SBC to Offer 2Wire IP STB with Dish/DSL/Yahoo Service

SBC Communications has formed a joint venture with 2Wire to deliver a home entertainment service that integrates satellite TV programming, digital video recording, video on demand, and Internet content via an IPTV set-top box. The service will use 2Wire's MediaPortal set-top box, which will receive DISH Network satellite programming as well as provide a DSL interface for downloading video and music content. The box includes high-definition Digital Video Recorder (DVR) capability. 2Wire's box server as a home digital media server and features a built-in DVD/CD drive and burner.



The forthcoming home entertainment service is separate from SBC's recently announced Project Lightspeed. Customers will not need access to the fiber network to subscribe to the home entertainment service. The company expect to begin marketing the service by mid-year.
http://www.sbc.com
http://www.2wire.com

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KT Kornet Selects Juniper Networks

KT Kornet has again selected Juniper Networks' T-series routing platform for its Internet backbone. This new deployment follows previous deployments of the T640 in initial phases of KT Kornet's backbone network deployment. KT Kornet anticipates that its commercial and consumer IP services, such as ADSL, VDSL and access services based on metro switches, will grow to 350 Gbps by the end of 2004. Juniper said its "Matrix" technology will enable multiple T640 platforms to interconnect and operate as a single router that delivers ten or more terabits of throughput. Financial terms were not disclosed. http://www.juniper.net

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mPhase Selected for IPTV Network in Turkey

Beyaz Holding Company, owner of Turkey's leading television news and entertainment station, selected mPhase Technologies to provide technology enabling the introduction of an array of new digital television services throughout the country. The deployment will use the IP transport capabilities of Turk Telecom, the soon-to-be privatized Turkish telecommunications company, as the foundation of the broadband network. mPhase will provide the equipment and technical video expertise for the deployment, while Beyaz-owned Kanal 7 will organize and aggregate the content and manage the marketing of the services. http://www.mPhaseTech.com

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ECI Telecom Confirms Commercial PON Order in Europe

ECI Telecom confirmed that its Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) equipment is being deployed by a major European Utility provider under a contract with Nortel Networks. The ECI solution will allow the customer to deliver advanced "triple play" services - video, voice and data - to its customers over an optical broadband connection.



ECI said the order represents the first mass commercial deployment of FTTH PON in Europe. The announcement follows last month's announcement that ECI's equipment is carrying live traffic in England as part of BT's 21st Century Network initiative.



The ECI solution integrates video, voice and data services from a single, highly flexible platform. The Hi-FOCuS 4 Multi Service Access Gateway is used at the central office side and the Hi-FOCuS B-Light family of ONTs is used at the customer premises. http://www.ecitele.com

• Earlier this month, it was announced that EnergiMidt, a Danish utility company, had selected Nortel to provide a turnkey solution for delivering Triple Play residential services over a new PON network. EnergiMidt Broadband plans to deliver the services to all of its 162,000 customers. Nortel is also providing EnergiMidt with a carrier-grade optical transport network. Financial terms were not disclosed.



• The network will use Nortel's Broadband Access Services Gateway (BASG) product line, Nortel's optical Ethernet portfolio and a host of leading video and in-home networking partners – all brought together, tested and approved by Nortel to form a triple-play solution. The technologies behind Nortel's BASG portfolio are supplied by ECI Telecom.



• EnergiMidt will be adopting a phased rollout of its service to its current energy customers, aiming for approximately 2000 subscribers by the end of 2005. As part of the deployment strategy, EnergiMidt will connect each of the homes passed by their FTTH deployment, thus greatly reducing the time to turn up service for new customers.

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Cisco to Acquire Protego Networks for Security Monitoring

Cisco Systems agreed to acquire privately-held Protego Networks, a provider of security monitoring and threat management appliances for enterprise and small-to-medium business networks. Cisco will pay approximately $65 million in cash for Protego. The acquisition is subject to various standard closing conditions and is expected to close in the second quarter of Cisco's fiscal year 2005, which ends on 29-January-2005.



Protego's scalable appliances combine traditional security event monitoring with network intelligence, context correlation, vector analysis, anomaly detection, hotspot identification and automated mitigation capabilities. The products help identify and eliminate network attacks while maintaining network compliance.



Cisco said Protego's products would extend its Self-Defending Network initiative. Protego is currently a member of Cisco's AVVID partner program and the companies have been successfully working together to sell security products to customers. The Protego team will be integrated into Cisco's Security Technology Group. http://www.cisco.com

• Protego Networks was founded in 2002 and has 38 employees. The company is based in Sunnyvale, California.

