MEF and TM Forum align on Open APIs for Service Automation

MEF and TM Forum are aligning their efforts on open standard APIs to automate inter-provider services for digital transformation. 

Specifically, MEF’s inter-provider LSO Sonata APIs will be aligned with TM Forum's APIs so as to prevent a forking of the standards. 

MEF LSO Sonata APIs enable automation of MEF 3.0 Carrier Ethernet services, with additional work underway to automate connectivity services such as IP broadband, IP MPLS, Dedicated Internet Access, and 5G that underpin SD-WAN and SASE services at the network edge.

The two groups said their collaboration will help service providers accelerate their transition from operating within limited ecosystems/islands to being integral players in a worldwide federation of networks supporting on-demand digital services across multiple providers. 

TM Forum and MEF have specifically aligned on the following:

• TM Forum is developing Domain Context Specialization Guidelines that enable MEF LSO Sonata APIs to conform to TM Forum Open API standards.
• TM Forum API tooling is now being used by MEF to build the set of LSO Sonata APIs.
• LSO Sonata API product payloads work in alignment with TM Forum API standards using a polymorphic approach.
• The organizations have established a framework for ongoing collaboration.

“API alignment between MEF and TM Forum paves the way for members of both standards bodies to federate with the confidence and will accelerate service delivery across multiple providers.” said Pascal Menezes, CTO, MEF. “Automation of inter-provider services – with currently available and planned LSO APIs – ultimately opens up opportunities to offer enterprise customers on-demand/ dynamic connectivity with coveted global reach.”

“CSPs are clear that B2B services will be critical to the success of 5G. This requires CSPs to offer enterprises access to complex solutions to business challenges. CSPs cannot do this on their own, so building out ecosystems of partners to meet the myriad needs of enterprises is essential,” said George Glass, Chief Technology Officer, TM Forum. “Open APIs are an important part of integrating partner capabilities and enabling CSPs to establish, operate and monetize platform-based business models. Both MEF and TM Forum recognized that bringing our APIs into alignment was for the good of the industry.”

http://www.mef.net/Press-Releases/MEF-and-TM-Forum-Collaborate-on-Open-APIs-for-Service-Automation

MEF's LSO Inter-Provider Automation takes another step forward

Thursday, June 04, 2020  MEF  

Eight leading service providers are on track to be production-ready in 2Q 2020 for deploying MEF 3.0 LSO Sonata APIs to automate the ordering of MEF 3.0 Carrier Ethernet Access E-Line services:

• AT&T
• Infonas
• Bestel
• PCCW Global
• Sparkle
• Colt Technology Services
• Telefónica International Wholesale Services
• HGC Global Communications

Five already have implemented LSO Sonata APIs in production environments and three expect to be ready for deployment before the end of Q2 2020.  In addition, Bloomberg is the first multinational enterprise to take this step.

The goal of  LSO Sonata APIs is to help service providers to transition from operating as independent islands to participating in a global federation of automated networks that will support dynamic inter-provider services with frictionless commerce.

Read More

Acacia samples 100G coherent DWDM module in QSFP-DD

Acacia Communications has begun sampling a new 100G coherent DWDM pluggable aimed at edge and access applications. 

The new 100G coherent DWDM module , which is offered in the QSFP-DD form factor, is designed to provide scalable traffic aggregation. It also provides an upgrade path to migrate from existing 10G WDM networks to higher-performing 100G DWDM coherent links for new architectures in access networks, such as cable/fiber deep and 5G wireless X-haul applications.

The company said its 3D Siliconization approach, based on silicon photonics, will enable it to achieve high-volume manufacturing with this product. In addition, Acacia’s pluggable coherent solutions in QSFP-DD were designed to enable network scalability to 200G and 400G versions in the future. 

“As with our recently announced 100G point-to-point solutions, Acacia is working to satisfy the requirements of service provider edge and access applications with coherent solutions designed for this market,” said Anuj Malik, Director of Product Management at Acacia Communications. “The benefits of coherent have been demonstrated in the metro, long-haul and submarine markets and, with these new products, Acacia is looking to deliver the same scalability, operational simplicity and improved total cost of ownership to the edge and access space.”

