In Memoriam: Sir Charles Kuen Kao, 1933-2018, Pioneer of Fiber Optics

Sir Charles Kuen Kao, recipient of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics, passed away on September 23rd in Hong Kong.

Dr. Kao, who was often called the "Father of Fibre Optics", is credited with breakthrough research in the realization of fiber optics as a telecommunications medium in the 1960s while at Standard Telecommunication Laboratories (STL) based in Harlow, UK. He earned his Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 1965 from University College London.

Over his career, Dr. Kao published more than 100 papers and was granted over 30 patents. He was the founder of the Department of Electronics at Chinese University of Hong Kong and later became vice chancellor of the university. In 2010, he was awarded the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (KBE).

IEEE posted the following tribute to Dr. Kao
https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/tech-history/cyberspace/remembering-the-remarkable-feat-of-charles-kao

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FCC eases regulatory barriers for small cells and 5G infrastructure

The FCC adopted an order aimed at removing regulatory barriers that inhibit the deployment of infrastructure necessary for 5G and other advanced wireless services.

In a Declaratory Ruling, the FCC focuses primarily on local fees for the authorizations necessary to deploy small wireless facilities.  Specifically, the Declaratory Ruling concludes that state and local governments may not charge fees that "are greater than a reasonable approximation of objectively reasonable costs for processing applications and for managing deployments in the rights-of-way." The ruling sets specific fee levels for small wireless facility deployments that presumably comply with the relevant standard; and provides guidance on when certain state and local non-fee requirements that are allowed, such as aesthetic and undergrounding requirements—may constitute an effective prohibition of service.

The second part of the FCC's decision establishes two new shot clocks for small wireless facilities (60 days for collocation on preexisting structures and 90 days for new builds); and codifies the existing 90 and 150 day shot clocks for wireless facility deployments that do not qualify as small cells that were established in 2009.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai stated "To be sure, there are some local governments that don’t like this Order.  They would like to continue extracting as much money as possible in fees from the private sector and forcing companies to navigate a maze of regulatory hurdles in order to deploy wireless infrastructure.  But these actions are not only unlawful, they’re also short-sighted.  They slow the construction of 5G networks and will delay if not prevent the benefits of 5G from reaching American consumers.  And let’s also be clear about one thing:  When you raise the cost of deploying wireless infrastructure, it is those who live in areas where the investment case is the most marginal—rural areas or lower-income urban areas—who are most at risk of losing out.  And I don’t want 5G to widen the digital divide; I want 5G to help close that divide."

Dissenting, in part, FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel writes: "Instead of working with our state and local partners to speed the way to 5G deployment, we cut them out.  We tell them that going forward Washington will make choices for them—about which fees are permissible and which are not, about what aesthetic choices are viable and which are not, with complete disregard for the fact that these infrastructure decisions do not work the same in New York, New York and New York, Iowa.  So it comes down to this: three unelected officials on this dais are telling state and local leaders all across the country what they can and cannot do in their own backyards.  This is extraordinary federal overreach."

http://www.fcc.gov

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Ericsson and Telstra complete 100-km NB-IoT connection

Ericsson and Telstra announced a technical milestone for extending IoT over long distances.

The companies have deployed and tested Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) data connections up to 100km from a base-station in Telstra’s commercial network — the longest-range NB-IoT connection of its kind.

Telstra said this helps extend its LTE footprint in rural and regional Australia.

Ericsson notes the achievement extends the 3GPP standards-based limit from around 40km out to 100km and is activated entirely through software upgrades, with no changes required to NB-IoT devices.

Telstra launched Cat M1 coverage in 2017 over an approximate three million square kilometers before deploying NB-IoT technology in its IoT network in January 2018. With this new capability, Telstra’s NB-IoT coverage increases to more than three and a half million square kilometers and will provide enhanced accessibility and reliability.

Channa Seneviratne, Telstra’s Executive Director, Network and Infrastructure Engineering, says: “Telstra already had Australia’s largest IoT coverage with Cat M1 across our 4G metro, regional and rural coverage footprint. With this NB-IoT extended range feature, we have now extended our coverage to more than three and a half million square kilometers, delivering our customers the best IoT coverage and capability in the country. Once again Telstra, working closely in partnership with Ericsson, has delivered innovation that ensures the benefits of IoT technology can be enjoyed by the largest number of Australians, not just those in the cities and towns.”

