Nokia Sees 5G Delivering 1 Gbps Home Broadband by 2017

Nokia Networks believes home broadband will be successful use case for 5G in areas with millions of homes near to fiber but without last hop connectivity via fiber to the home.

Nokia's solution bridges from the existing fiber network using high throughput 5G-ready hotspots placed, for example, on adjacent lamp posts to cover the last hop. Nokia Networks will start trialling a solution in 2016 that ensures at least 1 Gbps throughput for every home. The company is targeting commercial availability in 2017.

In April, 2015, at the Brooklyn Summit, Nokia Networks together with National Instruments demonstrated 10 Gbps speeds over the air with massive MIMO and beamsteering technologies, paving the way for meeting 5G requirements. It is a concrete proof point of our capability to deliver on the promise of a true 1 Gbps last hop connection to the home in the timeline outlined here today.

http://nokia.ly/1KVUBCE#sthash.ZL7Vr0VL.dpuf

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Nokia Launches 1 Gbps Small Cell

Nokia Networks unveiled a new Flexi Zone outdoor modular base station that becomes the world’s first small cell to achieve over 1 Gbps peak data rate. 

The new Flexi Zone G2 Multi-Band Carrier Aggregation Outdoor Micro/Pico Base Station (BTS) offers three RF module slots, enabling operators to deploy and aggregate between various radio access technologies and spectrum combinations including up to three LTE licensed carrier bands or configurations offering a combination of LTE licensed carrier bands, unlicensed LTE bands (LTE-U or LAA) and Wi-Fi.

Nokia also announced a number of innovations to simplify small cell deployment and help operators to evolve to Ultra-Dense Networks. These include the optimal selection of viable sites, more efficient backhaul, improved plug and play technology, new energy-saving features and simplified synchronization between base stations. The company said its HetNet Engine Room allows operators to deploy small cells 30% faster, with 20% lower costs and serve 10% more subscribers. Using detailed 3-D street level maps, the service calculates a ‘Site Value Index’ that quantifies the likely return on investment (ROI) for operators from different locations.

Several other Nokia Networks innovations also focus on overcoming the technical and cost barriers of deploying small cells:

• A point-to-multipoint non-line-of-sight (NLoS) wireless backhaul option from Nokia Networks partner Tarana Wireless. Fast high-performance fiber-like backhaul can now be deployed to sites that are difficult to reach cost-effectively with fiber or line-of-sight  technologies.
• New Intelligent Self Organizing Networks (iSON) capabilities enable rapid small cell deployments with backhaul over public networks* and for operator networks that do not use Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol  (DHCP). In these two more complex environments, small cells can now be operational in under 20 minutes after being powered up.
• An integrated Grand Master Clock function added to the Flexi Zone Controller that distributes a high accuracy clock to all Flexi Zone AP** within the cluster. This functionality offers significant CapEx and OpEx savings by eliminating the need for an external timing solution or GPS antenna  for each small cell.

“Deploying a small cell on one side of a road can cost ten times more than at a location just a few meters away on the other side of the road. We are bringing a new approach that enables operators to pick the best sites and then deploy small cells and their backhaul quickly and at a much lower cost. Now operators can justify the business case for small cells and improve the return on their network investments,” stated Randy Cox, head of Small Cell Product Management at Nokia Networks.

http://networks.nokia.com

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Innovation Pact: Singtel, Orange, Deutsche Telekom and Telefónica

The start-up innovation arms of Singtel (Singtel Innov8), Orange (Orange Fab), Deutsche Telekom (hub:raum) and Telefónica (Telefónica Open Future) have joined forces to bridge the start-up ecosystems across Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.

The carriers aim to accelerate the growth of eligible start-ups by tapping into the resources and network of the four leading communications companies. This includes market insights, introductions to partners, the use of co-working spaces and access to the companies’ operating businesses. Selected start-ups may also have the opportunity to gain access to the operators’ collective mobile customer base of over one billion people across four continents.

Mr Edgar Hardless, CEO, Singtel Innov8, said: “This is a great opportunity for us to deepen our connections with leading innovation hubs around the world. More start-ups harbour aspirations to venture beyond their own markets and go global. Through Singtel Innov8’s deep connections in Southeast Asia, we can help open doors for African, European, Middle Eastern and Latin American start-ups to the region. Similarly, our portfolio companies can leverage this partnership to expand beyond their home markets.”

