Google Outage Leads to Big Drop in Internet Traffic

Google experienced a global outage beginning on 16-Aug-2013 at 4:37 PM (Pacific) and lasting 1 to 5 minutes.  The disruption impacted all of the company's most popular services, including search, Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Talk, Google Drive, Google Maps, etc.

GoSquared Engineering, which provides real-time analytics, said its tracking showed that the momentary Google outage resulted in an immediate, 40% drop in global Internet traffic.

https://engineering.gosquared.com/googles-downtime-40-drop-in-traffic
http://www.google.com/appsstatus#hl=en&v=status&ts=1376895599000

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Microsoft Suffers Multi-Day Outlook Outage

Microsoft experienced a multi-day outage last week impacting its Outlook.com, Calendar and certain SkyDrive services.

In a status update, Microsoft attributed the outage to a failure in a caching service that interfaces with devices using Exchange ActiveSync, including most smart phones. The company said this failure caused these devices to receive an error and continuously try to connect to service, resulting in a flood of traffic that was not handled properly.  Restoration required that some customer be temporarily blocked by Exchange ActiveSync until traffic volumes allowed it.

https://status.live.com/history

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Google Activates Automatic 128-bit Encryption for Cloud Storage

Google Cloud Storage has begun to automatically encrypts all data before it is written to disk, at no additional charge.   The company said the encryption is automatic, transparent and without performance penalty.  Google manages the cryptographic keys while providing key access controls and auditing logs.  Users also have the option of managing keys on their own.

Google Cloud Storage is using 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES-128) for all data and metadata, which is the same level of encryption that Google uses for its own encrypted data. The server-side encryption is already active for all new data written to Cloud Storage.

http://googlecloudplatform.blogspot.com/2013/08/google-cloud-storage-now-provides.html

• Last week, Google announced Layer 3 load balancing for Compute Engine. This enables users to load-balance ingress network TCP/UDP traffic over a specific set of Compute Engine virtual machines (VMs) within the same region, thereby handling spikes in load without pre-warming. It also ensures that only healthy VMs are used to serve Internet requests through the use of HTTP-based health checks.

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MIT Technology Review: Ambient RF Backscatter Could Connect Devices

Researchers at the University of Washington are investigating the use of ambient radio wave energy to power communication between small devices, according to an article published in the MIT Technology Review.

The communication is made possible by varying the amount of backscatter TV signal that the transmitting device reflects.

http://news.cs.washington.edu/2013/08/14/devices-connect-with-borrowed-tv-signals-and-need-no-power-source/

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/518111/devices-connect-with-borrowed-tv-signals-and-need-no-power-source/

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China Mobile: Data Traffic Up 129%, Data Revenue Up 62%, Profit up 1.5% 1H2013

China Mobile, the world's largest mobile operator, reported operating revenue for the first half of 2013 reached RMB 303.1 billion (US$49.58 billion), up 10.4% over the first half of 2012, while revenue from telecommunications services was up 6.8% to RMB 285 billion. Net profit increased 1.5% to RMB 63.13 billion.

Some operational highlights for China Mobile in the first half of 2013:

• Customers over 740 million, up 8.4% from 683 million at 1H2012.
• Data services revenue rose to 33.5% of revenue from telecommunications services.
• Wireless data traffic revenue up 62.2% while wire data revenue grew 129% over 1H2012.
• TD handset sales were up ~1.5 fold
• 3G customers are now over 137 million.
• 3G base stations reached 361,000
• The company plans to deploy >200,000 TD-LTE base stations in 2013.
• Wi-Fi APs reached 4.10 million
• WLAN offload accounts for 75% of data traffic -- a low cost bearer
• Growing TD device supply chain 595 new TD handset models available, virtually all smartphones
• So far, China Mobile has 25 TD-LTE trial devices, >100 models under development, of which 15 handsets intended for commercial use.
• China Mobile plans to procure < 1 million TD-LTE devices this year.
• Voice usage was up 3.7% to 2,061 billion minutes.
• China Mobile's transmission network increased by 23,600 of fiber route miles since last year.
• China Mobile's app store has 336 million cumulative registered customers. There were 506 million application downloads in 1H2013.
• In 2013, China Mobile aims to realize a 15% decrease in power consumption per unit of business.