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Indonesia's PT Aplikanusa Lintasarta Selects Juniper for IP/MPLS

PT Aplikanusa Lintasarta, which is part of Indonesia's Indosat Group, has deployed a next-generation IP/MPLS network using Juniper Networks' M-series routing platforms. The new network, Juniper Networks' first major network deployment in Indonesia, supports multiservice IP VPN services to corporate users. Financial terms were not disclosed. http://www.juniper.nethttp://www.lintasarta.co.id

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Empirix Enhances VoIP and TDM performance testing system

Empirix introduced an enhanced version of its "Hammer NXT" VoIP and TDM performance testing system featuring the ability to scale to more than 50,000 endpoints (signaling and media). The Hammer NXT offers up to 24K simultaneous signaling/media endpoints per system for high-density performance testing. The system can detect and analyze the content of each media stream generated (up to 24 K) at full Ethernet line rates, including detection of tones, DTMF, voice prompts, silences, and energy, allowing users to stress and verify media functionality under high-density conditions. A wide range of codecs are supported, as well as unique IP and MAC address emulation.



The new NXT shares a common signaling engine and architecture with the company's Hammer FX-IP functional test system. Customized protocol and signaling configurations can be ported between the two platforms. http://www.empirix.com

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WiQuest Raises $13 Million for Ultrawideband

WiQuest Communications, a start-up based in Allen, Texas, raised $13 million in funding for its ultra wideband (UWB) technology. WiQuest said it is building complete solutions for ultrawideband applications, from mobile handsets and portable gaming to audio/video systems in the modern digital home. The technology is expected to enable a new class of consumer product features, including wireless multimedia, flexible PC connectivity, and simplified, lower cost home theatre installation.



As an early contributing member of the MultiBand OFDM Alliance Special Interest Group (MBOA-SIG), WiQuest engineers have been actively involved in the development of the recently released MBOA-SIG physical layer (PHY) as well as the media access control (MAC) specifications.



WiQuest supports the MultiBand OFDM UWB proposal, currently under consideration in the IEEE 802.15 personal area network working group. The company is also a member of the USB Implementer's Forum and is active in its nascent wireless USB efforts.



The new funding was led by Menlo Ventures and Palomar Ventures. http://www.WiQuest.com

• WiQuest was founded by and is headed by Matthew B. Shoemake, who most recently served as Director of Advanced Technology for Texas Instruments WLAN Business Unit. Shoemake was an initial team member at Alantro Communications which was acquired for $300 million by Texas Instruments in 2000. Dr. Shoemake served the IEEE 802.11 Working Group for over five years in various capacities including chairing the 400-plus member IEEE 802.11n Task Group that is setting the standard for the next generation of Wi-Fi products and chairing the IEEE 802.11g Task Group, which extends Wi-Fi data rates to 54 Mbps. Dr. Shoemake is co-inventor of the high performance option (PBCC) in the 802.11b and 802.11g standards, and he was a lead designer of TI's IEEE 802.11b compliant processors.



• WiQuest Communications was founded in September 2003.

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Elcoteq and Thomson Enter Set-top Box Outsourcing Agreement

Thomson reached an outsourcing agreement with Elcoteq Network Corporation, a global provider of electronics manufacturing services . The deal includes the acquisition of Thomson's manufacturing operation in Juarez, Mexico, and manufacturing co-operation in the set-top box business.



Under the deal, Elcoteq will pay US$33 million for certain fixed assets and inventories of Thomson's Juarez manufacturing operation. Thomson's personnel in Juarez, Mexico will continue in Elcoteq's organization. Currently the plant employs approximately 2,000 employees.



Under the long-term manufacturing agreement, Elcoteq will become a preferred manufacturing partner to Thomson for the manufacture of set-top box products and produce Thomson's set-top boxes in Juarez, Mexico. In addition to manufacturing services Elcoteq will also offer other value add services such as component sourcing services to Thomson.



The acquisition of the Juarez plant will double Elcoteq's manufacturing capacity in Mexico. The Juarez plant is ideally located in the border region between Mexico and the US. http://www.thomson.nethttp://www.elcoteq.com

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ZigBee Wireless Specification Finalized

The ZigBee Alliance ratified the first ZigBee specification for low-cost, low-power wireless networks. Expected applications for ZigBee include wireless sensor networks for remote monitoring, home control, as well as industrial automation.



