Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Verizon Completes 10G FTTP Trial Using NG-PON2

Verizon has completed a test of a 10 Gbps technology on its fiber-to-the-premises network.

Field testing of the NG-PON2 technology was completed recently from Verizon’s central office in Framingham, Mass., to a FiOS customer’s home 3 miles away as well as to a nearby business location. This followed extensive testing in Verizon’s laboratories in Waltham, Mass.

A new optical line terminal (OLT) installed in the Verizon central office generated four wavelengths, each capable of operating at 10G/2.5G. Later versions are envisioned to support the same download and upload speeds of 10G/10G per color. One test transmitted the NG-PON2 signals over a fiber serving live GPON customers proving that the network can simultaneously deliver GPON and NG-PON2 on the same fiber. The trial was conducted with a NG-PON2 equipment system from Cisco and PT Inovação.  The technology will have the system capacity to grow to 40-80 Gbps as the market demands.

Verizon said upgrades on its FTTP network will begin when commercial equipment is available to support business services such as switched Ethernet services. The company plans to issue a request for proposals later this year for the purchase of hardware and software for the new NG-PON2 platform.

“The advantage of our FiOS network is that it can be upgraded easily by adding electronics onto the fiber network that is already in place," said Lee Hicks, vice president of network technology for Verizon. "Deploying this exciting new technology sets a new standard for the broadband industry and further validates our strategic choice of fiber-to-the-premises.”

http://www.verizon.com/about/news/verizon-tests-superfast-10-gigabit-internet-service-using-newest-optical-technology


HGST Announces Persistent Memory Fabric Technology

HGST has developed a persistent memory fabric technology that promises low-power, DRAM-like performance, and does not require BIOS modification nor rewriting of applications. Memory mapping of remote PCM using the Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) protocol over networking infrastructures, such as Ethernet or InfiniBand, enables a seamless, wide scale deployment of in-memory computing. This network-based approach allows applications to harness the non-volatile PCM across multiple computers to scale out as needed.

At this week's Flash Memory Summit in Santa Clara, California, HGST, in collaboration with Mellanox Technologies, its showcasing the PCM-based, RDMA-enabled in-memory compute cluster architecture. The HGST/Mellanox demonstration achieves random access latency of less than two microseconds for 512 B reads, and throughput exceeding 3.5 GB/s for two KB block sizes using RDMA over InfiniBand.

"DRAM is expensive and consumes significant power, but today's alternatives lack sufficient density and are too slow to be a viable replacement," said Steve Campbell, HGST's chief technology officer. "Last year our Research arm demonstrated Phase Change Memory as a viable DRAM performance alternative at a new price and capacity tier bridging main memory and persistent storage.  To scale out this level of performance across the data center requires further innovation.  Our work with Mellanox proves that non-volatile main memory can be mapped across a network with latencies that fit inside the performance envelope of in-memory compute applications."

"Mellanox is excited to be working with HGST to drive persistent memory fabrics," said Kevin Deierling, vice president of marketing at Mellanox Technologies.  "To truly shake up the economics of the in-memory compute ecosystem will require a combination of networking and storage working together transparently to minimize latency and maximize scalability.  With this demonstration, we were able to leverage RDMA over InfiniBand to achieve record-breaking round-trip latencies under two microseconds.  In the future, our goal is to support PCM access using both InfiniBand and RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE) to increase the scalability and lower the cost of in-memory applications."

http://www.hgst.com

Diablo Debuts All-flash DDR4 Server System Memory

Diablo introduces an all-flash DDR4 server system memory technology that packs four times the capacity of the largest DRAM modules and that is compatible with standard motherboards, servers, operating systems and applications. Diablo replaces expensive DRAM with low cost, high capacity flash.

The company says its Memory1 technology means that same system memory slots that now hold 128 or 384 gigabytes of DRAM memory can house up to four terabytes of capacity.

