Costa Rican Carrier Chooses Lucent's Optical Gear

Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE), the sole telecommunications provider in Costa Rica, will deploy Lucent Technologies' optical solutions to provide mobile and wireline services using a common transport network. The contract includes Lucent's Metropolis ADM MultiService Mux, LambdaUnite MultiService Switch (MSS), and the WaveStar ADM 16/1. COASIN Costa Rica, a Lucent Business Partner, is working with ICE and Lucent to supply and implement the Lucent solution. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.lucent.com

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Samsung and Staccato Collaborate on UWB Solutions

Samsung Electronics and Staccato Communications, a start-up based in San Diego, agreed to jointly develop Ultra-wideband-based (UWB) technology for the Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) market and to collaborate on application development. The companies envision UWB-based products for very high bit-rate networks, up to 480 Mbps, based on Multiband OFDM technology. Staccato will benefit from Samsung's leadership in developing memory chipsets, CDMA mobile phones, consumer electronics and Radio Frequency (RF) technologies. Samsung will benefit from Staccato's UWB expertise. Availability of initial chipsets will be in conjunction with emerging IEEE 802.15.3a standard.http://samsungelectronics.com
http://www.staccatocommunications.com

• In May 2003, Staccato Communications (formerly Discrete Time Communications), a start-up based in San Diego, raised $7.5 million in Series A funding for its development of Ultra-wideband (UWB) technology. The company has completed a silicon prototype of a new architecture for UWB that is both compliant with the FCC's regulations and enables high bit-rate UWB in CMOS for the first time. Investors include Bay Partners, Charles River Ventures, and Allegis Capital.



• Staccato Communications was formed in early 2002 by Roberto Aiello, former founder and CEO of Fantasma Networks, and other UWB veterans, to pursue a fabless IC business model.



• In February 2003, the FCC issued new rules to allow commercial use of UWB radios in 7500MHz of spectrum between 3.1GHz and 10.6GHz. Shortly following this ruling, the IEEE formed a standards committee, 802.15.3a, which is in the process of developing a standard specification for UWB for use in Personal Area Networks (PANs).



• A new WiMedia Alliance has been organized to guarantee interoperability between various manufacturers much the same way that the WiFi Alliance does for 802.11 wireless LAN. http://www.wimedia.org

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Canoga Perkins Introduces T3 and E3 Fiber Optic Modem

Canoga Perkins introduced a new fiber optic modem with hot swap capability that provides long distance extension of T-3/DS-3 signals operating at 44.736 Mbps or E3 signals operating at 34 Mbps. The device can be used with single mode or multimode fiber optic cable and is designed for extending PBX tie lines, router connects and E3 multiplexer links. The device provides retiming and reshaping of the signal, enabling distance extension of 100 km over a fiber optic single mode cable pair, and distance extension of 40 km over a single strand of single mode fiber.
http://www.canoga.com

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Shanghai Telecom Deploys Micromuse's Netcool

Shanghai Telecom has deployed Micromuse's Netcool suite of products to increase the availability of its voice and data services. Micromuse's Netcool can be used to proactively manage large and complex infrastructure and reduce the mean-time-to-repair of IT-related problems. In addition, Netcool provides a realtime analysis of IT faults so that the impact on business processes and services is visible to operations support staff.
http://www.micromuse.com

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VoicePulse Launches Broadband Phone Service in Boston

VoicePulse began offering a broadband, VoIP phone service in Boston's 617 area code. The company is offering unlimited local, regional and US long distance calling for $34.99 per month or unlimited local, regional and 600 US long distance minutes for $25.99 per month. The service includes traditional features such as caller ID, call waiting, call forwarding and voicemail as well as distinctive ring, call filters, telemarketer blocking and anonymous call rejection.
http://www.voicepulse.com

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Sonus Networks Establishes Operations in India

Sonus Networks has established a regional office in Mumbai, India to serve the local telecommunications market. The company named Mahinder Mansukhani as country director to oversee its sales, marketing and support operations in India. Mansukhani joins Sonus from Sify Limited (formerly Satyam Infoway Ltd.), India's largest network and e-commerce services company. Prior to that, Mansukhani served as a business development manager for Cisco Systems India, where he was responsible for sales to service providers.
http://www.sonusnet.com

