Vodafone plans 4G on the moon for rover mission

PTScientists, a privately-held venture based in Berlin, Germany is aiming for a historic lunar landing next year.

The plan calls for delivering two rovers, or up to 100 kg of payload, to the lunar surface using a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

The mission will be to approach and study NASA's Apollo 17 lunar roving vehicle that was used by the last astronauts to walk on the Moon (Commander Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt) to explore the Taurus-Littrow valley in December 1972.

Nokia Bell Labs is developing a space-grade, 4G Ultra Compact Network that will use the 1800 MHz frequency band to communicate from the landing site to the remote rovers. Streaming HD video will be captured by the rovers and retransmitted back to Mission Control in Berlin. The networking gear will weigh less than one kilo.

Audi will supply the rovers.

Vodafone said it is thrilled to deploy a 4G mobile network on the moon.

Vodafone Germany CEO, Dr. Hannes Ametsreiter, commented: "This project involves a radically innovative approach to the development of mobile network infrastructure. It is also a great example of an independent, multi-skilled team achieving an objective of immense significance through their courage, pioneering spirit and inventiveness."

Nokia Chief Technology Officer and Bell Labs President, Marcus Weldon, said: "We are very pleased to have been selected by Vodafone to be their technology partner. This important mission is supporting, among other things, the development of new space-grade technologies for future data networking, processing and storage, and will help advance the communications infrastructure required for academics, industry and educational institutions in conducting lunar research. These aims have potentially wide-ranging implications for many stakeholders and humanity as a whole, and we look forward to working closely with Vodafone and the other partners in the coming months, prior to the launch in 2019."

http://ptscientists.com

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Sprint deploys 64T64R Massive MIMO antennas

Sprint is deploying Massive MIMO antennas as it prepares for a 5G rollout in the first half of 2019. Sprint expects to deploy thousands of Massive MIMO radios in 2018 and 2019, significantly increasing network capacity for millions of customers across the country.

Specifically, Sprint will deploy 64T64R (64 transmit, 64 receive) Massive MIMO radios using 128 antennas from Ericsson, Nokia, and Samsung Electronics. The Massive MIMO radios from all three suppliers are software-upgradable to 5G without additional tower climbs. The Massive MIMO radios support split-mode service, enabling Sprint to offer both 4G LTE and 5G on the same radio.

Sprint customers using a 2.5 GHz (band 41) device in Chicago, Dallas and Los Angeles will begin seeing a significant bandwidth boost on the existing network in April thanks to the new equipment.

Massive MIMO deployments in additional markets including Atlanta, Houston and Washington, D.C. are planned for later this year.

“Massive MIMO is a game-changer for TDD-LTE networks that’s being used by leading operators around the world to deploy Gigabit LTE and 5G,” said Dr. John Saw, Sprint Chief Technology Officer. “For more than a year we’ve been testing this new technology, and in a few short weeks we’ll be bringing the power of Massive MIMO to Sprint customers beginning with some of the largest markets in the country.”

Sprint noted that it has 204 MHz of spectrum and more than 160 MHz of 2.5 GHz spectrum in the top 100 markets, giving it enough capacity to operate LTE and 5G simultaneously over 100-200 MHz on the same Massive MIMO radios.

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Vodafone and China Mobile enter IoT resale partnership

Vodafone and China Mobile agreed to resell each other’s IoT services.

Under the agreement, each company will share new IoT project opportunities. Vodafone customers will be given access to China Mobile IoT SIMS for deployments in China, and China Mobile customers wanting to offer IoT-enabled products outside of China will use Vodafone’s Global IoT SIM and management platform. Vodafone will manage all elements of the operational model for its customers including on-boarding, SIM and logistics as well as billing and support. The company will effectively act as a single point of contact for its enterprise IoT customers wanting to move into China.

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Huawei develops FDD bull-band 4x4 MIMO compact antenna for TIM

At Mobile World Congress 2018, Huawei is showcasing the first FDD full-band 4x4 MIMO antenna - a designed developed for TIM, the Italian mobile operator.

The antenna uses Huawei's patented AirType Dipole and AirMax Feeding Network technologies to support 4x4 MIMO on all of TIM's sub-3 GHz frequency bands in a single sector and a single antenna, including 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 900 MHz, 1400 MHz, 1800 MHz, 2100 MHz and 2600 MHz, while leaving room for one new active antenna in C band and mmWave. Its compact size - a 6-array, side-by-side design, only 469 mm wide - and excellent wind load allow for a 15% increase in efficiency and rapid deployment of best-experience networks.

Huawei said this innovation will help TIM to maximize site value while also favoring site sharing.

Giovanni Ferigo, Chief Technology Officer at TIM, comments: "TIM is dedicated to technological innovation for better network capacity and user experience. We worked together with Huawei to develop this FDD full-band 4x4 MIMO antenna, which helps us better address antenna deployment issues and paves the way for 5G."

Mr. Joyee Zhang, President of Huawei Wireless Network Antenna Business Unit, says: "We propose a 1+1 Antenna Modernization, Ready for 5G concept. This concept uses one passive antenna for 4x4 MIMO on all sub-3 GHz frequency bands and one antenna for C band and mmWave. The FDD full-band 4x4 MIMO antenna jointly developed with TIM will help TIM as well as other operators rapidly deploy 5G-oriented networks."

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Ericsson supplies radio access for T-Mobile's 5G in NY, LA, LV

Ericsson is supplying its radio access platforms for T-Mobile's 5G rollout in U.S. cities using 600 MHz and 28 and 39 millimeter-wave (mmWave) spectrum. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Specifically, T-Mobile is building out 5G in New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas this year utilizing Ericson's 5G New Radio (NR) radios and baseband.