“The edge of the network is evolving, and we’re bringing new solutions to market designed to provide scale and ease of use for new applications around IoT and edge computing,” said Jörg-Peter Elbers, Senior Vice President of Advanced Technology, ADVA. “As service providers upgrade their access and aggregation infrastructure, it is only a matter of time before coherent technologies make inroads in this space. Acacia has been a leading provider of pluggable coherent optics and their latest innovation provides interesting possibilities.” 

http://www.acacia-inc.com 

Read More

Deutsche Telekom to open fiber network to Telefónica Deutschland

Deutsche Telekom reached a milestone FTTH network sharing agreement with Telefónica Deutschland.

Under the ten-year contract, the companies are to extend their long-standing fixed line network collaboration to include Deutsche Telekom's fiber-optic network and new FTTH builds. Since 2013, Telefónica has been purchasing fiber-optic network-based copper lines (VDSL/vectoring) from Deutsche Telekom as part of a contingent contract that Telefónica then markets to its end customers. 

This is the first time that Deutsche Telekom will provide its partner with FTTH with download speeds of up to 1 Gbps. 

Telekom Deutschland CEO Dirk Wössner stated: “This is a pioneering deal for the buildout of the fiber-optic infrastructure in Germany for the next decade, based on a voluntary commercial agreement between two large market players from which many people and companies in Germany will benefit. Deutsche Telekom stands for open networks and cooperations. And we are emphasizing this with this wide-reaching cooperation agreement. This contract will secure the utilization of our broadband network. And we will receive financial resources that we will re-invest in our networks.”

"The long-term cooperation with Deutsche Telekom gives us planning security. In future, we will be able to offer our O2 customers access to the fiber optic network, especially in large cities. On this basis we can offer our customers first-class convergent products", explains Markus Haas, CEO of Telefónica Germany / O2.

Read More

Pluribus scales up with its Adaptive Cloud Fabric

Pluribus Networks introduced a number of architectural enhancements to its Adaptic Cloud Fabric to scale hybrid clouds and edge data centers to thousands of nodes.

The Pluribus Adaptive Cloud Fabric, powered by the Netvisor ONE OS and open network switching hardware, leverages a controllerless SDN architecture that incorporates network automation, virtualization, secure segmentation, visibility and analytics.

The company is introducing two complementary innovations:

• Thousand-Node Fabrics: Extending the advantages of controllerless SDN automation across larger fabrics. With a hierarchical multi-pod architecture and new capabilities incorporated into the Pluribus UNUM management system, Pluribus enables the Adaptive Cloud Fabric to scale far beyond current levels and meet virtually any customer’s scalability requirements. The new architecture is designed to scale to 256, 512 or even 1,024 switches in a unified fabric, extending the operational simplification benefits of the Adaptive Cloud Fabric to larger and more distributed data centers.
• Open Fabric Extension with EVPN: Enabling multi-fabric federation and multi-vendor interoperability. The Adaptive Cloud Fabric incorporates open fabric extension using BGP EVPN, which delivers additional scalability in two ways. First, this approach can enable even greater scalability in Pluribus-delivered network fabrics – far beyond 1,024 nodes if needed – by seamlessly interconnecting and federating multiple Adaptive Cloud Fabrics and extending services between them. Open fabric extension with EVPN also supports standards-based interoperability and service extension to 3rd party fabrics, ideal for brownfield deployments and for those customers who desire multi-vendor environments.

“In the current environment, data center network fabrics must scale in multiple dimensions to meet the challenges of large private cloud and edge computing deployments,” said Kumar Srikantan, CEO at Pluribus Networks. “The Adaptive Cloud Fabric is already proven as a distributed multi-site data center fabric that is highly cost-effective, automated, agile and easy to operate. Now we can extend all the advantages of the Adaptive Cloud Fabric’s controllerless SDN automation across much larger fabrics, while also enabling EVPN-based fabric extension and multi-vendor interoperability.”

