IDC sees global telecom and pay TV spending on the rise

Worldwide spending on telecommunications services and pay TV services reached $1,662 billion in 2017, an increase of 1.4% year over year (in constant dollar terms), according to the International Data Corporation's (IDC) Worldwide Telecom Services Database, and will accelerate to a 1.6%  growth rate in 2018, bringing worldwide spending on telecom and pay TV services to $1,689 billion. IDC is predicting the market to continue its positive growth until the end of the five-year forecast period (2018-2022), growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 1.1%.

On a geographic basis, the Americas will remain the largest services market until the end of the forecast period in 2022. However, due to somewhat slower growth compared to other regions, its share of total worldwide spending will decline from 38% in 2017 to 36% in 2022. In contrast, Asia/Pacific will see its share increase from 32% to 34%.

"The Asia/Pacific market is growing faster than other regions due to the thirst for data services – spending on fixed data services is set to grow by 6% over the forecast period, which is significantly higher than other regions and this, coupled with mobile data growth, is driving the overall market growth," said Eric Owen, group vice president, EMEA Telecommunications & Networking at IDC.

"The global telecoms market will maintain steady growth of 2% over the forecast timeframe of 2018-2022. Communications service providers are in transition, facing a flat voice market, but steady growth in fixed and mobile data services. Fixed data services will grow by 4% due to strong demand for broadband, Ethernet, and high-speed fiber connectivity. While mobile voice revenues are declining, this sector will be sustained by strong growth in data and other services," said Courtney Munroe, group vice president, Worldwide Telecommunications Research at IDC.

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Trump defends pivot on ZTE

In a follow-up tweet regarding ZTE, President Trump defended his decision to intervene in the case with the Department of Commerce, citing on-going trade negotiations and his personal relationship with President Xi.

Meanwhile, Wilbur Ross, Secretary of Commerce, said ZTE did "inappropriate things" referring to its violation of economic sanctions against Iran, but that his department would now consider "other remedies" instead of the current export ban of U.S. products to ZTE. Media sources also speculated that China was using the delayed approval process for Qualcomm's acquisition of NXP Semiconductor as its own bargaining chip in the ongoing bilateral trade negotiations.

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Tele2 and Telia set 2025 data for deactivation of 3G in Sweden

Tele2 and Telia have agreed to deactivate the the 3G network in their joint company, Swedish UMTS Net AB, Sunab by the end of 2025.

Swedish UMTS Net AB, Sunab, is responsible for building, owning, and operating Tele2’s and Telia’s common 3G network. Today, the 3G network has over 6,000 base stations that will gradually be phased out or reused in other network expansion, which will result in cost and energy efficiency for Tele2.

The companies expect significant cost and energy efficiency gains. They said 3G deactivation is a natural part of future network evolution.

"This initiative is further proof of Tele2's challenger spirit. The transition from 3G to 4G is completely in line with our network strategy to move away from legacy networks, and move towards next generation networks. As Sweden’s most energy efficient network provider, we are extremely proud to accelerate our development , and become even more economically and environmentally efficient, says Samuel Skott, CEO Tele2 Sweden.

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Charter's Spectrum Enterprise to invest $1 billion in national fiber network

Spectrum Enterprise, which is a part of Charter Communications, will invest more than one billion dollars in new fiber infrastructure this year to increase the density of its national fiber network. The carrier will also new tools, training and resources required to provide a differentiated client experience.

The company said its one billion dollar investment will primarily fund increased client access to the existing Spectrum Enterprise national fiber network, adding to the network's nearly 200,000 fiber-lit buildings.  The majority of the new fiber will be constructed within the existing Spectrum Enterprise national footprint. 

Last year, Charter also invested in excess of $1 billion exclusively in Spectrum Enterprise.

"As fiber connectivity has become fundamental to economic growth, we are focused on making our fiber infrastructure more accessible to clients, and reshaping their experience to align with the evolving realities of today's modern enterprise," said Phil Meeks, Executive Vice President and President, Spectrum Enterprise. "Advanced video and virtual reality solutions, cloud, IoT and the future of 5G all depend on a reliable and highly-dense fiber network. Our commitment is to ensure that our clients have the most robust fiber network and solutions to grow today and take advantage of future technologies that have immense demands on bandwidth."

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OFS cleared in patent claim involving optical fiber coatings

OFS Fitel prevailed over DSM Desotech, a Dutch company, in patent infrigement case heard by the United States International Trade Commission (ITC).

The final determination cleared OFS, a manufacturer of optical fiber products, of all allegations that OFS optical fiber and the coating used on that fiber violated Section 337 of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended.  The Final Determination found that all claims asserted by DSM at the ITC are invalid.