“Memory1 represents a major evolution in server architecture. The needs of the large-scale datacenter are changing, with a very sharp focus on increasing capability to win the Internet while managing tight constraints on cost and power. The Memory1 platform allows customers to leverage NAND flash as pure system memory in a seamless manner, with no changes to their hardware and software stacks,” said Riccardo Badalone, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Diablo Technologies. “The business impact on datacenter economics and application performance is dramatic. We’ve seen customers envisioning everything from aggressive server consolidation all the way to doubling and tripling individual machine profit. The implications of this technology cannot be overstated.”

http://www.diablo-technologies.com/

CENX Raises $12.5 Million for Service Orchestration

CENX, a start-up providing Lifecycle Service Orchestration solutions for software-defined and virtualized networks, raised US$12.5 million in new venture funding.

CENX's solutions automate the fulfillment and assurance of advanced data services in software-defined networks, bridging physical and virtualized network functions.  The company is based in Ottawa.

New investors BDC Capital, Mistral Venture Partners, and VMware joined the Series D financing round, in which all current investors participated: Highland Capital Partners, Mesirow Financial Private Equity Inc., Verizon Ventures, a subsidiary of Verizon Communications, Ericsson, DCM Ventures, and Cross Creek Advisors.

“We welcome the market, business and partnership perspectives that VMware, BDC Capital, and Mistral bring to CENX,” said Ed Ogonek, President and CEO of CENX. “We are seeing tremendous demand worldwide for our Cortx solution, delivering tangible value in today’s networks and empowering the evolution to virtualized networks and services with NFV and SDN. With the support and confidence of our growing investor group, we continue to expand our world-class team to meet these global opportunities.”
 
http://www.cenx.com

Symantec to sell Veritas to The Carlyle Group for $8 Billion

Symantec agreed to sell its information management business, known as Veritas, to an investor group led by The Carlyle Group together with GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, and other expected co-investors for $8 billion in cash. The deal is expected to close at the end of the year and Symantec expects to receive approximately $6.3 billion in net cash proceeds, subject to certain customary post-closing adjustments.

Michael A. Brown, Symantec president and CEO, said, “This transaction strengthens our financial foundation, paving the way for Symantec to grow its security business and increase its lead as the world’s largest cybersecurity company. We believe the agreement with the investors, including The Carlyle Group and GIC, delivers an attractive and certain value for the Veritas business, and is in the best interests of all stakeholders.”

https://www.symantec.com/about/news/release/article.jsp?prid=20150811_01

  • In October 2014, Symantec first announced plans to separate into two, independent publicly traded companies: one business focused on security and one business focused on information management (“Veritas”).

Viavi Announces Leadership Change One Week After Launch

The Board of Directors of Viavi Solutions appointed Richard E. Belluzzo as interim president and chief executive officer, effective immediately. Belluzzo currently serves as Chairman.  Tom Waechter has stepped down as the company's president and chief executive officer and Board member. The Viavi Board is commencing a search for a permanent president and chief executive officer.

The announcement follows the separation of JDSU into two public companies on August 1, 2015 -- Viavi and Lumentum.

On behalf of Viavi’s Board, Mr. Belluzzo said, "We thank Tom for his contributions to the company since joining in 2007. He has led the company through a period of significant transformation, including the successful spin-off of Lumentum Holdings. As Viavi moves forward, we will seek a new leader with strong industry knowledge and customer relationships, technical expertise and operational acumen.”

Mr. Belluzzo added, “The Lumentum spin-off and related business realignment are the first milestones in repositioning Viavi for the future. Viavi’s Board is committed to implementing additional steps to enhance both its market position and shareholder value. The appointment of two new directors will add experience, expertise and momentum to these efforts. Through this transition, our foremost focus will remain on delivering value to our customers and shareholders as we execute to our industry shaping vision.”

http://www.viavisolutions.com/

Video: Tom Waechter on the Viavi Launch


In this 2-minute video, Tom Waechter introduces Viavi Solutions. the new company out of JDSU following the spin-off of the optical components division as Lumentum. Viavi itself has two divisions: the optical security and performance business; and the network & service enablement business. The name Viavi derives from "Via" (the Way) and Vi (visibility). https://youtu.be/sWbk0HjS2N...