NTT forms new company for Photonics-Electronics Convergence

A new company has been established by NTT Group to manufacture Photonics-Electronics Convergence devices that are indispensable for the realization of its next-generation "IOWN (Innovative Optical and Wireless Network)" concept. 

Specifically, the new company will accelerate the development of low-power short-distance optical transmission products in the mid- to long-term and expand into the computing area.

NTT Innovative Devices Corporation, which was established on June 12, 2023, will market Photonics-Electronics Convergence technologies developed at NTT Laboratories. 

NTT said the reason for making a new operating company is that, unlike the conventional network-centered solutions business, "Photonics-Electronics Convergence Technology" is a business that involves hardware. To further accelerate this business, on August 1 the company integrated with NTT Electronics, a leading-edge component manufacturer with development and manufacturing know-how as an optoelectronic component manufacturer. As a result, NTT Electronics has taken a new step forward as a specialized manufacturer with a full scope of functions including design, development, manufacturing, and sales of Photonics-Electronics Convergence devices.

https://group.ntt/en/magazine/blog/photonics_electronics_convergence_pressconference/

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NASA's Psyche mission to test Deep Space Optical Comms

This week NASA is slated to launch its Psyche asteroid mission on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The spacecraft will visit Psyche, which orbits the Sun between Mars and Jupiter, to learn how Earth and other rocky planets formed. It is the first mission to an asteroid with substantial amounts of metal, as previous missions have explored asteroids made mostly of rock or ice. 

The mission will also host NASA's Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) experiment, which will test the ability of lasers to transmit data at higher rates than traditional radio communications beyond the Moon. During the first two years of Psyche's journey to its namesake asteroid, DSOC will test high-bandwidth optical communications to Earth. The experiment will not be relaying Psyche mission data.

The near-infrared transceiver’s 22-centimeter aperture telescope is mounted on an isolation-and-pointing assembly that stabilizes the optics and isolates it from spacecraft vibrations. 

The data sent back by the DSOC transceiver on Psyche will be collected by the 200-inch (5.1-meter) Hale Telescope at Caltech’s Palomar Observatory in San Diego County, California, using a sensitive superconducting nanowire photon-counting receiver to demonstrate high-rate data transfer.

Signals sent back to the spacecraft will be emitted by a high-power near-infrared laser transmitter at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Table Mountain facility near Wrightwood, California.

The key objectives of the experiment are to demonstrate:

• that flight laser transceiver and ground systems are able to lock onto each other’s laser signals during DSOC’s calibration and commissioning phase.
• that optical transmissions are feasible at a distance of 1 astronomical unit (equal to the distance from the sun to the Earth ~ 150 million km)
• that the system can operate for a duration of 2 years.

https://www.nasa.gov/solar-system/deep-space-optical-communications-dsoc/

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Deutsche Telekom, AWS, VMware demo connectivity across distributed data centers

Deutsche Telekom with the support of AWS and VMware,  demonstrated a globally distributed enterprise network that combines Deutsche Telekom connectivity services in federation with third party connectivity, compute, and storage resources at campus locations in Prague, Seattle, and an OGA (Open Grid Alliance) grid node in Bonn, Germany.

The proof of concept (POC) showed the capability to federate, abstract and orchestrate geographically distributed compute and connectivity resources for hosting multi-national enterprise services on Cloud and OGA grid nodes, providing global reach with local autonomy. 

The setup integrates Deutsche Telekom private 5G wireless solutions, AWS services and infrastructure, VMware’s multi-cloud telco platform, OGA grid nodes, and Mavenir’s RAN/Core functions. It connects two 5G Standalone (SA) private wireless networks deployed in Prague and Seattle to a Mavenir 5G Core hosted on AWS Frankfurt Region. 

The 5G SA private wireless network with User Plane Function (UPF) and RAN hosted at the Seattle location is operating on the VMware Telco Cloud Platform to enable low latency services. The VMware Service Management and Orchestration (SMO) is also deployed in the same location and serves as the global orchestrator. The SMO framework helps to simplify, optimize, and automate the RAN, Core, and its applications in a multi-cloud environment.

