprise-grade control and reliability," stated Steven Martin, general manager, Microsoft Azure at Microsoft.

http://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/expressroute/
http://www.equinix.com

• Equinix already offers an AWS Direct Connect Service.

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Microsoft Highlights Cloud Growth - 4 Million Office 365 Home Subscribers, Azure up 150% YoY

Satya Nadella, Microsoft's new CEO, gave a cloud spin to the company's quarterly financial report.

“This quarter’s results demonstrate the strength of our business, as well as the opportunities we see in a mobile-first, cloud-first world. We are making good progress in our consumer services like Bing and Office 365 Home, and our commercial customers continue to embrace our cloud solutions. Both position us well for long-term growth,” said Satya Nadella, chief executive officer at Microsoft. “We are focused on executing rapidly and delivering bold, innovative products that people love to use.”

Some highlights:

• Devices and Consumer revenue grew 12% to $8.30 billion.
• Windows OEM revenue grew 4%, driven by strong 19% growth in Windows OEM Pro revenue.
• Office 365 Home now has 4.4 million subscribers, adding nearly 1 million subscribers in just three months.
• Microsoft sold in 2.0 million Xbox console units, including 1.2 million Xbox One consoles.
• Surface revenue grew over 50% to approximately $500 million.
• Bing U.S. search share grew to 18.6% and search advertising revenue grew 38%.
• Commercial revenue grew 7% to $12.23 billion.
• Office 365 revenue grew over 100%, and commercial seats nearly doubled, demonstrating strong enterprise momentum for Microsoft’s cloud productivity solutions.
• Azure revenue grew over 150%, and the company has announced more than 40 new features that make the Azure platform more attractive to cloud application developers. 
• Windows volume licensing revenue grew 11%, as business customers continue to make Windows their platform of choice.
• Lync, SharePoint, and Exchange, our productivity server offerings, collectively grew double-digits.

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2014/apr14/04-24fy14q3earningspr.aspx

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NTT's Dimension Data Acquires Nexus for ICT Integration

Dimension Data has acquired Nexus, a privately-owned provider of advanced IT solutions based in Valencia, California.

Dimension Data said the deal expands its operations in the U.S. by 40%, significantly increasing its presence throughout the West, Southwest and Southeast.  Nexus’ data center solutions and services complement Dimension Data’s focus in this area.

Nexus serves enterprises, mid-sized business and public sector clients, with industry specializations in education, retail, hospitality and healthcare.

“The acquisition of Nexus is a significant strategic step in enhancing the Group’s geographic coverage and depth of skills and capabilities to support our clients. For over three decades, Dimension Data has been building expertise and experience in ICT solutions and services that deliver real business value to our clients. Nexus increases our ability to support both our US-based and global clients with West Coast presence,” stated Brett Dawson, CEO of Dimension Data plc.

https://www.dimensiondata.com/

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Nuage Networks Cites 30+ SDN Trials

Marking the one-year anniversary of its launch, Alcatel-Lucent's Nuage Networks division announced that it has participated in over 30 SDN trials with Fortune 500 enterprises, leading cloud providers, and telecommunication companies.

“In the year since Nuage Networks was launched around the same time as my own arrival at Alcatel-Lucent, it has already become recognized by the industry for its game-changing technology and for understanding the way CIOs think about operating their networks,” said Michel Combes, CEO of Alcatel-Lucent. “It is the perfect example of the kind of entrepreneurial innovation Alcatel-Lucent, under its new specialist focus, is now bringing to market.”

http://www.nuagenetworks.net

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