Fredrik Jejdling, Executive Vice President and Head of Business Area Networks, Ericsson, says: “We have been working in close partnership with T-Mobile on 5G for tests in the lab, field trials, and now initial deployment into the T-Mobile network. Our 5G Platform enables operators like T-Mobile to launch 5G as quickly as possible.”

Ericsson says 5G RAN software will be ready by Q4

Sunday, February 11, 2018  #5G, Ericsson  No Comments

Ericsson announced that its 5G Radio Access Network (RAN) software, based on the recently approved first 3GPP 5G New Radio (NR) standard, will be commercially available by Q4 2018, paving the way for operators to launch commercial services in 2019. The 5G radio network software complements Ericsson’s already launched baseband and 5G radios. The company says all of the base radios from the Ericsson Radio System delivered since 2015 will be 5G NR-capable by a remote software installation.

Ericsson’s 5G radio network software promises multi-band support for global deployment and will allow operators to use new frequency spectrum as it becomes available. It also introduces a new category of radio products called Street Macro – a new site type that addresses the need of operators to grow in cities with limited available radio locations. The idea is to place radios on building facades with a smaller footprint but the necessary strength to secure network efficiency and coverage. Ericsson is also adding new radios with Massive MIMO technology.

Ericsson also announced enhancements to its Distributed Cloud architecture, which support cloud application deployment across multiple sites - central, distributed, and edge. The design can be managed, orchestrated, and perceived as one solution in what the company calls "Software Defined Infrastructure (SDI) to the edge". In addition, the Ericsson Distributed Cloud will add support for hardware options in a multi-vendor framework.

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6WIND, Advantech and Cloudify demo vRouter for White Box Networking

At this week's Mobile World Congress, 6WIND is demonstrating high-performance vRouter use cases for white box networking with partners Advantech and Cloudify.

The demo infrastructure includes:

• vRouter: 6WIND Turbo Router and Turbo IPsec are routing and IPsec VPN software network appliances to be deployed in bare metal environments or as Virtual Machines (VMs) on COTS servers with licenses for 1 – 100G throughput in a single software instance.
• COTS Server: Advantech's SKY-8101 offers an innovative white box networking hardware infrastructure in a short depth, 1RU single-socket Intel Xeon Scalable Processor server with a wide choice of GbE, 10GbE & 40GbE connectivity. 6WIND's vRouter software appliances are deployed as VMs and scale linearly with the assigned processor cores.
• Management & Orchestration: Cloudify Manager is serving the VNF Manager and NFV Orchestrator functions for the 6WIND vRouter. 6WIND's virtual appliances are instantiated on OpenStack, and OSPF routing and IPsec VPN tunnels are configured, deployed and orchestrated by Cloudify Manager with TOSCA based templates. The solution is then monitored by Grafana out of the box or any other pluggable monitoring platform of choice.

"The future of networking is high-performance software on white box servers, just as we've already seen with examples such as cell phones and computers," said Eric Carmès, Founder and CEO of 6WIND. "The combination of 6WIND, Advantech and Cloudify brings the promise of white box networking with a ready-to-use vRouter that can displace expensive networking hardware to save Network Operator budgets today."

"Universal CPE has successfully disrupted the customer edge with cost-saving SD-WAN and VNF rollouts by service providers around the globe," said Paul Stevens, Marketing Director, Advantech Networks and Communications Group. "In the same vein, we expect this next wave of white box solutions to revolutionize the Provider Edge."

"Building an ecosystem of interoperability is the only way to open up a market that has been a black box of closed technology to date," said Sebastian Grabski, Solution Architect at Cloudify. "Cloudify's goal through this partnership is to achieve both openness & interoperability, as well as greater flexibility. Through open source and open standards with TOSCA - it is now possible for organizations to build best of breed networking stacks with cutting edge technology like 6WIND & Advantech, with VNF management and orchestration across clouds and environments more rapidly and economically."

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GSMA: 23 operators now running both NB-IoT and LTE-M

To date, 23 mobile operators have commercially launched 41 Mobile IoT networks worldwide across both NB-IoT and LTE-M, according to the GSMA.

The GSMA's Mobile IoT Innovators Community has grown to include 34 IoT Labs and an expanding community of over 800 organisations.

According to GSMA Intelligence forecasts, by 2025 there will be 3.1 billion cellular IoT connections, including 1.8 billion licensed LPWA connections.

“2018 is the year that Mobile IoT networks will scale. We have seen huge growth in the availability of commercial networks in licensed spectrum and anticipate seeing many more launches this year. This is underpinned by an expanding community of organisations developing innovative new solutions and a number of IoT Labs helping companies to test out new products and services,” said Alex Sinclair, Chief Technology Officer, GSMA. “Mobile IoT networks are fast becoming the defacto global IoT solution, as only licensed, managed mobile services can provide the secure low power connection that can meet future demand.”

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Mist raises $46 million for self-learning WLAN

Mist, a start-up based in Cupertino, California. raised $46 million in an unsubscribed C round of funding for its self-learning wireless networks powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Mist says its wireless platform, which is designed specifically for the Smart Device era, makes Wi-Fi predictable, reliable and measurable by providing visibility into the user experience and by replacing time-consuming manual IT tasks with proactive automation.

