Intel to open data center R&D lab in Oregon

Intel plans to invest more than $700 million for a 200,000-square-foot, state-of-the art research and development mega lab focused on data center technologies and addressing areas such as heating, cooling and water usage. Construction on the lab will begin this year at the Jones Farm campus in Hillsboro, Oregon, with opening expected in late 2023.  The lab will qualify, test and enable Intel’s portfolio of data center products including Intel® Xeon, Intel Optane, network interfaces and switch gear, Intel Agilex™ FPGAs, Xe architecture, Habana accelerators and future products under development.  

Additionally, Intel introduced an open intellectual property (open IP) immersion liquid cooling solution and reference design. With the initial design proof of concept initiated in Taiwan, Intel aims to simplify and accelerate the implementation of immersion liquid cooling solutions throughout the ecosystem globally. 

“Intel’s dedication to its global partnerships is evident with these announcements today. The future of the data center and data center design is based on innovative and sustainable technologies and practices, and I’m proud of the work we’re doing every day to help make a sustainable future a reality,” stated Sandra L. Rivera, Intel executive vice president and general manager of the Datacenter and AI Group.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/key-investments-advance-data-center-sustainability.html

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Motorola Solutions signs GlobalFoundries to secure radio chip supply

Motorola Solutions, which supplies two-way radios for public safety, critical infrastructure and enterprise organizations, signed a long-term agreement with GlobalFoundries to supply chip solutions.

The companies point out that several critical chips the company designs for its public safety, professional and commercial radios are manufactured by GF in Vermont. GF's SiGe process technology enables the highly reliable, long-range, secure and clear communications vital to police, fire and other first responders.   

“Millions of first responders, utilities, infrastructure providers and businesses rely on Motorola Solutions radios for everyday and emergency communications, and it is essential that we maintain supply of these critical components,” said Scott Mottonen, senior vice president of products, Motorola Solutions. “Our long-term relationship with GF provides important capabilities, reliable U.S.-based manufacturing and added assurance that we will continue to meet the safety and security needs of our customers across the globe.” 

 "Through long-term agreements, we provide assured supply of highly reliable and vital chips used in millions of mission-critical products worldwide. A great example of this is our collaboration with Motorola Solutions on their two-way radios, which are relied upon by first responders everywhere,” said Dr. Bami Bastani, senior vice president and general manager, mobile and wireless infrastructure strategic business unit at GF. “We are gratified to serve the industry with feature-rich solutions but also the innovations in RF technology that deliver low noise and high power and efficiency to allow for clear and long-range communications in highly demanding situations.” 

https://gf.com

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Celona picks Keysight’s Open RAN Architect test solution

Celona has selected Keysight’s Open RAN Architect (KORA) solution portfolio to validate the quality and reliability of 5G private network deployments for enterprises.

Celona is using several Keysight 5G radio access network (RAN) test tools, including:

• Keysight’s user equipment emulation (UEE) test solution (UeSIM) to emulate real network traffic over radio and O-RAN fronthaul interfaces, enabling comprehensive base station performance validation across the protocol stack.
• Keysight's S9130A 5G Performance Multi-Band Vector Transceiver (VXT), a non-signaling measurement system, to accelerate the validation of sub-6GHz and mmWave 5G base stations (gNodeBs) according to the latest 3GPP specifications.

Keysight says its integrated test, validation and optimization tools enable Celona to accelerate the deployment of 5G local area network (LAN) solutions, including access points for indoor and outdoor wireless coverage and cloud-native software powered by artificial intelligence (AI). 

“Keysight is pleased to support Celona in delivering end-to-end networking solutions that seamlessly integrate with existing enterprise networks to simplify private cellular wireless operations and accelerate the adoption of business-critical applications requiring deterministic wireless connectivity,” said Giampaolo Tardioli, vice president and general manager for Keysight's enterprise and service providers group. “Keysight’s test solutions speed industrial device and network validation and certification, network planning, deployment and site acceptance, as well as simplify network monitoring critical in smart manufacturing, energy, utilities, mining, transport and health care.”

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GlobalFoundries announces research and collaboration program

GlobalFoundries is launching a new program that extends the development horizon of innovative, differentiated semiconductor technology and broadens the company's portfolio of feature-rich and enablement solutions. 

GF Labs will focus on advancing new technology and long-term roadmap differentiation that will enable GF customers to develop innovative products and accelerate their time-to-market. The program is offer an open framework of internal and external research and development initiatives that deliver a differentiated pipeline of market-driven process technology solutions for future data-centric, connected, intelligent and secure applications. GF Labs will harvest capabilities from a broad research platform including the Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre (IMEC) in Belgium, Fraunhofer in Germany, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the U.S., and the Institute for Microelectronics in Singapore, along with a broad network of university partnerships.