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Holland's Multikabel selects ADC's Cuda CMTS

Multikabel, one of the largest cable operators in the Netherlands, will deploy ADC's Cuda 12000 CMTS (cable modem termination system). The contract marks ADC's first such installation in the region. Currently, Multikabel delivers data services to around 60,000 subscribers. The ADC equipment will be used to support a new VoIP service. In Europe, ADC sells its IP cable solutions direct to customers or through partners including Communication Concept Inc, EURConnect, SDT Electronica, Siemens and Spie Trindel.
http://www.adc.com

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Alcatel Broadens FTTU Portfolio with Enterprise ONT Box

Alcatel introduced a new optical network termination (ONT) device for businesses being served by Broadband Passive Optical Network (BPON). The new Alcatel 7340 FTTU Business Optical Network Termination (B-ONT) unit interconnects various customer-owned devices, including telephones, PCs, and TVs to a network operator's PON. On the customer interface side, the new box offers an Ethernet connection, up to four DS-1s, a video port for an overlay video service, and up to 8 POTS lines. Voice traffic is carried across the BPON using the VoATM BLES standard.
http://www.alcatel.com

• The Alcatel 7340 is based on the ITU-T BPON (Broadband Access Passive Optical Networking) standard and complies with the Full Service Access Network PON (supports both 155 Mbps symmetrical and 622/155 Mbps asymmetrical PONs). Each fiber from the CO carries one PON and can be shared by up to 32 subscribers using optical splitters. Capabilities include interactive video services using CATV, DBS or baseband technologies and support for hundreds of analog and digital channels; data access at 20 Mbps per subscriber with even higher bursting rates; and four POTS lines (VoATM) with lifeline support and toll-quality voice. The Alcatel 7340 product line consists of multiple elements, including a Packet Optical Line Terminal, a Home Optical Network Terminal, a Video Optical Line Terminal, and an element management system.



• Alcatel's Home Optical Network Terminal (H-ONET) supports up to four POTS lines.

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Telstra Deploys ADVA's FSP 3000 for Metro Rings

Telstra is deploying ADVA Optical Networking's Fiber Service Platform (FSP) 3000 for metro rings in major Australian cities. The deployment is part of a 3-year contract awarded to Siemens IC Networks for the carrier's nationwide 10 Gbps optical backbone network. The contract includes ADVA's FSP 3000 metro system, Siemens' Multiservice Provisioning Platform Surpass hiT 70xx series, and Siemens' Surpass hiT 7500 DWDM long-haul equipment. The FSP 3000 will be installed at critical junctions in metro areas to interconnect Siemens' long-haul systems. The FSP 3000 employs parallel use of DWDM and Time Division Multiplexing (TDM) technology to enable all protocols between 8 Mbps and 10 Gbps and up to 256 applications to be transported over one single fiber pair. The system's design supports point-to-point, linear add/drop, ring, and meshed network topologies with up to ten nodes across distances up to 500 km without regeneration. ADVA's platforms enables two Gigabit Ethernet connections to be carried on the same OC-48/STM16 wavelength. The equipment will be integrated into Telstra's SDH network and managed by Siemens' Transport Network Management System (TNMS) at Telstra's Global Operations Centre. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.advaoptical.com
http://www.siemens.com/index.jsp?sdc_p=dpo1074210fc9ls5mnt2u&sdc_sid

• ADVA's FSP 3000 platform is a DWDM system with 32 protected/64 unprotected wavelengths for P-t-P, mesh and ring topologies. It offers optional 4:1 TDM and OXC modules, and supports all applications up to 10 Gbps. An EDFA option extends the platform's reach up to 300 km.