The funding round was led by Kleiner Perkins, with additional funding from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, GV (formerly Google Ventures), NTT DOCOMO Ventures, and Dimension Data. This brings total funding in the company to approximately $88 million.
 In addition, Mamoon Hamid (General Partner at Kleiner Perkins) and Rob Lopez (Group Executive – Networking and Data Centre at Dimension Data) join Mist as board observers.

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China Mobile signs cooperation pact with Ericsson

At Mobile World Congress, China Mobile signed a Strategic Cooperation Framework Agreement with Ericsson to develop Internet of Things (IoT) opportunities in industry and enterprises.

The partnership will build on Ericsson’s Device Connection Platform IoT (DCP-IoT) Connectivity Management platform, as part of the IoT Accelerator Platform, to help China Mobile expand IoT business worldwide, and to support China’s One Belt One Road initiative.

The companies plan to jointly build an Industry IoT Cooperation Center to plan for and develop IoT Connectivity and IoT ecosystem solutions in areas such as manufacturing, industry, health, and intelligent transportation.

Ericsson and China Mobile also agreed to strengthen cooperation in 5G standardization and 5G networks, and also jointly develop 5G network-enabled use cases for industries, as well as exploring business opportunities to reach the full potential of IoT.

Chris Houghton, Head of Market Area North East Asia, Ericsson, says: “At MWC 2018 we are showing that we are no longer just talking about 5G and IoT, we are doing what it takes to make it happen. The IoT Strategic Cooperation Framework Agreement with China Mobile shows we are working with partners to put our 5G and IoT technology leadership into practice.”

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Qualcomm's Snapdragon 700 on pace for this year

Qualcomm confirmed that it will begin sampling its Snapdragon 700 Mobile Platform Series in the first half of this year.

The chipset promises features and performance previously only available in the premium Snapdragon 800 Mobile Platform Series. These capabilities include on-device AI supported by the Qualcomm Artificial Intelligence (AI) Engine, and improvements to camera, device performance and power.

"The Snapdragon 700 Mobile Platform Series will bring premium tier technologies and features into more affordable devices, something our global OEM customers and consumers are demanding," said Alex Katouzian, senior vice president and general manager, mobile, Qualcomm Technologies. "From our cutting-edge Qualcomm AI Engine to superior camera, device performance and power, the Snapdragon 700 Series is optimized to support the experiences consumers have come to expect from the most advanced mobile devices at a lower price point."

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Orange Labs integrates Radisys' virtualized Media Resource Function into ONAP

Orange Labs Networks has integrated Radisys’ MediaEngine virtualized Media Resource Function (vMRF) in the ONAP (Open Network Automation Platform) “Amsterdam” release. This paves the way for additional VNF integrations with ONAP, accelerating commercial deployments.

The overall solution includes complete cost-effective vMRF lifecycle management of ONAP infrastructure, including elastic scaling, policy-driven controls, and zero-touch automation and management, significantly reducing time-to-market and OpEx.

“As we transform our network, we are turning to new innovative and disruptive vendors that will support our move to open source technologies like ONAP to guarantee our software independence and openness,” said Eric Debeau, Head of Network Automation Platform Team at Orange. “With its deep heritage in software, hardware and services for the telecom industry combined with its experience with ONAP, Radisys is helping drive new service creation through enabling virtualization of network services through cost-efficient design, implementation and management.”

“Our collaboration with Orange on this first demonstration of vMRF on ONAP sets the stage for operators like Orange to transform their networks with other commercial VNFs,” said Adnan Saleem, CTO Software and Cloud Solutions, MediaEngine, Radisys. “We are excited to be able to participate with Orange Labs Networks, and other service providers to not only onboard our VNFs, but also bring the expertise to onboard other VNFs and provide complete ONAP integration services to accelerate delivery of new innovative applications.”

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T-Mobile US to deploy Nokia 5G in 600MHz and 28GHz mmWave this year

T-Mobile U.S. announced plans to build out 5G in 30 cities this year and Nokia confirmed that its equipment has been selected for the rollout. T-Mobile will deploy its 5G RAN using both 600MHz and 28GHz millimeter wave spectrum.

Nokia will begin building the network during the second quarter of 2018, completing the deployment during 2020. Financial terms were not disclosed.

T-Mobile said New York, Los Angeles, Dallas and Las Vegas will be first to get 5G. Service, of course, will require a 5G smartphone and these are expected to launch early in 2019.

Nokia listed the following elements in T-Mobile's deployment:

• Nokia AirScale baseband and remote radio heads supporting 5G NR, and ReefShark-enabled portfolio in the 600MHz and 28GHz mmWave spectrums. The Nokia 5G-ready AirScale radio access portfolio, which is software upgradable to full 5G services will provide enhanced RAN support for 4G and 5G T-Mobile subscribers
• Nokia installed Core technologies will be enhanced to support 5G, implementing a cloud-native architecture, powered by the Nokia AirFrame data center solution, Subscriber Data Management, CloudBand and Cloud Packet Core
• Nokia Mobile Anyhaul framework to enable ultra-broadband connectivity
• Nokia Digital Experience and Monetization solutions will support 5G device management and Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) solutions
• Nokia CloudBand Management and Orchestration (MANO) software suite will automate cloud application deployment and lifecycle management
• Nokia NetAct virtualized network management software provides capabilities for troubleshooting, assurance, administration, software management and configuration, and managing the smooth evolution to 5G
• Nokia Global Services expertise, including automation to speed the rollout and analytics to help optimize network performance

T-Mobile also took the launch announcement as a chance to poke fun at its rivals.