"Fostering semiconductor innovation is critical to delivering a differentiated technology portfolio that will continue to fuel emerging markets," said Gregg Bartlett, senior vice president of Technology, Engineering and Quality, GF. "Our focus is on making sure we're always developing the latest technologies that provide meaningful differentiation for our customers, not just in the near-term, but far into the next decade. The launch of GF Labs accelerates our pursuit of the innovation it takes to develop and deliver powerful technological advances for our customers."

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Dell'Oro: RAN misses estimates in 1Q 2022

Preliminary findings suggest the positive momentum that has characterized the RAN market over the past four years extended into the first quarter, according to Dell'Oro Group.

However, external challenges, including Covid-19 restrictions and supply chain disruptions, taken together with more challenging year-over-year comparisons, impacted the growth rate. Preliminary estimates suggest that the overall 2G–5G RAN infrastructure equipment market—including hardware, software, and firmware—increased at the slowest pace in more than two years.

Additional highlights from the 1Q 2022 RAN report:

• Top 5 suppliers in the quarter include Ericsson, Huawei, Nokia, ZTE, and Samsung.
• Ericsson, Nokia, Huawei, and Samsung lead outside of China while Huawei and ZTE continued to dominate the Chinese RAN market.
• Non-top 5 suppliers collectively gained around 2 percentage points of share in 1Q 2022.

“Even with the RAN results now coming in below expectations two quarters in a row, it is important to keep in mind that it is still early days in the broader 5G cycle and fundamentals remain healthy”, said Stefan Pongratz, Vice President at Dell’Oro Group. “We have not made any major adjustments to the aggregate forecast and still expect the broader RAN market to record a fifth consecutive year of growth in 2022, underpinned by elevated investments in North America, Europe, and China”, continued Pongratz.

https://www.delloro.com/news/ran-misses-estimates-in-1q-2022/

 

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Dell'Oro: Microwave transmission equipment up 7% in 1Q 2022

Microwave Transmission equipment revenue grew 7 percent year-over-year in the first quarter of 2022, according to Dell'Oro Group. In the quarter, Huawei and ZTE grew revenues at a faster pace than the market, resulting in significant market share gains for each company compared to the year-ago quarter.

“Sales of microwave transmission equipment started the year strong as operators increasingly added backhaul capacity to cell sites,” stated Jimmy Yu, Vice President at Dell’Oro Group. “While component shortage and supply chain issues are expected to remain a problem for this industry through 2022, we continue to forecast a strong rate of market growth this year. That said, without a shortage of components, the market would be growing at a much higher rate as identified in this quarter,” added Yu.

Highlights from the 1Q 2022 Quarterly Report:

• Mobile backhaul drove better than expected results in Microwave Transmission. We estimate the Microwave Transmission market grew 7 percent year-over-year (Y/Y) in 1Q 2022 due to a 16 percent Y/Y growth in mobile backhaul. This sharp growth, however, was slightly offset by a decline in the Verticals market.
• Component shortages and supply chain issues in the quarter seemed to have worsened compared to the prior quarter. We estimate that without component shortages and supply chain issues the Microwave Transmission market could have grown 11 percent Y/Y in the quarter.
• Significant market share shifts occurred in the quarter with Huawei and ZTE each gaining over 4 percentage points of share compared to 1Q 2021.

https://www.delloro.com/news/microwave-transmission-equipment-market-grew-7-percent-in-1q-2022/

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Airgain releases CBRS and C-Band antennas

Airgain introduced its Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) and Lower C-Band Panel Antenna. 

The antenna provides high performance CBRS and C-Band connectivity for point-to-point or point-to-multipoint applications. Equipped with two ports, this antenna connects to most branch routers or modems. Leveraging MIMO technology, this antenna also offers two high-gain CBRS and Lower C-Band antennas that operate in the 3300 to 3800 MHz band. The small panel limits the wireless infrastructure footprint and provides high-gain for stable point-to-point links.

“There is an explosion in demand for a next generation private wireless network, from corporations needing to power greater productivity to school districts pushing connections on campus and to nearby homes,” said Airgain SVP of Global Product and Marketing Morad Sbahi. “Airgain will be at the forefront of enabling the connectivity of these networks by helping base stations to broadcast reliable and secure private networks at a lower cost.”

http://www.Airgain.com

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