“As AI gets engrained deeper in the ecosystem of our lives, it necessitates equitable access to compute and connectivity for everyone, everywhere across the globe. Multi-national enterprises are seeking trusted and sovereign compute & connectivity constructs that underpin an equitable and seamless access. Deutsche Telekom is excited to partner with the OGA ecosystem for co-creation on these essential constructs and the enablement of the Distributed Edge AI Networking applications of the future,” - Kaniz Mahdi, Group Chief Architect and SVP Technology Architecture and Innovation at Deutsche Telekom.  

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Windstream Wholesale delivers network intelligence via customer portal

Windstream Wholesale has upgraded its customer portal to provide map-based network intelligence.

iconnect is Windstream Wholesale's premier customer portal providing access to multi-layer network health data and self-service tools. These latest capabilities are part of an ongoing series of portal advancements offering superior network performance and transparency, giving customers an essential tool that reveals more about their network and enables them to confidently manage their operations. Customers can also access a range of data through the iconnect portal, from real-time updates on their circuits to historical insights to identify performance and trends.

• Real-time fiber outage visibility with location data: pinpoints the precise location of a fiber outage on the customer’s map to gain near real-time awareness and operational control over network issues. The  speed of isolation and resolution ensures minimal downtime for the customer.
• Fiber route map views and KMZs on-demand: Dark Fiber and Managed Spectrum customers can also now view their fiber route and download network KMZs on demand, enabling more efficiency and transparency to their operations.
• Proactive monitoring and ticketing for Dark Fiber and Managed Spectrum: this expanded feature, previously only available for Wave services, provides detection of network issues, maintaining the company’s commitment to keeping customers informed about any potential outages and enabling faster reaction and repair to maintain business continuity.

“We’re committed to delivering leading technology and products to our customers and staying ahead of the curve,” said Joe Scattareggia, chief revenue officer for Windstream Wholesale. “As the industry leader, we are excited about this elevated insight and unmatched transparency truly setting us apart in the market.”

https://www.windstreamwholesale.com/network-expansion/

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Samsung's upcoming innovations including NB-IoT NTN satellite comms

At its inaugural Samsung System LSI Tech Day 2023 event in San Jose, Samsung previewed upcoming technological advancements, including:

• the Exynos 2400 flagship mobile processor with Xclipse 940 GPU, based on the latest AMD RDNA 3 architecture, with substantially enhanced ray tracing capability. The Exynos 2400 processor features a 1.7x increase in CPU performance and a remarkable 14.7x boost in AI performance compared to the previous Exynos 2200 product
• 
  a new AI tool for upcoming smartphones, demonstrating text-to-image AI generation using its Exynos 2400 reference board
• Zoom Anyplace technology based on its 200-million pixel image sensor, enabling up to 4x close-ups of moving objects without any image degradation
• Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) non-terrestrial networks (NTN) ready next-generation 5G modem; 
• A new vision sensor brand, the ISOCELL Vizion; 
• a Smart Health processor
• the Exynos Auto V920, an automotive processor slated for mass production in 2025 capable of running several applications across multiple displays;
• Video demo of NB-IoT NTN satellite communication in collaboration with Skylo Technologies, an NTN service provider, using Samsung’s next-gen modem reference device
• Live demo of wireless lighting control through its ultra-wideband (UWB) solution, the Exynos Connect U100

“Generative AI has quickly emerged as perhaps the most significant trend of the year, demanding more powerful foundational technologies to process data and bring AI to life,” said Yong-In Park, President and Head of System LSI Business at Samsung Electronics. “We are paving the path toward a new era of proactive AI, leveraging our Samsung System LSI Humanoid platform, which seamlessly converges our capabilities across a broad spectrum of logic semiconductors, from powerful computational IPs, connectivity solutions to sensors emulating the main five human senses.”

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