The ZigBee Alliance, which includes more than 100 member companies, plans to validate the specification through expanded interoperability and scalability tests. http://www.zigbee.org

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NTT DoCoMo Tests 1 Gbps VSF-Spread OFDM

NTT DoCoMo has successfully tested a broadband wireless access system with 1 Gbps downlink capability. The 4G radio access equipment employed variable-spreading-factor spread orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (VSF-Spread OFDM) radio access technology along with multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) multiplexing techniques and a new signal detection algorithm in order to achieve the 1Gbps data transmission within 100 MHz of spectrum.



NTT DoCoMo said it is currently conducting indoor tests with various radio conditions as preparation for future field tests to develop a 4G global standard in coordination with the ITU. http://www.nttdocomo.com

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PacketFront Supplies In-Building Broadband for Tokyo's Four Seasons Hotel

PacketFront, together with NEO Index Corporation and Soliton Systems KK, are suppliying a new broadband network for the Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Chinzan-so. The fully automated network will be based on PacketFront's Intelligent Broadband Solution and will offer 300 hotel rooms and conference facilities a selection of Triple Play services. Soliton Systems has built and is operating the network, while NEO Index Corporation offers Triple Play services to the hotel. The hotel is now providing access to a content library with over 5,000 video titles from major Hollywood studios, as well as Japanese films. http://www.packetfront.comhttp://www.neoinc.jp/e/index.html

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KPN Selects Siemens Surpass for Network Upgrade

KPN selected Siemens as the strategic IP partner for its fixed network and mobile activities in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. Under the five year agreement, Siemens Communications will set up a completely new IP environment for the whole of KPN, laying the foundation for a new generation of communication services.



Siemens will supply network elements and application platforms (IMS, IP Multimedia Subsystem) mostly based on its IP convergence architecture Surpass. Financial terms were not disclosed.



KPN is already a major supplier of IP-based services to businesses in the Netherlands and abroad, offering IP-PBX and IP-VPN connectivity. http://www.siemens.com

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Thomson Completes TR-069 Testing with SupportSoft

Thomson and SupportSoft successfully conducted interoperability testing of the DSL Forum CPE WAN Management protocol. Known as TR-069, this specification ensures that DSL modems can be easily configured, activated and managed from a console in the network, helping service providers to effectively address the costs of deployment and support of their CPE as well as tightly manage broadband service delivery. TR-069 provides the necessary framework for efficient and scalable deployment of new services on top of the DSL broadband infrastructure. Thomson and SupportSoft have validated that Thomson's DSL CPE devices and SupportSoft's netConfiguration software interoperate in accordance with the DSL Forum TR-069 specification. http://www.supportsoft.comhttp://www.thomson.net

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AMC-16 Satellite Launched from Atlas V

The AMC-16 telecommunications satellite, which was designed and built by Lockheed Martin for SES AMERICOM, was successfully launched aboard a Lockheed Martin-built Atlas V rocket provided by International Launch Services (ILS).



AMC-16, a hybrid satellite featuring the second operating Ka-band payload in the SES AMERICOM fleet, with 12 spot-beams and 24-36Mhz transponders of Ku-band capacity for both fixed satellite service or direct broadcast service. The Ka-band beams will be deployed in a pattern to take advantage of frequency re-use while eliminating interference between and among the beams.



SES AMERICOM has an agreement with EchoStar Communications Corporation, a leading U.S. satellite TV provider, to use both payloads on AMC-16.



AMC-16 is the fourth Lockheed Martin-built satellite ILS has launched in 2004 to expand SES AMERICOM's fleet of satellites, which provide global distribution of cable, broadcast television and radio programming, mobile communications, business television, broadband data and telecommunications services.



AMC-15, which features the first Ka-band operating payload in the SES AMERICOM fleet, was successfully launched in October aboard an ILS Proton vehicle from Baikonur, Kazakhstan in October. http://lmms.external.lmco.com/

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MaxStream Adopts Freescale ZigBee Wireless

MaxStream, a supplier of embedded RF modules, has adopted Freescale Semiconductor's ZigBee wireless silicon. In Q1 2005, MaxStream will introduce the FCC and CE-type approved XBee family, which incorporates Freescale's ZigBee-ready and 802.15.4 chipsets onto MaxStream's RF modules. The XBee line of RF modules and stand-alone connectivity solutions will allow OEMs to add ZigBee wireless capabilities to their products.