Pluribus notes that its Adaptive Cloud Fabric has been deployed by hundreds of customers to create secure software-defined data centers (SDDCs), unified network fabrics across multi-site data centers, and distributed clouds for 5G and edge computing. The company cites two recent examples:

• A regional government agency has deployed a 64-node Adaptive Cloud Fabric in a single data center and will expand it to a unified 128-node fabric across two geographically separated data centers, enabling active-active operations for high application agility and availability with low operational complexity.
• Trilogy Networks is leading the Rural Cloud Initiative (RCI) along with numerous rural telecom network providers. Trilogy, which recently announced completion of Phase 1 of the RCI Farm of the Future and is transitioning to production network deployments, is using the Adaptive Cloud Fabric to connect hundreds of highly distributed edge computing sites into a unified fabric to support edge applications for precision agriculture.

https://www.pluribusnetworks.com/

Read More

Spectra7 cites progress in 800G active copper cables

Luxshare will evaluate 800Gbps data center interconnects using Active Copper Cable (ACC) interconnects based on Spectra7’s new GC1122 solution.

Spectra7 also confirmed that Foxconn Interconnect Technology, Inc. (Foxconn) a leading supplier of interconnect solutions will support next generation 800 Gbps Active Copper Cable (ACC) interconnects using Spectra7’s new GC1122 solution. 

Spectra7 said its GaugeChanger allows copper to extend much longer lengths without the cost and power penalty of optics. It works equally well at 25Gbps NRZ, 50Gbps PAM-4 and 100Gbps PAM-4 enabling new connector standards of 100, 200, 400 and 800Gbps.

Spectra7 Microsystems' GC1122 is the latest addition to the company's GaugeChanger product line and extends the data rate from 56Gbps to 112Gbps per lane. Since the GC1122 is analog and highly linear, dynamics such as line rate adjustment, multi-level signaling, intermittent line silence, transmit pre-emphasis or amplitude adjustment and receiver adaptivity are fully preserved.

“Spectra7 has created a compelling solution to address the dramatically increasing power and cost of data center interconnects. We are seeing significant interest from our largest customers for 800Gbps ACCs,” said Jinhua Chen, Enterprise GM at Luxshare-ICT.

“We are thrilled to have Luxshare as a partner for our 800Gbps GaugeChanger™ technology," said Spectra7 CEO Raouf Halim. "They are a technology leader in the hyperscale interconnect market."

Luxshare-ICT is a manufacturer of cable assembly and connector system solutions for consumer, automotive, cloud, and enterprise applications. 

Read More

HAPSMobile completes first stratospheric flight with Loon payload

 HAPSMobile, a start-up backed by SoftBank with minority investment by AeroVironment, reached an altitude of 62,500 feet (approximately 19 kilometers) during the fifth test flight for “Sunglider,” a solar-powered unmanned aircraft system (“UAS”) designed for stratospheric telecommunications platform systems. 

The test flight, which took place on September 21, 2020 (MT) at Spaceport America in New Mexico, lasted a total 20 hours and 16 minutes, with 5 hours and 38 minutes of them in the stratosphere. 

Sunglider completed its flight on a pre-flight battery charge and solar energy during the flight. Sunglider also demonstrated its high-performance capabilities under extremely demanding conditions where wind speeds were greater than 58 knots (approximately 30 meters per second) and temperatures fell as low as -73 degrees Celsius.

Sunglider also carried a telecommunications payload from Loon. Smartphones on the ground connected to the Internet via the Loon payload in the stratosphere. Team members in New Mexico using the connection successfully placed a video call to Japan.

https://www.hapsmobile.com/

Read More

Seaborn appoints Steve Orlando as CEO

Seaborn Networks appointed Steve Orlando as its new Chief Executive Officer.

Orlando brings 27 years of experience across senior leadership positions at Zayo Group, 

Orlando joins Seaborn from Zayo Group, where he served as the Senior Vice President of Fiber and Network Solutions. In this role, he led product, operations and network development to support indirect and direct sales for the organization across 18 states in the Central Region. He has also served at CenturyLink, Level 3, Global Crossing and Verizon Business.

“Seaborn is helping to transform global communications, and this appointment is sure to create a new era of success for the company and its customers,” comments Pete Hayes, Chairman of the Board at Seabras Group. “Steve brings a strong history of leadership and telecommunications experience, and he’s thoroughly equipped to lead Seaborn as it looks to address evolving global communications requirements.”