Looking forward, the company says its top challenges include China's Slowing macroeconomic development, rising mobile penetration, increasing notable OTT headwinds, and ntensifying competition among operators.

An investor presentation in English is posted here:
http://www.chinamobileltd.com/en/ir/webcasts/pre130815.pdf

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Sprint Implements Long haul 100G with Ciena, Tests 400G

Sprint and Ciena announced two milestones in speed and capacity on Sprint’s network:

• Sprint has deployed one of the longest 100 Gbps circuits in the United States with a live transmission that required no signal regeneration over a distance of 2,100 km, or 1,304 miles, between Chicago and Fort Worth, Texas. The 100Gbps link uses Ciena WaveLogic 3 coherent optical processors on the 6500 Packet Optical Platform
  
• Last month, the companies successfully completed a live 400Gbps trial on Sprint’s network in the Silicon Valley area using existing Sprint fiber infrastructure and Ciena’s 6500 with WaveLogic 3 cards. The high-capacity link operated without error. The companies said this demonstrated the viability of using 400Gbps channels alongside existing channels carrying live customer traffic. 

“Customers have expressed their hunger for higher speed networks to support their substantial data needs, which we project will only continue to grow exponentially,” said Wayne Ward, vice president-Business and Product Development, Sprint. “The 400Gbps trial demonstrates our ability to offer higher speeds with our existing fiber, which means that our customers can feel assured that our network is future-proofed to meet their needs as they evolve. The delivery of 100Gbps and 400Gbps speeds will be critical as we launch our Ethernet Wave Services and support a growing wireless infrastructure.”

As announced in 2012, Sprint is upgrading its optical backbone network with Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform as part of its Network Vision initiative.

http://www.sprint.com
http://www.ciena.com

• Ciena has been a strategic supplier to Sprint since 1998.

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Emerald Networks Signs Vodafone Iceland for New Cable

Vodafone Iceland has signed a contract for capacity on Emerald Networks's new submarine cable system, "Emerald Express", which is a new-build system connecting North America to Europe, with a branch to Iceland. The system is scheduled to be ready for service in Q3 2014, and Vodafone Iceland plans on using it for communications for at least the next 15 years. Vodafone is the first Icelandic company to sign a contract with Emerald Networks.

The cable landing station in Iceland is in the vicinity of Grindavik, and Emerald will provide backhaul to Reykjavik and on the Reykjanes Peninsula.

http://emeraldnetworks.com

• Emerald Networks' submarine cable system span 6,700 km along the "Great Circle" route connecting North America to Europe via Iceland. The company has previous calculated that this northerly route will have a latency of less than 62 milliseconds round trip from New York to London, making it one of the fastest networks across the Atlantic. 

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Fujitsu Gains MEF CE 2.0 Certification

Fujitsu Network Communications’ FLASHWAVE 9500 Packet Optical Networking Platform and FLASHWAVE CDS Micro Packet Optical Networking Platform have achieved Carrier Ethernet (CE) 2.0 certification from the Metro Ethernet Forum (MEF).

Specifically, Fujitsu’s FLASHWAVE 9500 is now MEF CE 2.0 certified for E-Line, E-Access, and E-LAN services and the FLASHWAVE CDS Micro Packet Optical Networking Platform is now CE 2.0 certified for E-Line and E-Access services.  

Fujitsu’s FLASHWAVE 9500 integrates Carrier Ethernet, ROADM, and SONET/SDH technologies. With the addition of the MEF certification, the FLASHWAVE 9500 forms a unified CE 2.0 Ethernet service delivery platform that can deliver any of the MEF services over any type of access network. The FLASHWAVE CDS system is an access and aggregation solution for mobile backhaul and commercial/enterprise Ethernet services.