“Dumb and Dumber are in a meaningless race to be first. Their so-called 5G isn’t mobile, and it’s not even on a smartphone. It’s a puck?! You gotta be pucking kidding me!” said John Legere, president and CEO at T-Mobile. “While the Duopoly focus on bragging rights, we focus on customers. T-Mobile has massively bigger plans for a truly transformative 5G experience on your smartphone nationwide. We’re playing the long game ... the only game that matters.”

Nokia's President and Chief Executive Officer Rajeev Suri said: "We are excited to work with T-Mobile for their groundbreaking nationwide 5G rollout. Nokia's 5G solution combines our high-capacity New Radio, Core and SDN controlled 'anyhaul' transport and software, and incorporates innovations such as the new in-house silicon ReefShark chipset to deliver a new level of network performance. 5G is happening now, and no company is better placed to deliver than Nokia."

Nokia's ReefShark silicon cuts massive MIMO antenna size and power consumption

Monday, January 29, 2018  #5G, Nokia, Silicon  No Comments

Nokia unveiled its ReefShark 5G chipsets for radio frequency (RF) units such as the radio used in antennas. The chipsets, which were developed in-house, significantly improve radio performance resulting in halving the size of massive MIMO antennas. Nokia says its ReefShark chipsets also reduce power consumption in baseband units by 64%, compared to current technology.

The ReefShark chipsets comprise:

• ReefShark Digital Front End for LTE and 5G radio systems supporting massive MIMO
• ReefShark RFIC front-end module and transceiver: massive MIMO Adaptive Antenna solution
• ReefShark Baseband Processor: All-in-one compute heavy design, capable of supporting the massive scale requirements of 5G. This is the brain power of baseband processing.

The ReefShark chipsets for compute capacity are delivered as plug-in units for the commercially available Nokia AirScale baseband module. The new plug-in units triple throughput from 28 Gbps today to up to 84 Gbps per module. Additionally, AirScale baseband module chaining supports base station throughputs of up to 6 terabits per second. Nokia said this level of performance will allow operators to meet the huge growing densification demands and support the massive enhanced mobile broadband needs of people and devices in megacities.
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xRAN Forum merges with C-RAN Alliance, seeking innovation in radio access

Two industry organizations are combining their efforts to drive innovation in radio access networks.

The xRAN Forum will merge with the C-RAN Alliance to form the ORAN Alliance, which is backed by AT&T, China Mobile, Deutsche Telekom, NTT DOCOMO, and Orange.

• The key principles of the ORAN Alliance include:
• Leading the industry towards open, interoperable interfaces, RAN virtualization, and big data enabled RAN intelligence.
• Maximizing the use of common-off-the-shelf hardware and merchant silicon and minimizing proprietary hardware.
• Specifying APIs and interfaces, driving standards to adopt them as appropriate, and exploring open source where appropriate.

“xRAN Forum members have made excellent progress this year and we expect completion of the first open, interoperable front haul specification in March,” said Dr. Sachin Katti, Professor at Stanford University and Director of the xRAN Forum. “We are advancing both a southbound interface specification to an open RAN and a northbound interface specification, delivering applications access to rich controller functions and abstracted RAN control. Going forward, we believe there will be strong, complimentary collaboration with our new colleagues from the C-RAN Alliance.”

“The xRAN Forum was created to accelerate the delivery of products that support a common, open architecture and standardized interfaces that we, as operators, view as the foundation of our next-generation wireless infrastructure,” said Alex Jinsung Choi, SVP Research & Technology Innovation, Deutsche Telekom. “xRAN members have made strong progress this year, and we are confident that by building on the xRAN architecture in combination with the RAN virtualization focus brought by the C-RAN Alliance, we are well positioned to achieve the joint objectives of the ORAN Alliance.”

"Our industry is approaching an inflection point, where increasing infrastructure virtualization will combine with embedded intelligence to deliver more agile services and advanced capabilities to our customers. The xRAN Forum has been at the forefront of defining the next generation RAN architecture for this transformation," said Andre Fuetsch, CTO and President AT&T Labs. "This is a global change that will impact all network operators. It will be accelerated by the merger of the xRAN Forum and the C-RAN Alliance into the ORAN Alliance, which promises to be a strong global forum."

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Telefónica implements 4.5G technologies from Huawei

Telefónica is introducing 4.5G Evolution technologies from Huawei, 4x4 MIMO, 3x Carrier Aggregation (CA), 256-QAM and CloudAIR (Huawei’s proprietary technology), into its international networks.

The first deployments are happening in Bogotá (Colombia), Monterrey (Mexico) and Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). After several months assessment in these cities, Telefónica will consider additional rollouts.

Telefónica Deutschland and Huawei have implemented in Germany a 4.5G high-speed mobile radio network as part of their joint TechCity project, which achieves data rates of up to 1.65 Gbps under laboratory conditions. For the field tests, the two companies have set up a 4.5G pilot network in Munich.

Edward Deng, President of Telefónica Global Account of Huawei, said “4.5G Evolution helps Telefónica enhance its businesses by introducing 5G technologies into existing LTE networks. The 5G-like services and the new business models that 5G will support can be quickly launched and developed”.

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DT, Intel and Huawei show 5G NR interoperability

Deutsche Telekom, Intel and Huawei have completed 5G interoperability and development testing (IODT) based on the 3GPP R15 Standard with a commercial base station in an operator lab environment.

