Thursday, January 19, 2017

Facebook to build Next Data Center in Odense, Denmark

Facebook has selected Odense, Denmark as the location for its next data center, joining Prineville (Oregon), Forest City (North Carolina), Luleå (Sweden), Altoona (Iowa), Fort Worth (Texas), Clonee (Ireland), and Los Lunas (New Mexico) facilities as one of the cornerstones of its global infrastructure.

The new data center will be built with Open Compute Project hardware designs and will be one of the most energy efficient to date.
The company said Denmark was chosen for its robust Nordic electric grid, access to fiber, access to renewable power, and a great set of collaborative community partner. Renewal energy is expected to account for 100% of electricity needs.

https://www.facebook.com/notes/odense-data-center/hello-odense/1104572789664613

Facebook Expands Fort Worth Data Center to Five Buildings


Facebook revealed plans to expand its data center in Fort Worth, Texas from one building to five buildings on the same campus. Construction on the first building is nearing completion. Facebook is now rolling racks of servers into the new building. The facility will be powered by 100% renewable energy, thanks to the more than 200 MW of new wind power that we worked with Citigroup Energy, Alterra Power Corporation, and Starwood Energy Group to bring...


CenturyLink Pushes into Big Data as a Service with Cloudera

CenturyLink launched Big Data as a Service (BDaaS) with Managed Cloudera, a new managed service offering that combines CenturyLink’s expertise in data and advanced analytics, network, cloud and application services with the highly secure Apache Hadoop-based data management and analytics platform from Cloudera.

CenturyLink said its BDaaS is enhanced by adding data and advanced analytics consulting services supported by a deep bench of Cloudera-certified data scientists and Cloudera Hadoop solution administrators, developers and architects. The solution, bolstered by CenturyLink’s global high-speed network connectivity, provides storage, processing, and management components deployed on CenturyLink Cloud Bare Metal servers. The bare metal private cloud environments have been certified by Cloudera.

“Forward-thinking organizations around the world are quickly becoming more agile and responsive to their customers’ needs across all channels,” said Gary Gauba, chief enterprise relationship officer and president, Advanced Solutions Group, CenturyLink. “These enterprises are seeing significant competitive advantages by better leveraging their data, and our new managed service helps them achieve their big data objectives.”

http://www.centurylink.com

Windstream Introduces SD-WAN Powered by VeloCloud

Windstream introduced its software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN) solution powered by VeloCloud that uses SDN to dynamically route traffic over a combination of private and public access types to reach multiple locations.

Windstream said its new service helps customers maintain control over their network from a convenient centralized location rather than requiring them to manage various routers, firewalls and switches. It also simplifies management and monitoring by presenting comprehensive information to the customer in a unified management console - a "single pane of glass."

"SD-WAN is another example of Windstream partnering with enterprise customers to deliver reliable, secure communications solutions that fuel productivity and growth," said Joe Harding, enterprise chief marketing officer at Windstream. "By including SD-WAN as another solution in our portfolio of managed WAN services, Windstream offers mid- to large-sized enterprise customers the same technology advantages that large enterprises enjoy, which include custom-designed networks and services, as well as a highly responsive support team."

http://www.windstream.com


Avaya Files for Chapter 11

Citing a need to recapitalize the company, Avaya filed voluntary petitions under chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York.

The company also announced a $725 million debtor-in-possession DIP financing facility underwritten by Citibank.

“We have conducted an extensive review of alternatives to address Avaya’s capital structure, and we believe pursuing a restructuring through chapter 11 is the best path forward at this time,” said Kevin Kennedy, Chief Executive Officer of Avaya.  “Reducing the Company’s current debt through the chapter 11 process will best position all of Avaya’s businesses for future success.”