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IPCC Defines CALEA Safe Harbor Requirements for Packet Voice

The International Packet Communications Consortium (IPCC) published an informational report entitled, "Lawfully Authorized Surveillance for Softswitch-based networks." CALEA requires telecommunications carriers to provide specified capabilities to law enforcement agencies (LEAs) when presented with the proper lawful authorization. CALEA also requires manufacturers of equipment used in connection with the covered telecommunications facilities and services to make available the features or modifications necessary to permit carriers to comply with these capabilities requirements. While this informational report contains partial technical guidelines based on preliminary work performed by the IPCC LI Working Group and does not offer Safe Harbor under CALEA, it does address CALEA requirements for the benefit of any carriers, vendors and government agencies who might use this architecture or technology. Specifically, the report describes the interfaces between a Telecommunications Carrier that provides telecommunications services and a Law Enforcement Agency (LEA) to assist the LEA in conducting lawfully authorized electronic surveillance. It also describes services and features that support lawfully authorized electronic surveillance of packet-mode communications provided by Telecommunications Carriers. The document is now available online.
http://www.packetcomm.org/dms/viewdetail.asp?parentID=27&CatID=56&id=578

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Alaskan Telco Partners with DISH Network for Video Services

Alaska Communications Systems (ACS), which serves some 339,000 access lines, 83,000 cellular customers, 44,000 long distance customers and 45,000 Internet subscribers, announced an agreement with EchoStar to offer the DISH Network TV service to its customers. ACS said it has been actively pursuing the best way to integrate television into its service portfolio. DISH Network offers consumers 50 popular TV channels such as ESPN, Discovery, CNN and the Food Network, for $24.99 per month. ACS will begin offering DISH Network service through its ACS Wireless retail stores in the Anchorage area beginning in August.
http://www.acsalaska.com
http://www.dishnetwork.com

• In July 2003, SBC Communications announced a deal with EchoStar Communications to offer a co-branded satellite TV service as part of its integrated local, long distance, wireless and DSL bundle. The deal is an exclusive telecom partnership for single-family residences throughout the SBC 13-state traditional service area, where SBC provides service to more than 56 million access lines.

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Global Crossing Outlines Business Continuity Solutions

Global Crossing rolled out a portfolio of enterprise continuity services to help customers to survive a major network interruption. Key elements of the Global Crossing business continuity program include:

• Diversity and Customer Specified Routing (DACSR), a private line service that allows customers to deploy redundant connectivity or specify alternative routing paths on circuit connections globally.



• Service Management System (SMS) Emergency ReRoute, a feature that allows the customer to choose from nine plans to re-route toll-free voice traffic between two or more carriers in real time. Re-routing is performed with a toll-free call and touchtone phone using a simple command menu.



• Disaster Recovery Service for Trader Voice, a private line voice service that provides reliable, desk-to-desk "ring-down" connections between financial trading companies. A ring-down is a private line-based phone link between two traders requiring a constant, open phone connection.



• Fixed Wireless Service, which offers a service diversity option between two or more carriers. Global Crossing is initially partnering with Winstar Communications.



• IP VPN Service, which can provide global enterprises with the technology redundancy and security of a fully provisioned, alternate network with unprecedented flexibility as a reliable, secure backup to primary WAN connections.



• Mobility Tools, which let employees gain secure access to key resources, particularly in times when travel plans are interrupted.



• Global Crossing Remote Access Service (RAS), which uses a secure tunnel across the Internet over any Frame Relay or IP VPN service.



• Global Crossing Conferencing Services, which enables users to establish instant toll-free emergency conference calls that keep associates connected and productive during times of business interruptions.

http://www.globalcrossing.com

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Global Crossing Partners with IDT on Fixed Wireless VPNs

Global Crossing and IDT Solutions, the marketing arm of Winstar Communications, announced a partnership that combines Global Crossing's IP VPN services with Winstar's wireless network in 22 U.S. cities. The bundle will be offered by Global Crossing. Initial service availability is planned for Chicago, New York, Philadelphia and Dallas.
http://www.globalcrossing.com

• In February 2003, IDT first unveiled a bid to acquire Global Crossing. In public comments since then, IDT has been critical of the proposed acquisition deal between Global Crossing and Singapore Telemedia.