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ECOC 2018: Cisco shows 400 Gigabit Ethernet Nexus switch

At ECOC 2018. as part of the 100G Lambda multisource agreement (MSA) interoperability demonstration, Cisco demonstrated Nexus 32-port 100 GbE & 400 GbE 1RU switches populated with modules from various manufacturers.

In a blog post, Cisco's Mark Nowell writes "It is very exciting that 400 GbE is now becoming available for testing, deployment, and adoption by network operators, paving the way for Terabit Scale Ethernet being a mainstream technology. There will be many more announcements in the future but it is important to mark this key milestone!"

https://blogs.cisco.com/datacenter/cisco-makes-terabit-scale-ethernet-networking-a-reality-with-400-gbe-technology

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ECOC 2018: EXFO reveals open transceiver system for testing 400G and up

At ECOC 2018, EXFO unveiled a new 400G test module featuring its Open Transceiver System (OTS), which is a modular design concept that enables compatibility between current or future high-speed transceivers and EXFO's test platforms (lab and field).

EXFO said inserts to test specific transceiver types, including those used in 400G systems (e.g., QSFP-DD, OSFP, COBO, and CFP8), eliminate the need to replace entire testing modules and can be interchanged directly in the lab, out in the field or on the production floor. The OTS debuts on the new FTBx-88460 Power Blazer: a compact testing solution that supports all of today's latest high-speed ecosystem technologies (400G, FlexE and OTUCn/FlexO) and transceivers on a single module.

"We are proud of our position at the core of the 400G ecosystem—demonstrated by our participation alongside key industry partners in important interoperability events at ECOC," said Stéphane Chabot, EXFO's Vice President, Test and Measurement. "These activities, strategic relationships and new innovations contribute to our goal of delivering smart solutions that help our customers get the most from their testing investments while staying ahead of the 400G curve."

"Xilinx is pleased to partner with the EXFO team in a FlexE (Flex Ethernet) interoperability demonstration taking place during ECOC 2018. The Xilinx leadership FlexE solution combined with the EXFO test platform leadership clearly show that the FlexE and 400G ecosystem is mature and ready for production. FlexE is becoming an increasingly important component of the network evolution. Proven interoperability between Xilinx's leading FPGA, FlexE IP and design platform and EXFO's test and measurement products provide confidence to our customer base", said Farhad Shafai, Vice President Communications Markets, Xilinx.

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ECOC 2018: Sicoya shows 100G Embedded Optical Module, 400G DR4

At ECOC 2018, Sicoya held private demonstrations of one chip 100G solutions based on its SETR-CDR-E100 Silicon Photonic Engine, which integrates CDRs, TIAs, drivers, modulators, and PINs. The engine enables QSFP28 transceivers using chip on board assembly technology or embedded optical modules utilizing Sicoya's optical ASIC packaging solution.

Highlights:

• a 100G Embedded Optical Module (EOM) that comes in a 20x20mm BGA ASIC package. The EOM can be soldered to the main board and is optically pluggable utilizing Sicoyas optical connector system. 
• sampling of the SETR-E400 monolithically integrated Silicon Photonic 400G DR4 engine along with the SIGT-I200 400Gb/s PAM4 Gearbox starts in Q4 2018 to selected partners.

http://sicoya.com/

• Sicoya, founded in January 2015, is a spin-off from TU Berlin based on continuous R&D in Silicon Photonics since 2007.

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ECOC 2018: ColorChip shows 40-400G optical transceivers

At ECOC 2018, ColorChip showcased its portfolion of optical transceivers ranging from 40 to 400G.

During the exhibition, ColorChip demonstrated a new family of 100G-400G PAM4 optical transceivers, including 100G Single-Lambda PAM4 QSFP28, 200G FR4 (2km) and LR4 (10km) QSFP56 and 400G QSFP56-DD DR4/FR4 transceivers, built with power efficient uncooled DML/EML-based CWDM4 optical engines.

ColorChip's CEO, Yigal Ezra, commented: "Today we are proud to announce the availability of 200G QSFP56 FR4 beta samples and expect to have 400G DR4/FR4 samples available in Q4, proving once again our commitment to spearhead innovative optical interconnect solutions that will further advance a truly connected world".

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ECOC 2018: MaxLinear intros 400 Gbps DR4 Optical Modules, 100G transceiver/driver

At ECOC 2018, MaxLinear introduced a 100 Gbps transceiver with integrated driver.

