VoLTE-HD Operational in 55 Mobile Networks Worldwide

LTE networks are now widely deployed worldwide with 492 operators now offering commercial service in 162 countries, according to a newly published report from the GSA. LTE-Advanced is currently in commercial operation to some extent with 127 operators and a further 175 are currently testing the technology.

Some highlights from the GSA report:

• 422 operators deployed LTE using the FDD mode only, 51 operators deployed LTE using the TDD mode only, 21 operators deployed using both LTE FDD and TDD modes
• 126 operators in 60 countries are investing in VoLTE deployments, studies or trials. 55 operators have commercially launched VoLTE-HD voice service in 34 countries
• 1800 MHz band 3 spectrum is in commercial service in 104 countries on 226 LTE networks (LTE1800) representing over 45% of all LTE networks globally
• 5,104 LTE user devices announced by 417 suppliers. This is 2,185 devices more than GSA reported in April 2015, representing 75% Y-o-Y growth. The number of manufacturers grew 40% in the same period
• 1800 MHz (3GPP Band 3) is the best supported spectrum for LTE deployments, having the largest LTE devices ecosystem (LTE1800). Over 55% of LTE devices can operate in band 3 spectrum

http://www.gsacom.com

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Micron Launches NVMe PCIe SSDs for Data Centers

Micron Technology announced a new portfolio of NVMe PCIe solid state drives (SSDs) aimed at scale-out data centers. The idea is to bring nonvolatile memory as close as possible to the processor.

Micron said it sees many customers toward server-based storage instead of SANs of frame-arrays because of the changing computing landscape.  Many hyperscale companies are using server-based storage for consistent, accelerated access to data.

The line-up includes:

• Micron 9100 NVMe PCIe SSD  -- up to 10x faster compared to a single data center SATA SSD. Offers 3.2TB of storage in both a HHHL & a 2.5" U.2 form factor. The U.2 form factor of Micron's 9100 SSD allows front-bay access to the server, delivering a recognizable form, fit and function.
• Micron 7100 NVMe PCIe SSD -- brings higher performance and lower TCO. Offers a slim 7mm U.2 (2.5") hot-pluggable form factor. It uses half as many watts as a standard high-performance NVMe drive but provides low latencies unachievable by SATA SSDs. 
• Micron S600DC SAS SSDs -- greater capacity, better performance and higher endurance at a much more affordable price point compared to 15K HDDs. The S600DC SSD offers 4TB of storage in a 2.5" form factor - more than double the capacity 10K 2.5" HDDs and 4x the capacity of 15K HDDs. 

Micron also announced a set of purpose-built, scale-out accelerated solutions for open source and software-defined data centers. The first suite of Micron Accelerated Solutions are built with key enterprising software and hardware partners including VMware, Supermicro and Nexenta. Some highlights:

• Micron Accelerated Solution for VMware Virtual SAN Ready Nodes -- Micron, Supermicro and VMware have partnered to design all-flash Ready Nodes that enable VMware vSphere administrators to future-proof their data center architecture using all-flash, delivering compelling all-flash performance. The companies claim up to 40X IOPs and bandwidth improvement compared to hybrid VMware Virtual SAN implementations that include traditional HDD. The Micron Accelerated Solution for VMware Virtual SAN Ready Nodes offer deduplication, compression and erasure coding. The VMware Virtual SAN All-Flash Ready Nodes can be purchased for as low as $0.44/GB (effective capacity) which includes the full MSRP of all server hardware, software and three-year support.
• Micron Accelerated Ceph Storage Solution -- leveraging an open source object storage solution that runs on Linux software that hits 1M IOPS and reaches 140Gbps throughput. The all-flash Ceph storage solution allows customers to stand up a dynamic cloud infrastructure.
• Micron Accelerated NexentaEdge Solution -- a full featured all-flash block and object storage based on NexentaEdge scale-out Software-Defined Storage. The Micron Accelerated NexentaEdge Solution will provide high performance native block, iSCSI block, Swift and S3 object services to OpenStack, VMware and Container based infrastructure. NexentaEdge provides unlimited instant snapshots and clones, as well as patented cluster-wide inline deduplication and compression.This collaboration is expected to result in a joint reference architecture and purchasable solution from Supermicro in the second half of 2016.

http://www.micron.com

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Mitel to Acquire Polycom for Nearly $2 Billion

Mitel agreed to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Polycom common stock in a cash and stock transaction valued at approximately $1.96 billion, including $3.12 in cash and 1.31 Mitel common shares for each share of Polycom common stock, or $13.68 based on the closing price of a Mitel common share on April 13, 2016 -- a 22% premium to Polycom shareholders based on Mitel's and Polycom's recent share prices.