Ms Nathalie Boulanger, Start-up Ecosystem Director, Orange said: “Having built up extensive experience of working hand-in-glove with start-ups across the world, Orange sees the formation of global partnerships such as this as the critical next step to ensure that digital innovators continue to flourish. With our collective and complementary footprints spanning four continents, we can provide start-ups with access to new markets, thereby enabling them to accelerate their growth further.”
Mr Min-Kin Mak, VP, hub:raum, Deutsche Telekom said: “With the partnership between Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Singtel and Telefónica, we see a huge opportunity to develop the bridges between the ecosystems in Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America and to provide start-ups with critical market access, funding and expertise to become more successful with their international expansion.”

http://pressoffice.telefonica.com/

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NEC Supplies Juniper and Infinera Gear to Telenor

Norway's Telenor Group signed a global framework agreement with NEC covering all major aspects of the operator’s transport network, including microwave, IP routers and optical and will manage the delivery, installation and commission of equipment.

NEC has supported Telenor Group’s successful rollout of 3G and 4G mobile services across the globe as a global supplier of microwave communications systems since 2006.

Under the new contract, NEC, Juniper Networks and Infinera will provide IP transport routers and wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) optical communications equipment to the Telenor Group’s 13 telecommunications affiliates worldwide to handle the ever increasing volume of traffic and content over today’s networks.

“Today’s announcement further reinforces our 30-year plus relationship with Telenor that started when NEC provided satellite communications systems to the operator in the 1980s,” said Takayuki Morita, executive vice president, NEC Corporation. “NEC, together with its partners Juniper Networks and Infinera, are fully committed to helping Telenor maintain its competitive edge through the provision of highly-reliable, market-leading transport network solutions.”

http://jpn.nec.com/press/201509/20150909_01.html

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Telefónica Completes SDN/NFV Proof of Concept with NEC and NetCracker

Telefónica Business Solutions completed a Proof of Concept (PoC) based on SDN/NFV aimed at enabling new agile WAN for the business market.

Telefónica partnered with NEC and NetCracker on this PoC, combining software-defined networking (SDN) and network functions virtualization (NFV) to provide more dynamic services on the worldwide WAN portfolio for enterprises. The PoC built an end-to-end solution for a virtualized VPN service over a virtual CPE. The solution includes a full orchestration and self-care stack from NEC/NetCracker, integrated with Telefónica’s virtual infrastructure solution and several virtual network functions, such as virtual SSL termination gateway, virtual firewall, etc. The orchestration solution successfully handled automated provisioning and the activation of both virtualized and traditional networks to establish virtualized VPN service and deploy the virtual network functions on the cloud.

NEC said the solution enabled the fully automated provisioning of a virtualized VPN service triggered by customers from a self-care portal, as well as fully automated value-added service provisioning and configuration.

“Given the increasing demand for virtualized solutions, we are excited to work with Telefónica and demonstrate the in-depth capabilities of our innovative SDN/NFV solutions,” said Frank DeTraglia, Chief Customer Officer at NetCracker. “We are pleased with the results of this PoC and look forward to expanding our relationship with Telefónica as the market and demand for virtualized technologies grow.”

http://www.netcracker.com/

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IHS: Big Spending on GPON in China

Global broadband aggregation equipment revenue (DSL, PON, and Ethernet FTTH) grew 12 percent sequentially in the second quarter of 2015 (2Q15) and 11 percent year-over-year, driven largely by record Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) equipment shipments in China and an increase in very-high-bit-rate DSL (VDSL) deployments, according to newly published research from IHS (Infonetics).

Some highlights:

• China set a record for PON equipment revenue in 2Q15, surpassing $1 billion in a quarter for the first time ever
• Q2 spending on PON equipment globally was up both sequentially and on a year over-year basis, and IHS anticipates increased spending for the full-year 2015 as more operators deploy FTTH services
• The 2Q15 spending environment in North America was very mixed: GPON expenditures were up 1 percent from 2Q14 but down 10 percent from 1Q15, while DSL spending plunged 18 percent from 2Q14 but grew 5 percent from 1Q15
• Due to the tremendous, sustained investment in China, IHS now predicts the worldwide broadband aggregation market will reach $9 billion in 2019

http://www.infonetics.com

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NoviFlow Raises $9 Million for SDN Switching

NoviFlow, a start-up based in Montreal, announced $9 million in Series A funding for its programmable, high-performance SDN forwarding plane solutions.

The company's NoviSwitch is an OpenFlow v1.3/1.4 switching solution boasting up to 240 Gbps of wire-speed performance, 1 million flow entries and over 12000 flowmods/sec. It is capable of wire speed packet payload (L2-L7) matching and flow handling and is powered by EZchip's NP-5 NPU.  NoviFlow also offers its OpenFlow v1.3/1.4 switching software for use in other embedded solutions.

The funding round was led by Fonds de solidarité FTQ and joined by W3 Investissement and Somel Investments Inc., with participation from previous investors and directors of NoviFlow Inc.

According to NoviFlow Inc. president and CEO Dominique Jodoin: "With this financing, we are well positioned to extend the reach of our SDN hardware and software offering beyond our existing client base in North America, Asia, and Europe.”

http://noviflow.com/products/our-products

• NoviFlow was founded in March 2012 as a spin out of the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), 

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