The test, which was carried out in Bonn, Germany, used  Huawei's 5G commercial base station and Intel's third generation 5G NR Mobile Trial Platform (MTP). The testing included synchronization, coding, frame structure, and numerology components underlying the interconnection of the NR-compliant terminal and network. The configuration was based on the largest C-band cell bandwidth defined by the 5G NR standard. It also incorporates the latest Massive MIMO multi-antenna and beamforming technology enabled by the standard framework.The companies have also verified 5G NR interoperability in Huawei’s Shanghai labs.

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ECI presents its connectivity fabric for 5G

At Mobile World Congress, ECI is presenting its dynamic, intelligent connectivity fabric for 5G networks.

At the core of ECI’s solution is its newly launched Elastic Services Platform, which consists of its: Apollo Optical family, Neptune Packet-Optical family and Mercury NFV-based solutions.

ECI has developed an open, modular SDN software suite for eal-time network control and optimization of service delivery.

The company says its solution brings together the latest in IP and Optical interworking (including new technologies such as FlexE and Path Computation), intuitive service orchestration and network automation. Highlights of ECI’s 5G solution:

Scalable Transport – provides the basis for a highly dynamic, distributed 5G architecture. ECI’s Neptune and Apollo product lines deliver scalable transport for RAN to Core connectivity, offering an optimized feature set for mobile backhaul. The solution is also environmentally hardened.

Adaptive Network Slicing – ECI’s Elastic Services Platform creates and supervises end-to-end network slicing, enabling dynamic latency adaptation and policy-driven bandwidth assignment for ultra-high bandwidth and low latency services, so slices can be customized according to required network performance metrics.

Assured Service Delivery – ECI’s Muse software suite enables a simple and intuitive way to define, profile, monitor and enforce SLAs to ensure current and future 5G services e.g. autonomous cars, are optimized, always on and running at peak efficiency.

Integrating (MEC) Multi-Access Edge Computing – ECI’s Mercury NFV-based solutions, operators can simply and easily add compute power, speed or capacity while preparing for 5G.

Open Architecture – ECI's ELASTIC network strategy promotes and supports open APIs, interfaces and SDN controllability to ensure full functionality in multi-vendor environments.

“5G promises to change the way we live, offering unprecedented services and an unparalleled user experience, but 5G goes beyond capacity. It is not just another G, nor is it simply about radio, rather it will change networking as we know it,” said Darryl Edwards, CEO and president of ECI. “However, we must remember 5G will still need to operate in conjunction with 4G LTE, and even 3G. It is paramount that network infrastructure be ELASTIC enough to enable the interworking and coexistence of generations.”

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Avanti readies Ka-band satellite for March launch

Avanti Communications confirmed that its HYLAS 4 satellite has arrived safely in French Guiana ahead of a scheduled launch in March.

The Avanti HYLAS 4 is a Ka-band satellite that will provide coverage over Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. It has 64 active fixed beams and four independent steerable beams and is designed for:

• Backhaul services for mobile network operators
• Wholesale broadband for ISPs
• Connectivity for governments (civil and defence)
• High-speed broadband services for the enterprise market
• Infill capacity for satellite operators

The spacecraft was built by Orbital ATK.

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Samsung's Galaxy S9 brings camera improvements but no 5G

Samsung is ready to ship its Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ smartphones in March in global volumes.

The new flagships boast an improved camera with a dual aperture lens for low light, Super Slow-mo video capabilities, and personalized AR Emoji.

As the units are now ready, network connectivity remains pretty much unchanged, with no 5G in this generation.

However, Samsung is introducing a SmartThings App with S9 and Galaxy S9+ that will connect to other Samsung and non-Samsung devices to serve as a connected hub for Smart Homes.

Regarding security, the new phones are protected by Knox 3.1, Samsung’s latest defense-grade security platform, as well as three different biometric authentication options – iris, fingerprint, and facial recognition.

A new verification mode can combine iris scanning and facial recognition technology to quickly unlock a user’s phone.

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Italy's SM-Optics develops OTN switching matrix scaling 300G to 1T

SM-Optics, a technology developer based in Milano, introduced a single chip OTN switching matrix that scales from 300 Gbps to 1 Tbps.

The company said its FLEX device can be addressed by ports spanning from traditional low-speed services like 2Mbps over micro-OTN, to layer2 and layer3 over ODUFlex, 100G over ODU4 and 200G over FlexO. Embedded capabilities include multi-technology OAM, packet processing, synchronization and fast protection functions. The FLEXSET boasts low latency performances and features an Intel Stratix 10 FPGA.

“Traditional systems rely on a multiple detached matrix architecture, often the result of scaled down core equipment at the expenses of flexibility, latency and physical dimensions” says Giorgio Cazzaniga product line director in SM-Optics, adding “FLEXSET has an unprecedented density coupled with wide tributary flexibility and multi-gigabit processing with bare minimum latency, using Intel Stratix 10 FPGAs. This single chip flexible architecture is reflected in the LM-1 product lines retaining the same advantages at system level.”

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Dell'Oro: Fast growth predicted for CBRS

The nascent Citizen Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) market opportunities are expected to grow 10-fold between 2018 and 2022 with total RAN investments approaching $1 billion, according to a new report from Dell'Oro Group.

“One of the more compelling propositions relating to the CBRS band is that it lowers the barrier to entry and provides opportunities for a wide range of participants to operate a public or private LTE network — or eventually even a 5G network — at a fraction of the cost of operating a typical network, utilizing licensed spectrum,” said Stefan Pongratz, Senior Director at Dell’Oro Group. “Taking into consideration both the enormous market opportunity with CBRS and the long list of caveats that could curtail the impact in the near-term, we expect activity to accelerate rapidly between 2018 and 2022 to support a wide range of participants to operate a public or private LTE network,” explained Pongratz.