“This is a critical step in our ongoing transformation to a successful software and services business. Avaya’s current capital structure is over 10 years old and was put in place to support our business model as a hardware-focused company, which has evolved significantly since that time.  Now, as a result of the terms of Avaya’s debt obligations and the upcoming debt maturities, we need to recapitalize the Company,” continued Mr. Kennedy.  “Our business is performing well, and we are confident that we can emerge from this process stronger than ever, as this path is a reflection of our debt structure, not the strength of our operations or business model.  Pursuing restructuring through chapter 11 will enable us to reduce Avaya’s debt and interest expense, while providing increased financial flexibility to further invest in innovation and growth to enhance our market-leading competitive position.  Most importantly, we are keenly focused on minimizing disruption to our customers, partners, and employees and do not expect to experience any material disruptions during the chapter 11 cases.”

Separately, Avaya reported Q4 2016 revuenu of $958 million, up $76 million compared to the prior quarter as demand improved for products and services, and decreased $50 million year-over-year, due to lower demand for unified communications hardware.  GAAP gross margin was 60.9% for the fourth quarter.  GAAP operating loss was $428 million, reflecting $542 million of impairment of goodwill and intangibles.  Non-GAAP operating income was $229 million which compares to $180 million for the prior quarter and $202 million for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2015.  For fiscal 2016, Avaya reported revenue of $3,702 million, down 9% compared to fiscal 2015, or down 8% in constant currency. GAAP gross margin for fiscal 2016 was 60.6%.

http://www.avaya.com/en/about-avaya/newsroom/

PTC'17: Where Global Connections are Made - iMiller PR

Ilissa Miller, CEO of iMiller Public Relations, provides an overview of iMPR's Trade Show Marketing Services including Content Marketing Strategy, at PTC'17 in Honolulu, Hawaii.



https://youtu.be/kfJ4-FwH0dM


Oclaro Expects Financial Performance at High End of Previous Guidance

Oclaro expects revenue for the second quarter of its fiscal 2017, ended December 31, 2016, to be in the range of $153.5 million to $154.0 million, at the high end of the prior guidance of $146 million to $154 million provided on November 1, 2016.

GAAP gross margin of approximately 39.5% and non-GAAP gross margin of approximately 40%, above the prior non-GAAP guidance of 33% to 36%.  Non-GAAP gross margin excludes the effect of approximately $0.5 million of stock-based compensation.

GAAP operating income of approximately $33 million and non-GAAP operating income of approximately $36 million, above the prior non-GAAP guidance of $22 million to $26 million.  Non-GAAP operating income excludes $2.6 million of stock-based compensation and $0.2 million of amortization of other intangible assets.

"Our excellent preliminary results for the December quarter once again demonstrated the strength of Oclaro's products in the markets we serve.  We expect revenue to come in at the high end of guidance as 100G and beyond sales again exhibited excellent growth.  In addition, we expect the quarterly results to reflect record levels of gross margin and operating income and exceed our prior guidance.  Our performance was driven by strong execution, a richer product mix, and favorable foreign exchange rates," said Greg Dougherty, Chief Executive Officer, Oclaro.

http://www.oclaro.com


Oclaro updated its outlook for the first quarter of fiscal year 2016 saying it now expects to exceed its previously provided financial gu

U.S. Army Awards $62 Million Cloud Contract to IBM

The U.S. Army awarded a five-year, multi-million dollar contract to IBM to build, manage and operate a cloud solution for the Redstone Arsenal, near Huntsville, Ala.

The solution is part of the Army Private Cloud Enterprise (APCE) program, a one-year task order with four additional one-year options under the Army Private Cloud 2 (APC2) contract.* If the Army exercises all options, the contract would be worth approximately $62 million over the five years.

In addition to building the infrastructure, IBM will provide the Army with Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) services, enabling it to provision computing power on an as-needed basis for the most efficient and cost-effective IT. The Army also will begin migrating applications to the private cloud, moving up to 35 applications to the private cloud in the first year.
“With this project, we’re beginning to bring the IT infrastructure of the U.S. Army into the 21st century,” said Lt. Gen. Robert Ferrell, U.S. Army CIO. “Cloud computing is a game-changing architecture that provides improved performance with high efficiency, all in a secure environment.”

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



IBM announced new hybrid cloud all-flash storage solutions as well as new software capabilities that allow clients to store their v