“Achieving MEF CE 2.0 certification on our FLASHWAVE platforms is an important milestone for Fujitsu. With this certification, we are assuring customers that our solutions enable standardized, interoperable services with which Service Providers can offer world class carrier grade Ethernet connectivity while creating new revenue generating opportunities,” said Rod Naphan, Senior Vice President, Planning, Fujitsu Network Communications. 

http://www.fujitsu.com/us/services/telecom/

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T-Mobile USA Sells $500 Million in Notes

T-Mobile USA will sell $500,000,000 aggregate principal amount of its 5.250% Senior Notes due 2018 (the “Notes”) in a private offering. The offering is scheduled to close on August 21, 2013, subject to satisfaction of customary closing conditions.

http://www.t-mobile.com/

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Mellanox Completes Acquisition of Kotura

Mellanox Technologies completed its previously announced acquisition of Kotura, a developer of advanced silicon photonics optical interconnect technology, for a total cash purchase price of approximately $82 million.

Kotura holds over 120 granted or pending patents in CMOS photonics and packaging design.  The company has made a number of ground breaking innovations in optical interconnects by integrating multiple high speed active and passive optical functions onto a silicon chip.

Kotura’s current location in Monterey Park, California, will serve as Mellanox’s first R&D center in the United States.

http://www.mellanox.com/
http://www.kotura.com/

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Ericsson appoints Head of Business Unit Modems

Ericsson has appointed Mats Norin as Vice President and Head of Business Unit Modems.  He will also take a seat on Ericsson’s Global Leadership Team, reporting to Chairman of Business Unit Modems and Head of Group Function Strategy, Douglas Gilstrap.

Business Unit Modems includes the design, development, supply and sales of the LTE multimode thin modem solutions, including 2G, 3G and 4G interoperability. On August 2, 2013, this activity was transferred to Ericsson from ST-Ericsson where Norin served as Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer since 2012.

Hans Vestberg, President and CEO said: “The LTE multimode thin modems is an important enabler for our vision of 50 billion connected devices in a Networked Society. I am pleased that Mats Norin, with his extensive industry experience, will lead the work to realize the potential in this business. Our focus is on bringing the best modems to market, and to work closely with customers to integrate these modems into their products.”

http://www.ericsson.com

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Silicon Labs Launches SyncE-Compliant Clock

Silicon Labs introduced a low jitter, low power timing solution for high-speed networking equipment based on the Synchronous Ethernet (SyncE) standard.

The new Si5328 precision clock multiplier and jitter attenuator boasts jitter performance as low as 263 femtoseconds RMS and is fully compliant with ITU-T G.8262 SyncE clock requirements including EEC Options 1 and 2. The SyncE clock can generate any output frequency ranging from 8 kHz to 808 MHz and from any input frequency from 8 kHz to 710 MHz. 

“As today’s telecom infrastructure rapidly migrates from legacy standards to SyncE, equipment manufacturers require fully SyncE-compliant timing solutions that not only offer low jitter performance but also reduce design complexity and power consumption,” said Mike Petrowski, vice president and general manager of Silicon Labs’ timing products. “Silicon Labs’ new Si5328 clock multiplier offers the most advanced SyncE timing solution available, giving designers an unparalleled margin in jitter performance, BOM cost, footprint and energy efficiency.”

http://www.silabs.com/timing

http://news.silabs.com/press-release/silicon-labs-launches-industrys-lowest-jitter-fully-synce-compliant-clock

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Verizon Hit by Thieves in Maryland

Verizon has experienced a series of thefts at company garages and central offices in Maryland.

In recent weeks, thieves have stolen approximately $300,000 worth of FiOS-specific installation and testing equipment, tools and copper wire.  The company is offering a reward of up to $10,000 for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of individuals responsible.