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Seamless Air Alliance to ride OneWeb's LEO satellites

A new Seamless Air Alliance has been formed with the goal of providing better in-flight connectivity for passengers across airlines and irrespective of routes. Mobile operators would be able to extend seamless connectivity to their customers while in flight.

Key members of the alliance include Airbus, Delta, OneWeb, Sprint, and Bharti Airtel.

Low-latency, high-bandwidth in-flight connectivity will be delivered via OneWeb's forthcoming constellation of Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellites. The partners expect to be able to lower costs as well.

The alliance aims to streamline system integration and certification, providing open specifications for interoperability, increasing accessibility for passengers, and enabling simple and integrated billing.

"What if the best internet you ever experienced was in the air? Keeping this goal in mind, together, we will enable an affordable and frictionless experience for passengers everywhere," said Greg Wyler, Founder and Executive Chairman of OneWeb. "With the launch of our first production satellites set for later this year, we're one step closer to bridging the global Digital Divide on land and in the air."

"Easy-to-use, high-speed connectivity is part of the next revolution in aerospace," said Marc Fontaine, Airbus Digital Transformation Officer. "We're excited to create this seamless experience for our airline customers and their passengers. As we showed with our Skywise aviation data platform, Airbus is committed to innovation that creates value across the aviation industry."

• OneWeb has previously disclosed $500 million in finding from Airbus, Bharti Enterprises, Hughes Network Systems, (Hughes), a subsidiary of EchoStar Corp., Intelsat, Qualcomm, The Coca-Cola Company, Totalplay, a Grupo Salinas Company, owned by Ricardo B. Salinas, and Richard Branson's Virgin Group. OneWeb aims to launch a constellation of 648 small, low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites to provide global broadband and mobile telephone services. The system promises to bring more than 10 Tbps of new capacity.

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Cisco backs Open vRAN initiative for disaggregated mobile networks

Cisco is backing a new, open virtualized Radio Access Network (vRAN) initiative aimed fostering end-to-end, software-defined mobile networks. Additional backers include Altiostar, Aricent, Intel, Mavenir, Phazr, Red Hat and Tech Mahindra to spur rapid innovation in both hardware and software domains.

Reliance Jio is the first carrier to join.

While virtualization already plays a key role in other domains of mobile networking, such as in the Evolved Packet Core (EPC), IP Multimedia Subsystems (IMS), the Gateway Internet LAN (Gi-LAN) and data transport, backers of this initiative say that the RAN still has not benefitted from disaggregation.

Cisco and the other ecosystem parties plan to focus on assembling viable solutions that build on an open and modular architecture. Priorities include activities that simplify the transition to Open vRAN and software-defined mobile networks including:

• Testing and integration
• Solutions validation
• Transport evolution
• Publishing performance benchmarks
• Running Proof of Concepts (POC)
• Coordinating roadmaps for end-to-end solutions
• Creating and validating network management templates

“In collaboration with the ecosystem vendors, we aim to make the Radio Access Network more open and flexible, enabling the deployment of additional value-add mobile services at the network edge,”  said Tareq Amin, senior vice president, Technology Development and Automation, Reliance Jio. “Through this innovation and collaboration we will be able to deliver a better user experience for our customers.”

“We believe it is an ideal time to align and collaborate on these issues to deliver innovative solutions ready for commercial deployment,” said Yvette Kanouff, senior vice president and general manager, Cisco Service Provider Business. “Together with the ecosystem parties, we’re making leaps forward in developing a customer-centric ecosystem focused on accelerating innovation and enabling new business models to dramatically lower costs, add capacity and improve network performance.”

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GTT's acquisition of Interoute would add 72K km of European fiber to its transatlantic cables

GTT Communications agreed to acquire Interoute, operator of one of Europe’s largest independent fiber networks and cloud networking platforms, for approximately €1.9 billion ($2.3 billion) in cash.

Interoute's European fiber backbone spans 72,000 route kilometers connects nearly 200 data centres and colocation facilities.  Interoute also owns 15 of its own data centers and 33 colocation facilities. Its customers include international enterprises, as well as the world’s major service providers, ICPs and OTT providers. The company also operates 18 Interoute Virtual Data Centres (VDCs) globally, including three in Asia-Pacific, which are tied into its fiber backbone. In October 2017, Interoute launched its "Edge SD-WAN" service.

Interoute offers transport services (wavelength, Carrier Ethernet, managed bandwidth, storage connect, IP transit, cloud connect) and infrastructure services (dark fiber and data center colocation).

Interoute reported revenues of €718 million and adjusted EBITDA of €165 million for the 12 months ending September 30, 2017.

GTT said the merger contributes significant infrastructure, edge and hosted services to its network, as well as over 1,000 strategic enterprise and carrier clients, primarily headquartered in Europe.

In January 2017, GTT acquired Hibernia Networks and its five subsea cables, including Hibernia Express, the lowest latency transatlantic cable system, and eight cable landing stations, new global points of presence, and key clients in the financial services, media and entertainment, web-centric and service provider segments.

“The acquisition of Interoute represents a major milestone in delivering on our purpose of connecting people, across organizations and around the world,” said Rick Calder, GTT president and CEO. “This combination creates a disruptive market leader with substantial scale, unique network assets and award-winning product capabilities to fulfill our clients’ growing demand for distributed cloud networking in Europe, the U.S. and across the globe. Following our successful, proven acquisition model, we expect to complete this integration within three to four quarters postclose and achieve a post-synergy multiple of seven to eight times Adjusted EBITDA or better on a pro forma basis.”

