Monday, August 6, 2018

Arista to pay $400M to Cisco, resolving patent dispute

Cisco and Arista reached a settlement resolving their long-running patent dispute. Under the deal, Arista will pay $400 million to Cisco, and Cisco agrees not to assert against Arista patents that were included in the litigation as long as Arista shall continue to implement workarounds it had put in place to certain of those patents. In an SEC 8-K filing, Cisco also said Arista agreed to make certain changes to the user interfaces of its products. The...

Bharti Airtel buys capacity on MENA Cable and TE North Cable Systems

Bharti Airtel reached an agreement with Telecom Egypt under which it will acquire IRUs (Indefeasible Right of Use) on Middle East North Africa Submarine Cable (MENA Cable) and TE North Cable Systems. Specifically, Airtel gets the right to use fiber pairs on MENA Cable from Egypt to India with access to Saudi Arabia and Oman, and other fiber pairs from Egypt towards Italy. It also extends beyond MENA Cable, where Airtel will get the right to use...

Lumina enhances its SDN controller with PacketCable support

Lumina Networks has enhanced its OpenDaylight-powered SDN controller with support for the open source PacketCable multimedia interface (PCMM). Lumina's SDN controller with PCMM protocol enables cable operators (MSOs) to manage QoS for services such as VoIP by controlling QoS parameters in the cable modem termination system (CMTS). PCMM also provides resource auditing and management and a robust security mechanism. Lumina’s SDN Controller provides...

SpaceX launches comms satellite for Indonesia's PT Telkom

SpaceX successfully launched the "Merah Putih" satellite on behalf of PT Telkom, Indonesia's largest telecom operator. The launch used a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The geosynchronous Merah Putih satellite, which is based on the SSL 1300 platform, carries an all C-band payload of 60 transceivers capable of supporting a wide range of applications, including providing mobile broadband across Indonesia and Southeast...

Google Cloud expands its virtual workstations with NVIDIA Tesla GPUs

Google Cloud Platform began offering virtual workstations optimized for graphics-intensive applications and machine learning inference based on the NVIDIA Tesla P4 GPU. The new support enables users to turn any instance with one or more GPUs into a high-end workstation. P4s offer 8GB of GDDR5 memory https://cloud.google.com/ ...

AT&T teams with RapidDeploy on cloud-based Computer-Aided Dispatch

AT&T and RapidDeploy are collaborating to provide Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) access to RapidDeploy's cloud-based Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) platform. RapidDeploy, which is built on an open-API architecture, is a modern update to the dispatch solutions currently used by PSAPs. It can be integrated with relevant and emerging data-rich sources to improve public safety's situational awareness. AT&T is connecting PSAPs to the RapidDeploy...

Rostelecom sees growth in Pay TV

Rostelecom, Russia’s national telecommunications operator, posted Q2 revenue of RUB 77.365 billion, up 3% from a year earlier. The company cites pay-TV and fiber broadband services as key drivers as it invests in enterprise cloud services, data centers and cybersecurity services. In its quarterly report, Rostelcom also noted a positive marketing result from its role as regional sponsor to World Cup 2018. Some key Rostelcom metrics: The total...

Twilio hits Q2 revenue of $147.8 million, up 54%

Twilio, the cloud communications platform, posted total revenue of $147.8 million for the second quarter of 2018, up 54% from the second quarter of 2017 and 14% sequentially from the first quarter of 2018. There was a GAAP loss from operations of $22.0 million for the second quarter of 2018, compared with GAAP loss from operations of $7.1 million for the second quarter of 2017. Non-GAAP income from operations came in at $2.2 million for the second...

NeoPhotonics posts Q2 revenue of $81M, up 11% yoy

NeoPhotonics reported Q2 2018 revenue of $81.1 million, up 18% quarter-over-quarter and 11% year-over-year. Gross margin was 19.1%, compared to 13.4% in the prior quarter, and there was a net loss of $10.5 million, compared to a net loss of $18.2 million in the prior quarter. Non-GAAP net loss was $6.3 million, compared to a net loss of $14.6 million in the prior quarter “In the second quarter, NeoPhotonics delivered strong results with revenue...

Italy's Open Fiber secures EUR 3.5 billion for its rollout

Open Fiber has raised EUR 3.5 billion in financing from Italy's Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP), a consortium of international banks, and the European Investment Bank (EIB) for the rollout of its FTTH network. The company has now secured EUR 6.5 billion in funding commitments for its ambition to reach 19.5 million residences across Italy. The consortium of banks includes BNP Paribas, Société Générale and UniCredit as underwriters, along with Banca...

Samsung debuts 4-bit Consumer SSD at 4 TB

Samsung Electronics announced mass production of the first 4-bit (QLC, quad-level cell) 4-terabyte (TB) SATA solid-state drive (SSD) for consumers. Samsung said its 4-bit 4TB QLC SATA SSD maintains performance levels at the same level as a 3-bit SSD by using a 3-bit SSD controller and TurboWrite technology, while increasing drive capacity through the use of 32 chips, all based on 64-layer fourth-generation 1Tb V-NAND. The 4-bit QLC SSD enables a...

USDA funds 12 rural broaband projects -- $97M

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced plans to invest $97 million in 12 projects in 11 states: Arizona, Iowa, Idaho, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Wyoming. The funding is intended to improve rural broadband. The funding will be made available through the Telecommunications Infrastructure Loan Program and the Community Connect Grant Program. Example projects include: Chibardun Telephone...

Acacia is cautiously optimistic with recent lifting of ZTE ban

On August 2, Acacia Communications reported Q2 revenue of $65.0 million, a decrease of 18% year-over-year. The GAAP gross margin was 38.8%; and there was a GAAP net loss of $3.2 million. Non-GAAP net loss amounted to $3.2 million. “During the second quarter, we stayed focused on execution, particularly around new product development and revenue diversification,” said Raj Shanmugaraj, President and Chief Executive Officer of Acacia Communications....