Reliance Jio readies for a big 5G rollout

Reliance Jio announced a $25 billion rollout plan for 5G Stand Alone (SA) across India using an end-to-end 5G stack developed in India. 

This autumn, Jio will launch Jio 5G across multiple key cities, including the metropolises of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, and Chennai. 

Jio's spectrum licenses include the 3500 MHz mid-band, which is globally earmarked for 5G, and the 26 GHz millimetre-wave band for ultra-high capacity. Jio also has the 700 MHz low-band spectrum which is essential for deep indoor coverage.

Jio currently has 421 million mobile broadband subscribers on its 4G network. Average monthly data consumption is nearly 20 GB, nearly double from the same period last year.

Jio also plans to bring "highly affordable fixed broadband services" to 100 million locations in a very short period of time."

In a speech to investors, Mukesh Ambani, chairman and managing director of Reliance Industries, also highlight partnerships with Microsoft to expand the Azure ecosystem in India; with Intel on technologies used in Jio's cloud-scale data centres and 5G Edge locations; as well as relationships with leading global network technology providers such as Ericsson, Nokia, Samsung and Cisco. Ambani also announced a partnership with Qualcomm, which is not only a global semiconductor and communications technology major but also one of the valued investors of Jio Platforms. 

https://www.ril.com/InvestorRelations/Chairman-Communication.aspx

Reliance Jio becomes India's biggest spectrum holder

Tuesday, August 02, 2022  5G, Auctions, India, Mobile, Reliance Jio  

Reliance Jio was the largest purchaser in the auction of 5G spectrum conducted by the Department of Telecommunications, Government of India, over the past week.Jio confirmed that it acquired spectrum in the 700MHz, 800MHz, 1800MHz, 3300MHz and 26GHz bands. The company said it will use equipment made in India for its 5G rollout.Jio's total cost of acquiring the technology agnostic spectrum for a period of 20 years is Rs. 88,078 crore. As per terms...

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FCC Auction 108 concludes - 2.5 GHz Spectrum

Bidding has concluded in the FCC Auction 108.  Gross proceeds from the bid are expected to amount to $427,789,670.

The FCC said it will post full results in the next few days. 

https://auctiondata.fcc.gov/public/projects/auction108

FCC commences 5G mid-band spectrum auction

Sunday, July 31, 2022  Auctions, FCC  

The FCC opened bidding in its latest mid-band spectrum auction at 10am on Friday, July 29.

Auction 108 makes available 8,017 new flexible-use, county-based overlay licenses in the 2.5 GHz band. These licenses are in areas with unassigned 2.5 GHz spectrum— mostly rural parts of the country—following disposition of applications filed in the Rural Tribal Priority Window, which has to date resulted in the grant of 335 licenses to serve Tribal communities.

“We all know there are gaps in 5G coverage, especially in rural America, and this auction is a unique opportunity to fill them in,” said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel. “I am grateful to the teams that have worked so hard to both stand up this auction and ensure the success of our efforts to make these airwaves available to Tribes to support wireless service in their communities”

Auction 108 utilizes a “clock-1” auction format similar to the clock phase of past FCC auctions, but rather than offering multiple generic spectrum blocks in a category in a geographic area, it will offer only a single frequency-specific license in a category in a county. The new flexible-use geographic overlay licenses in the 2.5 GHz band (2496-2690 MHz) must protect the operations of incumbent licensees within the auctioned areas, including any licensees that receive their licenses through applications filed in the Rural Tribal Priority Window.

http://www.fcc.gov/auction/108

FCC incentivizes to open underutilized spectrum for rural carriers

Monday, July 18, 2022  FCC  

The FCC voted to create an Enhanced Competition Incentive Program (ECIP) to establish incentives for wireless licensees to make underutilized spectrum available to small carriers, Tribal Nations, and entities serving rural areas. The new program encourages licensees to partition, disaggregate, or lease spectrum to better match available spectrum resources with entities that seek to provide needed services to under-connected communities.  Under...