The deal combines Mitel's leadership in global communications with Polycom's well-known premium brand and portfolio in the conference and video collaboration market. The combined company will be headquartered in Ottawa, Canada, and will operate under the Mitel name while maintaining Polycom's strong global brand. Richard McBee, Mitel's Chief Executive Officer will lead the combined organization. Steve Spooner, Mitel's Chief Financial Officer, will also continue in that role. The combined company will have a global workforce of approximately 7,700 employees.

"Mitel has a simple vision - to provide seamless communications and collaboration to customers. To bring that vision to life we are methodically putting the puzzle pieces in place to provide a seamless customer experience across any device and any environment," said Mitel CEO Rich McBee. "Polycom is one of the most respected brands in the world and is synonymous with the high quality and innovative conference and video capabilities that are now the norm of everyday collaboration."

Some key market positions include:

#1 in business cloud communications
#1 in IP/PBX extensions in Europe
#1 in conference phones
#1 in Open SIP sets
#2 in video conferencing
#2 in installed audio
Combined portfolio of more than 2,100 patents and more than 500 patents pending

http://www.mitel.com
http://www.polycom.com

Mitel Acquires Mavenir for $560 million

Monday, March 02, 2015  Mavenir, Mergers and Acquisitions, Mitel  No comments

Mitel agreed to acquire Mavenir Systems (NYSE:MVNR) in a cash and stock deal valued at approximately $560 million.

Mitel specializes in enterprise and mobile IP unified communications.  Mavenir prrovides software-based mobile networking solutions, including a portfolio of voice/video, messaging and mobile core products that include IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), Evolved Packet Core (EPC) and Session Border Controllers (SBCs). Mavenir was the supplier for the world’s first live network deployments of Voice over LTE (VoLTE) and RCS5 with MetroPCS (now T-Mobile); the first mobile network deployment of IMS-based VoWi-Fi (Wi-Fi calling) with T-Mobile US; and the first implementation of Virtualized RCSe with Deutsche Telekom.

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ACCO Raises $35 Million for CMOS RF

ACCO Semiconductor, a start-up with offices in Sunnyvale, California and Paris, France, raised $35 million for its CMOS RF solutions.

ACCO has developed and patented RF front-end technology for mobile communications devices (power amplifiers and antenna switches) that uses standard complementary-metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) processing. Its bulk CMOS cellular power amplifier offers highly linear performance yet can operate at high power without breakdown or degradation.

ACCO said it is currently accelerating its business into various brands of LTE smart phones now found in several countries throughout Asia and Europe.

The funding round was led by Bpifrance, through its growth fund Large Venture, with participation from investors in both the US and France including Foundation Capital, Pond Ventures, Partech Ventures, Omnes Capital, Siparex Group and A Plus Finance.

"The commitment from Bpifrance and other participating investors validates the importance of building the RF front-end in bulk CMOS—the process used in nearly the entire electronics industry,” states Greg Caltabiano, ACCO President and CEO. “Not only is this important for smart phones, but also critical to IoT where highly integrated, highly functional, low-cost solutions will
drive success of the entire market.”

http://www.acco-semi.com

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Israeli Regulator Blocks Cellcom's Merger with Golan Telecom

The Israeli Antitrust commissioner and the Ministry of Communications are opposing the proposed purchase of Golan Telecom Ltd. by Cellcom Israel.

Cellcom Israel Ltd., established in 1994, is the largest Israeli cellular provider with approximately 2.835 million cellular subscribers (as at December 31, 2015).

http://www.cellcom.co.il

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Snowflake Targets Secure Data Warehousing in the Cloud

Snowflake Computing, a start-up based in San Mateo, California, has achieved HIPAA compliance with its cloud data warehousing service. Specifically, Snowflake has received key third-party validations of its service and processes, including a Service Organization Control (SOC) 2 Type II report and HIPAA compliance. SOC 2 is an industry standard that validates the security of infrastructures and services for cloud-based service providers.