“This is an exciting next chapter for Interoute, GTT, our customers and our team,” said Gareth Williams, Interoute CEO. “The combined assets and strengths of our two companies create a powerful portfolio of high-capacity, low-latency connectivity, and innovative cloud and edge infrastructure services to support our customers in the global digital economy.”

GTT acquires Amsterdam-based Custom Connect

Monday, January 08, 2018  GTT, Mergers & Acquisitions  No Comments

GTT has acquired Custom Connect, an Amsterdam-headquartered provider of high-speed network connectivity serving multinational enterprises and financial trading firms. Financial terms were not disclosed. Custom Connect, which was founded by Olav van Doorn and Jan Willem Meijer, operates a carrier-neutral MPLS/IP network that integrates SD-WAN and public and private clouds alongside existing data centers, offices, and branches. Its range of services...

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GTT Communications, a major global cloud networking provider serving multinational clients, announced an agreement with Jisc, the provider of digital solutions for the UK research and education community and operator of the Janet network for the delivery of Internet services.Under the agreement, GTT will provide high-speed Internet services for the Janet network to support the research and learning of its approximately 18 million UK college and university...

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GTT to Acquire Global Capacity, Building its SD-WAN

Monday, June 26, 2017  Global Capacity, GTT, Merger & Acquisitions  No Comments

GTT Communications agreed to acquire Global Capacity, a provider of enterprise network connectivity solutions, for $100 million in cash and 1.85 million shares of GTT common stock, to be issued to the sellers at closing. Global Capacity, which is based in Waltham, Mass., addresses a range of enterprise network issues including difficulty in load sharing traffic across a mix of access connections, complex, static and manual network configurations...

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GTT acquires Perseus for $37.5m

Wednesday, June 21, 2017  GTT  No Comments

GTT Communications based in McLean, Virginia, a global cloud networking provider to multinational clients, announced the acquisition of Perseus, a provider of high-speed network connectivity that serves major financial and e-commerce companies worldwide.GTT stated that the purchase price for Perseus was $37.5 million, plus the assumption of approximately $3 million in capital leases. GTT anticipates that the purchase price will rep

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Intel enters 5G pact with China's Unigroup Spreadtrum & RDA

Intel announced a strategic alliance with Unigroup Spreadtrum & RDA, a core subsidiary of Tsinghua Unigroup.

The plan is to develop a 5G smartphone platform for the China market that will feature an Intel 5G modem and will be targeted to coincide with 5G network deployments in 2019.

“Undoubtedly, China will be an important market at the forefront of 5G. Together with Unigroup Spreadtrum & RDA, Intel looks forward to making a 5G smartphone experience a compelling reality for consumers in China,” said Chenwei Yan, vice president in the Client Computing Group and general manager of Connected Products and Programs at Intel. “Intel is working with industry partners and network operators to accelerate 5G technology innovation across network, client and cloud. Through this effort, we will bring our modem expertise from years of research and development in driving standards, conducting trials, and building platforms to create a seamlessly connected, powerfully smart 5G future.”

“We are very excited to collaborate with Intel to build a leading 5G mobile platform. Unigroup Spreadtrum & RDA and Intel share the vision on transforming the mobile communication industry in the 5G era through technological innovation and innovation-driven revolution,” said Jingming Wang, vice president of Tsinghua Unigroup and COO of Unigroup Spreadtrum & RDA. “Drawing on the strong potential for global industry development and Intel’s profound technology experience, Unigroup Spreadtrum & RDA will persist on cultivating the 5G market and setting ourselves as a leading Chinese 5G high-end chipset brand.”

In 2014, Intel announced a minority stake investment in the holding company under Tsinghua Unigroup, which owns Spreadtrum Communications & RDA Microelectronics.

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KT, Qualcomm and Samsung Achieve Multi-vendor 5G NR Interoperability

KT Corporation, Qualcomm, and Samsung Electronics have completed multi-vendor 5G NR interoperable testing compliant with the 3GPP Release-15 Non-Standalone (NSA) 5G NR global standard.

The live, over-the-air interoperable testing demonstrated data connections operating in 3.5 GHz and 28 GHz bands, utilizing pre-commercial 5G NR base stations from Samsung and 5G NR UE prototype devices from Qualcomm.

The end-to-end 5G NR interoperability testing included scalable 5G NR OFDM numerology, advanced 5G NR channel coding and modulation schemes, low-latency 5G NR slot structure and 5G NR control and data channel support for Massive MIMO and mobile mmWave.

The vendors reported multigigabit downlink speeds, as well as latencies as low as 1 millisecond.

“KT has worked closely with Samsung and Qualcomm Technologies on testing innovative mobile technologies,” said Seo, Chang-Seok, executive vice president and head of network strategy unit, KT. “KT believes that this 5G NR trial will pave the way to a successful launch of 5G NR networks and mobile devices.”

“As the industry works toward the goal of commercial launches of 5G NR products and networks in 2019, close collaboration among global mobile industry leaders on testing and successful trials are necessary to validate the technologies and continue to build and improve our capabilities,” said Cristiano Amon, president, Qualcomm Incorporated. “We are proud of our achievement with Samsung and KT and look forward to further collaboration on the path to making 5G a commercial reality.”

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GSMA study warns the megacities could face bandwidth crunch by 2025

The world’s largest and densest cities, such as New York, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Tokyo, could face a wireless bandwidth crunch in their urban cores by 2025 warns a new report published by the GSMA.