The ZigBee wireless standard enables the connection of electronic devices in a short-range wireless mesh network. http://www.freescale.com/http://www.maxstream.net/

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Sumitomo Electric Ships IP Set-top to NTT Communications

Sumitomo Electric Networks announced commercial shipment of its "StreamCruiser" IP set-top boxes to NTT Communications for its "OCN Theater" video distribution service.



OCN Theater is a VOD service for NTT Comm's OCN optical fiber "B FLET'S" service. It features Hollywood movie productions, Japanese movies and the currently popular Korean dramas. In addition to VOD, the service provides video kara-oke, games, news news, weather reports, maps and other content.



Sumitomo Electric's StreamCruiser IP-STB connects to the TV set in the home as a set-top box using an FTTH or ADSL. The product uses "Raptor" high-speed, low-latency, packet-loss recovery technology developed through the collaboration betwen Sumitomo Electric Networks and US-based Digital Fountain.



StreamCruiser is also available with NTT East Corporation's IPv6 network service (FLET'S.Net), and implements links with the Digital Rights Management (DRM) system using content encryption, supporting video distribution service on a fully commercial basis. http://www.sei-networks.comhttp://www.streamcruiser.com/

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Nortel Softswitch Achieves Euro-PacketCable Qualification

Nortel's Communication Server (CS) 2000 has been awarded EUR-PacketCable Call Management Server (CMS) qualification status by the EUR-Cable Certification Board (ECB), a consortium consisting of 12 major European cable. EUR-PacketCable is the set of procedures for IP-based telephony over cable and builds on the North American PacketCable standard developed by CableLabs. The standard enables a range of multimedia services, including IP telephony, multimedia conferencing, interactive gaming, and general multimedia applications.



Nortel said it is the only CMS vendor with cable VoIP solutions qualified in both Europe (by ECB) and North America (by CableLabs). Nortel added eight new cable VoIP contracts in 2004. Announced cable VoIP deployments in EMEA include TeleCable (Spain), ish and Kabel BW (Germany) and Telenet (Belgium). http://www.nortel.com

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TANDBERG TV to Acquire N2 Broadband

TANDBERG Television agreed to acquire N2 Broadband, Inc., a provider of scalable, open-platform solutions for on-demand entertainment, in a cash and stock transaction valued at $110 million to $130 million.



The companies said their merger would create a global force in the provision of enabling technologies for the delivery of digital multimedia content. TANDBERG Television is a market leader in digital video compression, offering a portfolio of standard definition and high definition compression solutions for MPEG-2, MPEG-4 AVC and SMPTE VC-1. The company is the primary supplier of digital cable head ends in Europe, with a strong position in the global DTH satellite market and a market lead in the provision of IPTV delivery systems to telcos around the world.



N2 Broadband provides an open-platform solution that enables network operators and content providers to efficiently and confidently offer on-demand services. The company serves the North American cable market and has established relationships with the top cable operators, and an engineering staff intimately familiar with current and next generation cable system architectures.



"The North American market represents the largest growth opportunity for TANDBERG Television's products and services over the next several years and N2 Broadband will immediately strengthen the route to market for our video compression systems into the US cable market," said Eric Cooney, President and CEO of TANDBERG Television. "Of equal importance over the long term is the expanding worldwide market for on-demand services such as VOD. Our pole position in European and Asian cable markets, as well as our global lead in the telco IPTV segment, provides an established route to market for N2 Broadband's industry-leading VOD software."http://www.tandbergtv.comhttp://www.n2broadband.com

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Verizon Wireless Extends EVDO in California

Verizon Wireless announced the extension of its BroadbandAccess EVDO wireless service to nearly all of Los Angeles County and, for the first time, portions of Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. California. Verizon Wireless said its BroadbandAccess wireless service is now providing typical download speeds of 300 - 500 kbps throughout nearly 4,400 square miles of Southern California.



In addition to its ongoing annual capital investment program to build network capacity and coverage, Verizon Wireless expects to invest $1 billion through 2005 to further deploy its EV-DO technology nationally. In California, the company has invested $3 billion in its network since the company was founded in mid-2000.



BroadbandAccess service is priced at $79.99 monthly access for unlimited use with a 1- or 2-year customer agreement. The notebook interface card is priced at $49.99 with a 2-year customer agreement or $99.99 with a 1-year customer agreement after $150 mail-in rebate.



Verizon Wireless' BroadbandAccess is currently available in 17 cities across the U.S. and in over 25 major airports. http://www.verizonwireless.com

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