"With organizations increasingly looking to the cloud, security has become a focal point of today's data storage conversation and concern," said Bob Muglia, CEO of Snowflake Computing. "To date, database offerings have put the burden of security on the customer, leaving them to configure, manage, and monitor infrastructure, data, and application security. Snowflake has brought world-class security expertise to designing security into our service from the start, going above and beyond other offerings to relieve users of this burden so that they can focus on solving business problems rather than suffer the headaches of security management."

Snowflake's key feature set:

• Always-on Enterprise grade encryption. Snowflake automatically encrypts all customer data by default, in transit and at rest, using the latest security standards and best practices at no additional cost.
• Multi-factor authentication. Snowflake offers integrated multi-factor authentication, to further control access to the Snowflake service, and to reduce the threat of brute force attacks.
• Federated Services. Snowflake offers federated services for organizations that want to leverage their existing SAML 2.0 investments. 
• Automatic key management. Snowflake rotates account and table keys on a regular basis, entirely transparent to the customer and requiring no configuration or management.
• Intrusion Detection. Integrated SIEM services for monitoring and notifying customers of potential suspicious activities to help them thwart attacks.
• Role based access. Snowflake allows role based access and control for both data access and operation.
• Dedicated Instances. For customers with sensitive data who need added security including compliance requirements in a virtualized environment, Snowflake offers the option of dedicated compute resources.

http://www.snowflake.net

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Supermicro Sees Revenue at Low End of Range

Super Micro Computer said it now anticipates that it will report revenue for its third quarter of fiscal 2016 (ended 31-Mar-2016) in the range of $530 million to $533 million -- at the low end of the company's previous guidance range of $530 million to $580 million.

Non-GAAP gross margin is expected to be approximately 14.8% to 14.9% primarily due to lower demand with some large customers and the channel which led to lower cost absorption based on lower utilization as well as product mix.

“While we saw the market slow down a little in the March quarter, Supermicro revenue continued to grow at an industry leading pace by growing 12% to 13% year over year. However, results for this quarter were weaker than forecasted due to weaker demand with some large customers and the channel than we anticipated. January and February were particularly soft while March showed improved momentum. Storage and datacenter continued to grow,” said Charles Liang, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “We are confident that Supermicro will continue to gain market share consistently and grow multiple times the industry growth rate in the upcoming quarter and year. We will provide more details on the third quarter financial performance at the time of our earnings call later this month.”

http://www.Supermicro.com

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Docker Releases Runtime Compliant with Open Container Initiative

Docker announced its first release built on runC and containerd.

Docker said its Engine 1.11 demonstrates real progress with the Open Container Initiative (OCI), which was launched last year with a mission to build a vendor-neutral, portable and open specification and runtime for container-based solutions. Docker donated its container format and runtime to the OCI under the Linux Foundation in June of last year.

In December 2015, Docker introduced containerd, a daemon to control runC., which is the first compliant implementation of the Open Containers Runtime specification and the default executor bundled with Docker Engine.

Some highlights of Docker Engine 1.11:

• DNS round robin load balancing between containers with Docker’s networking. 
• VLAN support (experimental)
• IPv6 service discovery: Engine’s DNS-based service discovery system can now return AAAA records.
• Yubikey hardware image signing
• Labels on networks and volumes
• Better handling of low disk space with device mapper storage

https://blog.docker.com/2016/04/docker-engine-1-11-runc/

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Cumulus, Dell, Red Hat Collaborate on OpenStack

Cumulus Networks is working with Dell and Red Hat to simplify large-scale OpenStack deployments without the need for proprietary software-defined networking (SDN) fabric solutions. The goal is an all-Linux OpenStack pod that is easy to install and maintain, and incorporates the latest networking technologies.

The companies cited a joint project underway since February to see how advances in automation and networking could be applied to a production-scale OpenStack pod while removing scalability and maintenance challenges for end users. Some project highlights, “all the way down” the OpenStack pod:

• Scalable 300+ node 100% Linux OpenStack pod
• Installation and provisioning in six hours using standard open source DevOps tools
• Simplified IP networking and controller-less VXLAN-based SDN

Using certified Dell hardware for Cumulus Linux and Red Hat OpenStack Platform the pod included more than 300 PowerEdge rack-mount servers installed in nine racks interconnected with 24 Open Networking switches. Dual attached 10Gb Ethernet server connections and 8.6TB cluster bandwidth provided ample capacity for the OpenStack storage and distributed application communications. Ansible by Red Hat, Git, and Red Hat OpenStack Platform formed the deployment tool chain and a virtual environment allowed for prototyping and testing of all components. DevOps tools and principles enabled the geographically distributed team to hit a six hour deployment window to full operation. The pod used an all IP VXLAN networking topology using Cumulus Linux and OpenStack Neutron spanning the leaf/spine switches as well as all OpenStack compute nodes.