Dr. Timothy F. Murray, CEO and Chairman of OFS said: "We were surprised to be charged with patent infringement based on the use of coatings to make optical fiber by DSM, a foreign coatings manufacturer who supplies cable coating products to OFS and has been a supplier of fiber coatings in the past.  It is a measure of the strength of our US system of commercial and intellectual property law that foreign companies come to this country to seek just treatment. We appreciate the diligence and care taken by the ITC to hear and understand the arguments of both parties in delivering this ruling. The invalidation of the claims in the patents asserted by DSM is a cautionary note to those who attempt to use unsupportable positions to threaten action."

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Molex acquires BittWare for FPGA-based platforms

Molex has acquired BittWare, a provider of computing systems featuring field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) deployed in data center compute and network packet processing applications. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Bittware, which is based in Concord, NH, provides solutions based on FPGA technology from Intel (formerly Altera) and Xilinx. BittWare FPGA solutions are used in compute and data center, military and aerospace, government, instrumentation and test, financial services, broadcast and video applications. BittWare serves original equipment manufacture (OEM) customers.

“FPGA-based platforms have become a strategically important driver of machine learning, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, network acceleration, IoT, and other megatrends. As a Molex subsidiary, now working with Nallatech, I believe we will have the critical mass to bring new resources, better processes, and economies of scale to our valued customers and this rapidly growing industry as a whole,” said Jeff Milrod, president and CEO of BittWare.

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Switch hits revenue of $98 million, up 10% yoy

Las Vegas-based, colocation provider Switch Inc, reported Q1 2018 revenue of $97.7 million, compared to $89.2 million for the same quarter in 2017, an increase of 10%. Net income was $4.0 million, compared to $20.3 million for the same quarter in 2017.  Net income in the first quarter of 2018 includes $12.4 million in equity-based compensation expense compared with $2.3 million in equity-based compensation expense in the same quarter of 2017.

"We are pleased with our progress in growing our ecosystem and positioning Switch as a partner of choice for global enterprises," said Thomas Morton, president and general counsel of Switch.  "Our highly differentiated and strategically located campus ecosystems continue to attract primary deployments, while our unique telecom capabilities enable hybrid cloud environments and hyperscale cloud deployments with AWS Direct Connect, Microsoft Express Route, and Google Cloud Interconnect."

Switch completed its IPO in October 2017.

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Telefónica Certifies NETSCOUT for UNICA SDN/NFV

Telefónica has certified NETSCOUT's virtualized solutions vSCOUT and vSTREAM for deployment with their UNICA Lab architecture that supports future networks based on network function virtualization and software-defined networking (NFV/SDN) technologies.

NETSCOUT was able to demonstrate pervasive visibility across physical, virtual and cloud networks as well as interoperability with other virtual network functions (VNFs) on the UNICA platform.

“NETSCOUT is one of the first network and application management vendors certified by Telefónica's UNICA Lab.

“Telefónica has one of the industry’s most ambitious and forward-looking visions for future networks based on SDN/NFV technologies. Their UNICA architecture provides a roadmap to the future, and NETSCOUT has aggressively taken the necessary steps to be there with them, delivering unmatched visibility into the hybrid cloud environment,” said Bruce Kelley, senior vice president, chief technology officer, Service Provider, NETSCOUT. “NETSCOUT’s robust smart data technology delivers a pervasive troubleshooting and performance platform that Telefónica can use across all its new NFV domains, as well as future systems, such as 5G.”

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ADTRAN heads Broadband Forum’s Application-Level Traffic Generation Testing

ADTRAN is leading an initiative within the Broadband Forum that will leverage application-level traffic generation for advanced broadband testing.

The idea is to develop standardized testing of dynamically reconfigured virtualized services, which can challenge traditional methods of performance characterization.

The first project in the Application-level Traffic Generation for Advanced Broadband Testing Project Stream is expected to be completed in late 2018, with follow-on projects in early 2019. It will deliver on the following principals:

• Define and specify a model for the generation of test traffic at the application level that emulates real-time domain behavior of multiple applications from multiple subscribers.
• Create a reference implementation for use in test cases in Open Broadband Labs and in other test environments as developed by the Broadband Forum and other industry stakeholders.
• Primarily address high-speed internet access for residential use. In a later phase, business applications could also be addressed.

“This initiative will benefit service providers, vendors and testing labs by fundamentally allowing them to manage the increasingly complex subscriber traffic on the network as application and service parameters change and evolve,” Broadband Forum CEO Robin Mersh said. “The project stream will have far-reaching positive effects on the entire industry and is why the Broadband Forum is championing it. ADTRAN’s domain experience in helping the industry transition to a more flexible, scalable and secure software-defined access network is certainly appreciated.”

“As carriers invest in upgrading the access infrastructure and look to leverage the service creation capabilities now available, it is critical that testing evolves to keep pace and ensure that the promises of software-defined access are realized,” ADTRAN Senior Staff Scientist and Project Stream Leader Ken Ko said. “ADTRAN has played an instrumental role in bringing this work forward and we look forward to collaborating with our peers within the Broadband Forum to advance this important work.”

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