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Alcatel Shanghai Bell Selected for US$80M Ghana Project

Ghana Telecom (GT), the largest service provider in Ghana, selected Alcatel to upgrade and expand its national telecom network. The contract was won through Alcatel Shanghai Bell and is valued at US$80 million. Under the agreement, Alcatel will provide and install 250,000 switching lines and will expand mobile network capacity to 630,000 subscribers. Alcatel will also upgrade GT's metro optical transmission network in the city of Accra. At the project's completion, Ghana Telecom will be able to extend telecom services to all secondary schools, towns and villages in the country. The upgrade will provide a nine-fold increase in the country's mobile capacity, and a three-fold increase in fixed network capacity. The contract is part of a larger, three-year exclusive agreement between Alcatel and Ghana Telecom for fixed and mobile infrastructure expansion.
http://www.alcatel.com

• Alcatel Shanghai Bell is organized under China's “foreign-invested company limited by shares�? rules, with Alcatel holding 50% of the shares plus one, and Chinese entities holding the remainder. Alcatel Shanghai Bell operates its own international R&D center, and has full access to Alcatel's global technology pool, allowing the company to develop original technology for use in China and export to Alcatel's customers worldwide.

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Comcor Deploys Terawave's PON in Moscow

Comcor, a Russian carrier offering residential and business broadband in the Moscow metropolitan area, has completed the installation of the first 1,000 nodes of Terawave's TW-600 and TW-300 Optical Access Platforms. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.terawave.com

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Convergys Announces Contract Extension with DIRECTV

Convergys Corp. was awarded a three-year contract extension to provide customer service to DIRECTV's more than 11.5 million customers. Convergys has been the major provider of customer management services to DIRECTV since it launched its service in June 1994. Convergys has more than 4,500 employees working on the DIRECTV account. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.convergys.com

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OIF Launches Industry Survey on Common Electrical Interface

The Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) is conducting an industry-wide survey to solicit input on design practices and methodologies regarding the Forum's Common Electrical I/O (CEI) project. One goal of the CEI project is to define the specifications for electrical signaling at rates of up to 6+ Gbps and 11+ Gbps over a single differential backplane connection. The OIF's CEI survey is targeted at backplane designers who are interested in supporting serial data rates of 6+ Gbps and 11+ Gbps in their backplane applications. The survey is online.
http://www.oiforum.com/public/downloads/OIF-survey.pdf

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Sprint and RealNetworks Partner on Mobile Streaming

Sprint's PCS Vision wireless customers can now access streaming multimedia content from Real Networks' RealOne service. Customers can now see and hear breaking news, market reports, sports highlights, weather forecasts, and additional entertainment services such as horoscopes and movie reviews on the Sprint PCS nationwide network for $4.95 per month, plus airtime.
http://www.sprintpcs.com
http://www.realnetworks.com

• As of the end of Q2, Sprint had 2.1 million PCS Vision customers.

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UTStarcom Announces Further IP-DSLAM Contract from China Netcom

UTStarcom announced a new contract to supply over 200,000 lines of its AN-2000 IB IP-based DSLAM solution to China Netcom for deployment in several major cities in the Heilongjiang, Tiangjin, Hebei, Shangdong, and Shanxi provinces. The contract brings UTStarcom's total IP-DSLAM deployments with CNC to more than 400,000 ADSL lines since March 2003. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.utstar.com

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Telefonica Brasil Awards $20 Million Contract to Nortel

The Telefonica Group has awarded a series of contracts to Nortel Networks for expansion and maintenance of its nationwide multiservice optical network in Brazil and for support services for the data backbone operations of Telefonica Empresas. Under the contracts, Telefonica Brasil will deploy Nortel Networks OPTera Metro 4100, OPTera Metro 4200, and TN-1C. Telefonica Empresas will deploy Nortel Networks data networking solutions including Nortel Networks Passport 7000 Multiservice Switches, which are manufactured at Nortel Networks' Center of Excellence in Campinas. Telefonica Empresas will also deploy Nortel Networks Passport 15000. The deals were valued at US$20 million (R$58 million) over three years.
http://www.nortelnetworks.com

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