Thieves also stole copper wire in May through early August from Verizon work centers in Bel Air; Brooklyn; Churchville; Edgewood; Fork; Hampstead; Jarrettsville; North East; Owings Mills; Parkton; Randallstown; Sparks; and Taneytown.  In some cases, laptops also were taken.

http://newscenter.verizon.com/corporate/news-articles/2013/08-15-verizon-offers-reward-for-theft-at-maryland-work-centers/

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Maxim Integrated to Acquire Volterra Semiconductor

Maxim Integrated Products agreed to acquire Volterra Semiconductor Corp. (NASDAQ:VLTR) for $23 per share, which represents a 55% premium to Volterra Semiconductor's closing share price on August 14, 2013. The transaction value is approximately $605 million equity value or $450 million net of Volterra's cash position of approximately $155 million.

Volterra supplies high-current, high-performance, and high-density power management solutions. The company develops highly integrated solutions primarily for the enterprise, cloud computing, communications, and networking markets. Volterra's portfolio of highly integrated products enables better performance, smaller form factors, enhanced scalability, improved system management, and lower total cost of ownership.

http://www.maximintegrated.com/investor
http://www.volterra.com/

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Cisco Posts Strong Quarter but Trims Forecast on Uneven Global Economics

Cisco reported $12.4 billion, net income (GAAP) basis of $2.3 billion or $0.42 per share, and non-GAAP net income of $2.8 billion or $0.52 per share for its fourth fiscal quarter, ended July 27, 2013.  Q4 revenue was up 6% year-over-year.  

"My confidence in our ability to be the #1 IT Company is increasing. Our fourth quarter was a record on many fronts, with record revenue, and record non-GAAP operating income, non-GAAP net income, and non-GAAP earnings per share. In every case, we exceeded the midpoint of our guidance. We also generated $4 billion in operating cash flow in the quarter, another record," stated Cisco Chairman and CEO John Chambers.

"Our financial strategy is working as our profits grew faster than revenue for the full fiscal year," stated Frank Calderoni, executive vice president and chief financial officer. "Our fourth quarter also delivered solid financial results as we continued to deliver profitable growth to maximize shareholder value for the long-term."

However, Cisco trimmed its guidance saying the economic recovery was uneven, with some regions, notably Europe, performing worse than others. The company now expects growth of 3-5% for the current quarter, compared with the 6% rate just reported. Cisco said it remains committed to its long-term financial model, including driving profitable revenue growth of 5-7%.

Cisco plans to cut about 4,000 jobs or about 5% of its workforce as a result.

http://www.cisco.com
http://www.scribd.com/doc/160305902/Q4FY13-Earnings-Slides

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CloudNFV Group Develops Multi-vendor Prototypes

A new, CloudNFV vendor group has been established with the goal of developing a prototype based on the ETSI Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) Industry Specifications Group (ISG) work.

CloudNFV, which was set-up by CIMI Corporation President Tom Nolle, has just released a technical framework and public demonstration schedule of an open platform for implementing NFV based on cloud computing and Software Defined Networking (SDN) technologies in a multi-vendor environment.   The objective is to structure software and hardware elements, select practical interfaces and data models, and adapt as needed through the evolution of the ISG NFV specification.

The group is planning a series of webinars beginning in late September and will include live, in-person demonstrations conducted at various industry events through the end of the year.

Founding members include 6WIND, Dell, EnterpriseWeb, Overture and Qosmos.

“We formed CloudNFV in April 2013 with a group of like-minded companies working towards an open, effective, manageable, and extensible means to deploy NFV using proven cloud principles and techniques,” said Tom Nolle, President of CIMI Corp. “Today marks a milestone in this work as we invite others to join us as we work to demonstrate the practical application of well understood cloud technologies to NFV – really taking NFV to the cloud.”

http://www.cloudnfv.com

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DANTE and Infinera Set Optical Record: 8 Tbs Super-Channel Capacity

Infinera and DANTE (Delivery of Advanced Network Technology to Europe), have set a Guinness World Record for the fastest rate of multi-Terabit optical capacity provisioning across the GÉANT Network.