“When we launched our Open Networking initiative more than two years ago, our intent was to innovate the network and transform the data center by delivering industry-standard hardware and providing choice of network operating systems and data center applications,” said Tom Burns, Vice President and General Manager, Dell Networking. “This project demonstrated the power of that innovation and how, when combined in a DevOps model, can greatly simplify business challenges for customers.”

“With the increase in production rollouts of OpenStack, customers want the ability to scale without compromising on performance and manageability,” said Radhesh Balakrishnan, General Manager, OpenStack, Red Hat. “In collaboration with Cumulus Networks and Dell we have demonstrated the ability to scale with Red Hat OpenStack Platform and we're looking forward to bringing this powerful solution to our customers. What makes this project even more unique is our focus on delivering a fully open source tool chain, including Ansible, to simplify deployment.”

“It’s powerful to witness the software-defined data center at work,” said JR Rivers, co-founder and CTO of Cumulus Networks. “This project tied together automation, virtual testing environments, tight deployment schedules, and ‘Linux all the way down’ to deliver a production-ready OpenStack pod.”

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Digital Ocean Secures $130 Million for Cloud Buildout

DigitalOcean, a start-up based in New York City, secured a $130 million credit facility to continue its mission of building a next generation cloud for scaling startups and software defined businesses.

DigitalOcean offers SSD-enabled cloud servers with simplified pricing tiers.

The company said that over the past two years it has expanded its registered customer base from 253,000 to 708,000 users, who have launched over 13 million cloud servers. The credit facilities will be used to purchase equipment in order to continue its global expansion and support increasing demand.

"We are delighted with the outcome of our credit facility. It complements the $83 million Series B equity financing that we closed in June 2015 and our strong cash flows and balance sheet in pursuing long-term growth opportunities," commented Brian Cohen, Chief Financial Officer of DigitalOcean.

http://www.digitalocean.com

DigitalOcean Raises $83 Million for Cloud Hosting

Wednesday, July 08, 2015  #cloud, DigitalOcean, NY/NJ, Start-ups  No comments

DigitalOcean, a start-up based in New York City, announced $83 million in Series B funding for its cloud infrastructure for developers of websites and applications.

DigitalOcean offers simple cloud hosting with all servers built on powerful Hex Core machines with dedicated ECC Ram and RAID SSD storage. The company notes that more than 6 million Droplets (cloud servers) have been deployed on DigitalOcean by more than 500,000 developers to date.

The funding round was led by Access Industries, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz.

https://www.digitalocean.com/features/technology/

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Telia Carrier Brings Wholesale Transit to Montreal, Launches New Brand

TeliaSonera International Carrier has shortened its name to Telia Carrier and launched new global branding.

Telia Carrier also announced the establishment of a new presence in Montreal, offering wholesale IP transit, Ethernet and IPX services for carriers, content and cloud providers.  Telia Carrier enables Montreal customers to connect to its AS1299 fiber optic backbone, one of the largest in the world, at the highest speeds available in the region.

http://www.teliacarrier.com/

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Telefónica Mexico Orders 1,000 Ericsson Radio Dots

Telefónica Mexico will deploy more than 1,000 Ericsson Radio Dot Systems will be deployed in shopping malls, airports and commercial buildings in Mexico City to reinforce cellular coverage. The units will support 4G/LTE and 3G/WCDMA indoor coverage.

Eduardo Ricotta, Vice President, Ericsson Latin America, says: "Mexico City is the perfect place for Telefónica's largest deployment of Ericsson Radio Dot System. The city is full of high-rise buildings and millions of people wanting excellent mobile broadband services, which Telefónica can now provide in a cost-efficient way."

http://www.ericsson.com/ourportfolio/products/radio-dot-system

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Ixia Trims Q1 Revenue Outlook

Ixia updated its financial guidance, saying it now expects Q1 revenue to be between $108 million and $111 million, below the company’s previous guidance of $121 million to $126 million. The company currently expects a GAAP loss for the quarter of between $0.03 and $0.05 per diluted share, compared with previous guidance of breakeven to a loss of $0.04 per diluted share. The company currently expects non-GAAP earnings for the quarter to be between $0.05 and $0.08 per diluted share, compared with previous guidance of between $0.10 and $0.14 per diluted share.