The gap between mobile data traffic demand and available network capacity could become acute, with as much as 48 percent of traffic demand going unserved in ultra-dense urban areas by 2025. The report cites the rise of 5G and IoT as potentially increasing demand by 50 percent.

The GSMA report makes six key recommendations for policymakers to promote infrastructure investment:

• Release additional affordable spectrum: Greater availability of spectrum at fair prices could accelerate investment and have significant benefits in terms of network capacity.
• Facilitate deployment of fronthaul and backhaul infrastructure: Successful deployment of new macro and small cells to boost network capacity requires access to backhaul networks.
• Provide more access to advantageous macro-cell and small-cell sites: Rents for cell sites have risen steeply. Access to sites on publicly owned buildings and street furniture would remove a significant obstacle to new cell deployment.
• Allow network sharing agreements: Permitting operators the flexibility to enter into commercial agreements on network sharing would substantially reduce capital and operating costs for operators.
• Enable small-cell deployment: Streamlining planning approvals for widespread small cell installation could expedite network investment and increase capacity in large cities.
• Harmonise power density limits: Regulations setting exposure to levels of radiofrequency electromagnetic files should be harmonised with internationally recommended limits.

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Metaswitch lands extended reseller agreement with HPE

Metaswitch has signed a global resale agreement with Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) aimed at accelerating fixed and mobile network operators’ deployments of advanced services including VoLTE and VoWiFi on private, public or hybrid cloud infrastructures.

Under the deal, Metaswitch’s core network software products, including the Clearwater IMS core and Perimeta session border controller (SBC), will be integrated with HPE’s own virtual network functions and management platforms to deliver end to end virtualized VoLTE, VoWiFi and advanced communications services.

Metaswitch said this reseller relationship builds on the previous announcement of the integration of Metaswitch’s Clearwater core with HPE’s infrastructure platforms and NFV Director orchestration platform.

“Metaswitch has established a strong track record of collaboration with HPE that is giving operators a modern and compelling alternative to more limited, legacy approaches,” said Martin Lund, CEO of Metaswitch. “Today’s announcement marks a new level of collaboration between the two companies and is a significant step forward for carriers seeking more agility and velocity in service development and delivery.”

“HPE and Metaswitch are committed to easing operator adoption of virtualized infrastructure, applications and service innovation by pre-integrating best of breed cloud-native VNFs, management and orchestration, and subscriber management offerings in a rapidly-deployable package” said David Sliter, VP and GM Communications & Media Solutions, HPE. “Metaswitch offers service providers the only truly cloud native real time communications software solutions available in the market today. Metaswitch cloud native communications software solutions complement our range of advanced subscriber management platforms, orchestration software and cloud infrastructure elements on which operators can affect real architectural transformation.”

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Ericsson announces first Energy Infrastructure Management contract

Ericsson announced its first Energy Infrastructure Management contract with a mobile network operator -- Crnogorski Telekom, Montenegro’s leading telecommunications service provider and a member of the Deutsche Telekom Group

Ericsson’s Energy Infrastructure Management integrates big data analytics, energy management software, and lithium-ion batteries for energy storage. The solution provides an efficient means of measuring, monitoring and maintaining energy infrastructure at a mobile tower.

Ericsson said that Crnogorski Telekom has previously used a combination of diesel generators and lead-acid batteries as a source of backup power for its cell sites. New lithium-ion batteries from Panasonic offer superior energy density, are less vulnerable to damage from excessive discharging and extreme temperatures, and require less maintenance.

Under the 10-year contract with Crnogorski Telekom, Ericsson will assume responsibility for the design, roll out and management of lithium-ion battery and power infrastructure solutions for the operator’s cell sites. Ericsson will provide these services via an Energy Network Operations Center, thereby ensuring the highest levels of energy efficiency and availability. Panasonic, Ericsson’s partner, will handle the manufacturing, supply, asset ownership, dimensioning, 10-year performance service-level agreements (SLAs), and support for battery and power infrastructure. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Peter Laurin, Head of Managed Services at Ericsson, says: “Together with Panasonic, we will reduce the cost of energy equipment ownership for targeted Crnogorski Telekom sites by up to 40 percent. This is primarily a result of Ericsson’s advanced power source selection logic, extended battery life-cycles, and the reduced need for site visits. Our offering is based on an as-a-service business model, which provides Crnogorski Telekom with immediate savings with minimal upfront investment. Energy typically accounts for anything from 10 to 60 percent of an operator’s operational expenditure.”

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NETSCOUT brings NFV Service Assurance to VodafoneZiggo

NETSCOUT has been awarded a new multi-year agreement by VodafoneZiggo to support its Network Function Virtualization (NFV) transformation. Specifically, NETSCOUT will deliver end-to-end visibility and analytics into VodafoneZiggo’s converged, hybrid network to ensure the seamless delivery of services.

VodafoneZiggo is a joint venture of Liberty Global, the largest international TV and broadband internet company, and Vodafone Group. It provides fixed, mobile, and integrated communication and entertainment services to consumers and businesses in the Netherlands.

“The same NFV and virtualization technologies that drive service agility also bring significant challenges to identifying network and service performance. NFV networks do not usually operate in isolation, but rather work alongside existing physical network functions. With 360° visibility across the entire network, VodafoneZiggo can rely on our solution to rapidly pinpoint the exact location of an issue, wherever it occurs. By selecting to partner with NETSCOUT, VodafoneZiggo can move ahead with its NFV transformation with confidence that new and existing services and applications are performing optimally,” said Anil Singhal, co-founder, president, and chief executive officer, NETSCOUT.

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