Infinera and DANTE were able to install and activate eight Terabits per second (Tbps) of long haul super-channel optical capacity. The record was set using an Infinera Intelligent Transport Network, featuring the DTN-X packet optical transport networking platform, deployed on the GÉANT backbone across a long distance link from Vancis Amsterdam, The Netherlands to GlobalConnect Hamburg, Germany.  The DTN-X platform features 500 Gbps super-channel line cards which require only two fiber connectors each. Sixteen such cards and 32 fiber connections were deployed at each end of the link, and once the super-channels were in operation a 100 Gigabit Ethernet service was provisioned over the link. The total time from the insertion of the first super-channel line card to the activation of the 100 GbE service was 19 minutes and 1 second resulting in a provisioning rate of 26.02 Tbps per hour.

Infinera said the record underscores how an Intelligent Transport Network enables service providers to use the rapid provisioning time to increase revenues with reliable, differentiated services while reducing operating costs through scale, multi-layer convergence and automation.

“Working with Infinera to achieve the Guinness World Record for fastest provisioning of long-haul transmission capacity on a live network is consistent with our day-to-day experience operating an Intelligent Transport Network,” said Michael Enrico, CTO of DANTE. “Infinera provides the easy-to-deploy multi-Terabit capacity we need to rapidly scale GÉANT, Europe’s largest research and education network.”

http://www.infinera.com/go/gwr
http://www.geant.net
http://www.dante.net

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Tele2 and T-Mobile Announce Network Sharing in the Netherlands

Tele2 AB and T-Mobile Netherlands announced a network sharing agreement that provides Tele2 Netherlands with access to T-Mobile’s sites.

The deal gives Tele2 Netherlands access to the majority of antenna sites on rooftops and towers, in addition to its own sites in the Netherlands. Both operators will however roll out and operate their own frequencies and nationwide mobile communication network independently. Both T-Mobile and Tele2 will be installing their own network equipment at each site, but will share the antennas on rooftops or towers and the installment of other non-intelligent hardware.  In addition, Tele2 has extended the MVNO agreement for 2G and 3G with T-Mobile Netherlands for a period of 5 years.

The companies said the agreement ensures lower maintenance costs of the physical mobile network. The extended MVNO agreement ensures continued use of voice and data services for Tele2’s customers. It also serves as a fallback solution after the completion of Tele2’s own 4G network roll-out.

Günther Vogelpoel, CEO Tele2 Netherlands, commented: “This is a milestone in our continued path to challenge the Dutch telecom market. We can now incorporate the access to the T-Mobile sites in the total roll-out planning, which enables Tele2 to efficiently build a nationwide 4G-network.”

Thomas Berlemann, Managing Director T-Mobile Netherlands, commented: “We are very pleased with this renewed partnership. It underlines the continuing trust of Tele2 in our company as a reliable business partner with a future-proof nationwide network. This agreement will free up funding which we are able to reinvest to further differentiate ourselves from competition in customer services.”

http://www.tele2.com/

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Equinix Appoints Chief Operating Officer

Equinix has appointed Charles Meyers, formerly President of the Americas for Equinix, to the newly created role of Chief Operating Officer (COO).

The company said the addition of the COO function is part of a reorganization designed to align the company globally to best serve the needs of Equinix customers. The Global Sales, Marketing, Operations and Client Services functions will now report directly to Meyers.

http://www.equinix.com

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SanDisk Optimized SSD for Data Center Applications

SanDisk introduced enhanced versions of its solid state drive (SSD) line-up for businesses that prioritize fast, consistent access to data, such as search engine and cloud storage providers and streaming media companies.

The SanDisk X210 SSD provides up to 512GB of storage and offers up to 505 MB/sec sequential read and up to 470 MB/sec sequential write speeds.  It features automated power management and is built on SanDisk’s advanced 19 nanometer (nm) manufacturing process technology.

"Since launching SanDisk’s commercial SSD channel earlier this year, we have received a tremendous response from businesses that have seen significant advantages from incorporating SanDisk solid-state technology into their data center and workplace PCs and notebooks," said Tarun Loomba, vice president of Storage Solutions marketing at SanDisk.

http://www.sandisk.com

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