"We are disappointed with our first quarter results. Our topline performance was primarily impacted by an unexpected and marked slowdown in network test spending from our North America network equipment manufacturer customers in March, and we continued to experience delays in closing network visibility deals," said Bethany Mayer, Ixia’s president and chief executive officer. "Despite these near-term headwinds, we remain confident in our strategy to grow our business and are committed to financial discipline.”

http://www.ixiacom.com/

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Emerson Looks to Spin Out Network Power Division by Q3

Emerson confirmed previously announced plans to spin off its Network Power business into an independent business to be called Vertiv.

Emerson intends to spin off 100 percent of the outstanding common stock of Vertiv through a tax-free distribution to shareholders in a process expected to be substantially complete by September 30, 2016.

Vertiv designs, manufacturer and services mission-critical infrastructure technologies for vital applications in data centers, communication networks and commercial/industrial environments. The company offers a broad range of products in both power and thermal management and provides lifecycle management services and solutions for deploying, maintaining and optimizing these products. In addition, Vertiv provides infrastructure management, monitoring, controls and software solutions for its customers’ critical applications.

Scott Barbour, who has been Executive Vice President of Emerson and Business Leader for Emerson Network Power said, “Our years as part of Emerson have given us a tremendous foundation from which to launch and grow Vertiv as an independent company. Our team is looking forward to the opportunity to concentrate on our core competencies, expand our global customer base, strengthen our industry leading positions, and create value for our future shareholders.”

http://www.emerson.com
.

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Seagate Misses in Q1, Signs of Enterprise Shift to Cloud

Seagate Technology updated its Q1 guidance, saying it now expects to report revenue of approximately $2.6 billion and non-GAAP gross margin of approximately 23% for the fiscal third quarter 2016. The Company expects to report HDD unit shipments of approximately 39 million, representing approximately 40% market share.

Seagate said its weaker than expected performance was driven "primarily by reduced demand for traditional mission critical HDD enterprise products, reduced demand for the company’s systems and silicon products, reduced demand for desktop client products primarily in China, and the company’s decision to not aggressively participate in the low capacity notebook market." A strong point was better than expected demand for 8TB nearline products, reflecting the company’s belief that an increasing level of enterprise applications are shifting to cloud environments.

“We are disappointed that we did not anticipate the weaker demand in the March quarter. There are many complex issues impacting the traditional go to market channels in our market, which are reducing our forecast visibility. Despite the disruption of the shifts in our traditional mission critical HDD business in the near term, we believe the long term benefit of cloud architectures for end users, and the related need for very high capacity drives, is a net positive for Seagate and the HDD industry," said Steve Luczo, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.

http://www.seagate.com

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AT&T Mobility Workers Endorse Contract

AT&T Mobility employees in the company's Southwest Region (CWA District 6) have voted to ratify a four year contract.

The contract covers more than 9,400 Mobility employees represented by the Communications Workers of America in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.

https://www.att.com/

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Facebook's Terragraph Accelerates WiGig for City Access

Facebook took the wraps off of two terrestrial connectivity technologies for fast wireless access.

Terragraph is a 60 GHz, multi-node wireless system for dense urban areas and that uses radios based on the WiGig standard. Facebook said Terragraph will deliver gigabits of data capacity. IPv6-only Terragraph nodes will be placed at 200m intervals. Terragraph will incorporate commercial off-the-shelf components and aim for high-volume, low-cost production. Facebook noted that up to 7 GHz of bandwidth is available in the unlicensed 60 GHz band in many countries.  U.S. regulators are considering expanding this to a total of 14 GHz.

Facebook Terragraph will also leverage an SDN-like cloud compute controller and a new modular routing protocol that Facebook optimized for fast route convergence and failure detection. The architecture also tweaks the MAC layer to solve shortcomings of TCP/IP over a wireless link. The company says the TDMA-TDD MAC layers delivers up to 6x improvement in network efficiency while being more predictable than the existing Wi-Fi/WiGig standard.

Terragraph is already in operation at the Facebook campus in Menlo Park, California, where it delivers 1.05 Gbps bidirectional (2.1 Gbps total throughput per distribution node) in P2P mode, up to 250 meters away. A wider trial is planned for San Jose, California.

Facebook also released details on Project ARIES, a transmission technology that is a) spectrally efficient and allows for higher throughput in even the smallest bandwidths, and b) energy efficient, allowing for extended coverage range.