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Credo debuts 800Gbps and 400Gbps Optical DSP

Credo introduced its new PAM4 Dove 800 Digital Signal Processor family of products with integrated EML, TFLN and silicon photonics modulator drivers.

The Dove 800 family includes 800Gbps Dove 800/801/802 for OSFP and QSFP-DD800, and 400Gbps Dove 410/401/401 for QSFP112 optical transceivers. 

Highlights:

• 100G PAM4 on both the electrical host and optical line side.
• DSPs on optical line side and electrical host side deliver industry leading sensitivity and BER performance, allowing margin for optical alignment and crosstalk.
• Line side receivers include non-linear cancellation and reflection cancellation to improve yields, while reducing module cost.
• High-performance transmitters come with multi-tap FIR filters and non-linear cancellation, allowing precision optimization at both the module electrical connector and optical interface.
• Host side interface supports up to 30dB insertion loss channel, connecting seamlessly with different length switch interfaces without the need for customized per-channel settings.
• The family comes with EML, TFLN and Silicon Photonics drivers and bias-T but allows use with external laser or modulator driver support to provide customers with maximum flexibility.
• Independent phase locked loops per channel support flexible breakout configurations including 2x400G, 4x200G and 8x100G.
• Full suite of test features and loopbacks simplifies lab bring up and production testing to reduce time-to-market.
• On-chip crossbar simplifies module layout design.
• Low-power dissipation enables higher rack utilization and lower thermal cooling requirements.

https://credosemi.com/products/optical-dsp/

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DigitalBridge closes first stage of DataBank recapitalization

DigitalBridge Group announced the closing of the first stage of its previously announced recapitalization of its portfolio company DataBank, a leading nationwide edge data center platform.

DataBank’s portfolio consists of more than 65 data centers, 20 interconnection hubs in more than 27 markets, on-ramps to an ecosystem of cloud providers, and a modular edge data center platform.

New investors joined Swiss Life Asset Management AG and EDF Invest, increasing the size of this initial stage. As a result, 35% of the fully diluted equity interests in DataBank were sold for approximately $1.5 billion in cash, an increase from the anticipated $1.2 billion.

In connection with the completion of this initial phase of the recapitalization, DigitalBridge received cash proceeds of $318 million, up from the $230 million initially expected, and its ownership in DataBank was reduced to 13.4%. The recapitalization continues to imply a pre-transaction net equity value of DigitalBridge’s ownership of $905 million, reflecting a 2.0x multiple of invested capital (MOIC) since DigitalBridge’s first balance sheet investment in December 2019.

Marc Ganzi, CEO of DigitalBridge, said, “We are pleased to welcome Swiss Life and EDF as new DataBank shareholders, along with a number of new investors who have invested alongside of the consortium following our original announcement. The formation of this new permanent capital vehicle enables DigitalBridge shareholders to maintain exposure to the next phase of value creation at DataBank while freeing up significant capital at an attractive valuation that reflects DigitalBridge’s track record of investing successfully across the digital infrastructure ecosystem.”

www.digitalbridge.com

Swiss Life-led Consortium to acquire 27% equity Interest in DataBank

Monday, June 20, 2022  Data Centers, DataBank, Digital Bridge  

DigitalBridge Group will sell an equity stake in its DataBank company to a consortium led by Swiss Life Asset Management AG and EDF Invest.DataBank’s portfolio consists of more than 65 data centers, 20 interconnection hubs in more than 27 markets, on-ramps to an ecosystem of cloud providers, and a modular edge data center platform.Under the terms of the agreement, SLAM and EDF will acquire 27% of the fully diluted equity interests in DataBank for...

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DataBank to acquire Zayo's zColo data centers

Tuesday, September 29, 2020  Data Centers, Mergers And Acquisitions, Zayo  

DataBank agreed to acquire Zayo Group's zColo business, including 44 data centers across 23 markets in the U.S. and Europe. Financial terms were not disclosed.The deal will make DataBank one of the largest privately-held data center operators in the U.S. and a leading provider of edge colocation and connectivity solutions to hyperscale, technology, and content customers across the U.S. Zayo Group will become a significant customer and continue to...