Seaborn emerges from Chapter 11

Thursday, July 09, 2020  Chapter 11, Subsea  

Seaborn has emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy having reduced total outstanding debt, revised debt maturity arrangements, and restructured its ownership to provide a solid basis for the continued growth of the business going forward.

Coincident with the consolidation and Chapter 11 emergence, Larry Schwartz, former CEO of Seaborn, and Roger Kuebel, former CFO of Seaborn, have left Seaborn and the Seabras Group.

Pete Hayes and Don Shassian, Partners Group-appointed Board members, will serve as Interim CEO and Interim CFO, respectively, of the Seabras Group. Andy Bax, the Chief Operating Officer (“COO”) of Seaborn, will remain in the same role.

"We are excited about the future and sincerely thank all of our employees, customers, providers and other business partners for their continued commitment to the company”, said Andy Bax, Chief Operating Officer of Seaborn. “Our world-class team will continue to work hard to deliver innovative advancements and new, industry-leading solutions for our customers and partners for years to come."

“We believe that Seaborn’s technology-driven, client-first approach and advanced delivery solutions are best-in-class,” says Todd Bright, Partner and Head of Private Infrastructure Americas at Partners Group, a global private markets investment manager and owner of Seaborn on behalf of its clients. “We will continue to work side-by-side with Seaborn as a value-added investor to help the company meet the needs of its customers now and in the future.”

Seaborn is an independent cable operator that fully operates and maintains its submarine and terrestrial cable infrastructure. POPs, terrestrial backhaul, landing stations and subsea cable are all under Seaborn’s control. 

http://www.seabornnetworks.com

Seaborn extends Seabras-1 IP Network to key data centers

Monday, January 20, 2020  Seaborn, Submarine, Subsea  

Seaborn Networks announced new high capacity connectivity from their Seabras-1 IP Network directly into key global IX locations;

• Amsterdam - AMS-IX now live (January 6, 2020)
• Frankfurt - DE-CIX now live (January 6, 2020)
• London - LINX now live (January 6, 2020)
• San Jose - Equinix IX (SV1) live by end of January 2020
• Los Angeles - CoreSite Any2 IX (LA1) live by end January 2020
• Ashburn - Equinix IX (DC4) live by end January 2020

Read More

Fujitsu launches private 5G services in Japan

Fujitsu is launching private 5G enterprise services in Japan.

"Private Wireless Managed Services" provides one-stop services from Fujitsu's wireless technology specialists for measuring, designing, building, operating, and maintaining the private 5G system. The service is offered beginning this week on a monthly usage basis.  A variety of enterprise use cases are supported.

Read More

Marvell intros automotive Gigabit Ethernet PHY with MACsec

 Marvell introduced an automotive gigabit Ethernet PHY solution with integrated media access control security (MACsec).

Marvell said MACsec will fortify in-vehicle networking by securing data exchange on a hop-by-hop basis and prevents Layer 2 security threats such as intrusion, man-in-the-middle, and replay attacks. Marvell's new Open Alliance TC10 compliant, dual speed 100/1000 BASE-T1 88Q222xM Ethernet PHY enables energy efficient, secure in-vehicle networks and assists in achieving functional safety compliance at the system level.

Automotive networks rely heavily on partial networking in which some segments are hibernated and woken up on demand. Marvell's new gigabit PHY supports the Open Alliance TC10 for sleep mode and wake-up, tailored for automotive use cases. 

"Marvell is committed to developing innovative solutions for the automotive market and offers the industry's largest portfolio of secure Ethernet switches and PHYs," said Amir Bar-Niv, vice president of Marketing of the Automotive Business Unit at Marvell. "We are extremely proud to introduce the industry's first automotive gigabit Ethernet PHY that integrates Layer 2 security through MACsec while also delivering best-in-class lower power performance that meets the most stringent power budget. Marvell's 88Q222x solution is based on the Automotive QMS Process and comes with functional safety collateral assisting tier-1s and OEMs in fulfilling ISO 26262 at a system level."

https://www.marvell.com/products/automotive/88q222xm.html

Read More