The proof-of-concept system features a base station with 96 antennas and can support 24 streams simultaneously over the same radio spectrum. Researchers have demonstrated 71 bps/Hz of spectral efficiency. The target is aiming for an unprecedented 100+ bps/Hz of spectral efficiency. Facebook said ARIES is an embodiment of Massive MIMO — by using “spatial multiplexing,” the antenna array at the base station can serve a multiplicity of autonomous user terminals on the same time-frequency resource. This opens up possibilities such as resource sharing as an alternative not only to the need for spectrum licensing.

Facebook already has an ARIES testbed delivering 10x spectral and energy efficiency gains in point to multi-point deployments.

https://code.facebook.com/posts/1072680049445290/

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MEF Sets Ethernet Interconnect Point Agreement for Carriers

The MEF published the Ethernet Interconnect Point (EIP) ENNI Implementation Agreement – MEF 54, which streamlines the interconnection of operator networks to support end-to-end Carrier Ethernet (CE) services.

The IA provides practical guidance so operators can evolve their networks to meet full CE 2.0 E-Access interconnection capabilities. The IA gives operators the steps involved to create these new interconnections either all at once or in a series of steps. The  IA represents the completion of Phase 1 of the MEF EIP project, which includes the most basic interconnection possible: an Ethernet Private Line created using two E-Access EPL services from different operators with an ENNI interconnect between them.  Phase 2 – which currently is in progress – will add test cases with greater complexity and new use cases focused on EVPL and E-Transit (EPL and EVPL). Additional considerations include color awareness, Class of Service, end-to-end service OAM, and LSO (Lifecycle Service Orchestration).

“The purpose of the EIP project is to produce a series of implementation agreements/ guidelines to create a more efficient marketplace of interconnected operators offering standardized CE 2.0 services that interoperate effectively over two or more networks,” said Nan Chen, President of the MEF. “EIP progress is key to future industry growth and innovation because widely deployed and interconnected CE 2.0 networking fabrics will form the foundation upon which to build agile, assured, and orchestrated Third Network services. “More than a dozen MEF member companies participated in Phase 1 of the EIP project that included Rapid Prototype testing at the University of New Hampshire’s Interoperability Lab,” said Chen. “We want to thank these companies for contributing to move the industry forward: AT&T, Verizon, Windstream, CenturyLink, Frontier, TelePacific, Accedian, Alcatel-Lucent (Nokia), Canoga Perkins, Ciena, Cisco, Juniper, RAD, and Veryx Technologies.”

https://www.mef.net/

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NTT: Petahertz Frequency Observed in Gallium Nitride

Researchers at NTT and Tokyo University of Science  observed electronic oscillation (dipole oscillation) with attosecond (as: 10-18 of a second) periodicity using gallium nitride (GaN) wide-bandgap semiconductor. The experiment marks the first time the petahertz frequency barrier has been exceeded with a semiconductor. NTT said this shows the potential of future petahertz signal processing technology based on ordinary wide-bandgap semiconductor devices.

Previously, the maximum operational frequency was in the terahertz (1012 Hz) range, which was limited by the response time of band energy modulation with RF electric fields. To observe the ultrafast electron motion with petahertz frequency, extremely high temporal resolution was required.

http://www.ntt.co.jp/news2016/1604e/160411b.html

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CWA: Verizon Strike is On

Nearly 40,000 Verizon workers from Maine to Virginia, represented by the Communications Workers of America (CWA) and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), went on strike as of Wednesday morning at 6am. The parties have been unable to resolve differences since the last contract expired on August 1st, 2015.

The union cited the following unresolved issues:

• Offshoring Jobs – Verizon has already contracted out work to more than 5,000 employees in the Philippines, Mexico, the Dominican Republican and other overseas locations. These offshore workers handle customer service calls originating in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern states. 
• Outsourcing Work to Low-Wage Contractors – the union is concerned about the amount of outside line work, particularly vital work installing and maintaining telephone poles, that is being assigned to non-union workers.
• Contract for Wireless Workers – namedly, a fair first contract for Verizon Wireless retail workers who formed a union in 2014, and for the 100 wireless technicians who maintain the network in downstate New York.
• Call-Center Closings – hundreds of Verizon workers are at risk of losing their jobs or being forced to commute as much as three hours more each day because of the company's plan to close and consolidate call centers. 
• Out of State Assignments – long assignments of up to two months at a time

http://standuptoverizon.com/

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