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DataBank to acquire 4 Houston data centers from CyrusOne for $670M

Wednesday, January 19, 2022  CyrusOne, Data Centers, DataBank, Texas  

DataBank, a  provider of enterprise-class colocation, interconnection and managed cloud services,  agreed to acquire four existing data centers in the Houston, Texas metro area from CyrusOne for $670 million.The transaction positions DataBank as the largest independent data center provider in Houston, the nation’s fourth-largest metro area. The Houston facilities encompass more than 300,000 square feet of raised-floor data center capacity...

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Andre Fuetsch steps down from AT&T and the O-RAN Board

Andre Fuetsch, Network Chief Technology Officer of AT&T, is retiring, effective August 30, 2022. He is also stepping down from his Chairman position at the O-RAN ALLIANCE. AT&T will remain on the O-RAN Board as a founding member.

“Under Andre’s leadership, O-RAN has grown to a well-respected body changing the paradigm of Radio Access Networks towards openness, intelligence and innovation,” said Alex Jinsung Choi, Chief Operating Officer and interim Chairman of the O-RAN ALLIANCE and SVP of Strategy and Technology Innovation at Deutsche Telekom. “Many thanks to Andre for his chairmanship in the past four years and lots of success in his next career and personal life.”

www.o-ran.org

ONF Connect Keynote: AT&T 's Andre Fuetsch

Wednesday, December 05, 2018  AT&T, ONF  

It's a really exciting time at AT&T not only because of the upcoming 5G launch later this month but also because of the many other areas of innovation underway in the network, said Andre Fuetsch, CTO of AT&T and President of AT&T Labs, in a keynote address at the ONF Connect conference in Santa Clara, California. Some highlights: AT&T is actively developing the ONF Software-defined Broadband Access (SEBA) reference design....

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AT&T sees progress with ONF's SEBA, Trellis and other projects

Wednesday, September 11, 2019    

Projects like Trellis, SEBA, OMEC, Stratum, and P4 are redefining what a modern network looks like, said Andre Fuetsch, President, AT&T Labs and Chief Technology Officer, speaking at the Open Networking Foundation’s Connect 2019 conference in Silicon Valley/ AT&T is currently using SEBA (Software-Enabled Broadband Access) to deliver gigabit-plus, low-latency home internet access via white box hardware to 500 homes in the U.S. The carrier...

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AT&T's Path to 5G

Monday, September 10, 2018  ATT  

AT&T's path to 5G is driven by the growth of data on the network, which currently exceeds 220 petabytes of data per day, and new applications said company CTO Andre Fuetsch, speaking at the AT&T's Spark event in San Francisco. The data tsunami is accelerating and AT&T's is showcasing applications such as e-gaming, augmented reality, virtual reality, IoT sensors, and smart cities. Fuetsch announced an expansion of its 5G rollout...

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Cerebras opens engineering center in Bangalore

Cerebras Systems, which offers a Wafer Scale Engine AI processor, opened an engineering office in Bangalore, India. 

The new facility is led by industry veteran Lakshmi Ramachandran. Prior to joining Cerebras, she was with Intel in various engineering and leadership roles. Most recently, she was Senior Director at Intel's Data Center and AI group, responsible for delivering key capabilities of deep learning software for AI accelerators. She has extensive experience in scaling business operations and establishing technical engineering teams in India.

“India in general and Bangalore in particular, is extremely well-positioned to be a hotbed for AI innovation. It has world leading universities, pioneering research institutions and a large domestic enterprise market,” said Andrew Feldman, CEO and Co-Founder of Cerebras Systems. “Cerebras is committed to being a leader in this market. Under Lakshmi’s leadership, we are rapidly hiring top-notch engineering talent for Cerebras Systems India, as well as supporting sophisticated regional customers who are looking to do the most challenging AI work more quickly and easily.”

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