MaxLinear’s new MxL93512 is part of the Telluride family of devices, which are DSP SoCs with integrated electro-absorption modulated laser (EA-EML) drivers for 100 Gbps/400 Gbps optical interconnects. The new device allows optical module vendors to develop a 100 Gbps optical interconnect module in a compact form factor for intra-datacenter applications with a transmission distance up to 2 Kilometers.


The MxL9351x SoCs are suitable for use within QSFP28 module form factors. Two options are currently available: the MxL93512 that integrates an EA-EML driver with 1.8V PP SE swing, and the MxL93513 that offers differential 800mV peak-to-peak swing for non EA-EML-based optics.

Maxlinear said its Telluride family features several operating modes that can connect to multiple generations of switch ASICs (128x25G NRZ, 256x25G NRZ or 256x50G PAM4) enabling 3.2Tbps, 6.4Tbps or 12.8Tbps front panel capacity per data center rack unit. These different operating modes span a variety of optical module form factors such as QSFP28, SFP-DD, QSFP-DD, OSFP and COBO.

MaxLinear also announced support for 400 Gbps breakout mode clocking in its MxL9354x products. The functionality will be on display at the company’s stand (#684) at the European Conference on Optical Communication (ECOC) in Rome taking place from Sept. 24-26, 2018. MaxLinear’s Telluride 400 Gbps PAM4 DSP (MxL9354x), based on 100 Gbps single lambda technology, is enabling development of DR4 and FR4 optical modules for the upcoming hyperscale datacenter transition to 400 Gbps. The initial use case in this transition is expected to be dominated by use of 400 Gbps DR4 modules used in a breakout application. The breakout mode of a 400 Gbps DR4 module requires certain clocking considerations that allow for the four 100 Gbps lanes to be treated as independent 100 Gbps ports and connect to a 100 Gbps DR1 or FR1 module on the other side. The unique clocking architecture of the MxL9354x makes it possible to achieve this requirement seamlessly.

http://www.maxlinear.com

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ECOC 2018: DSFP form factor doubles data rate and density of SFP

A rev 1.0 hardware specification has been released for new DSFP (Dual Small Form-Factor Pluggable) modules -- doubling the data rate and port density of SFP modules in the same footprint.

Whereas SFP has a single electrical lane pair operating at bit and data rates up to 28 Gbps using NRZ and 56 Gbps using PAM4, the new DSFP has two electrical lane pairs, each operating at bit rates up to 26 Gbps using NRZ and 56 Gbps using PAM4, supporting aggregate date rates up to 56 Gbps and 112 Gbps, respectively. DSFP will potentially scale to a per lane bit rate of 112 Gbps using PAM4, supporting aggregate data rate up to 224 Gbps. SFP modules can be plugged into DSFP ports for backwards compatibility.

The spec was developed by the DSFP MSA (Multi-Source Agreement) Group, whose founding members are Amphenol, Finisar, Huawei, Lumentum, Molex, NEC, TE Connectivity, and Yamaichi.

The DSFP Hardware Specification Rev. 1.0 includes complete electrical, mechanical and thermal specifications for module and host card, including connector, cage, power, and hardware I/O. Also included are operating parameters, data rates, protocols, and supported applications.

Work is now underway on the DSFP MIS (Management Interface Specification), which is an abridged version of the CMIS (Common MIS) being developed by the QSFP-DD, OSFP and COBO Advisors Group.

“We are very excited about the introduction of a highly competitive new form factor by the DSFP MSA, which will double interface bandwidth and port density while maintaining compatibility with the existing SFP family of optics,” said Zhoujian Li, President of Research and Development, Wireless Networks, Huawei. “The DSFP form factor is low cost, has excellent high-speed signal integrity, reduces PCB area and is easy to design and manufacture.  It is a great platform that enables 5G deployment and evolution, while fully protecting our customers’ investment.”

“Publication of the DSFP Hardware Specification is part of an industry trend of quickly developing solutions optimized for specific applications. Stringent cost, power and size constraints in demanding market segments, like Mobile infrastructure, leads to solutions focused strictly on required functionality,” commented Chris Cole, Chair of the DSFP MSA Group, and Vice President of Advanced Development, Finisar.

http://www.dsfpmsa.org

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ECOC 2018: Finisar debuts 400G QSFP-DD DR4 transceiver

At ECOC 2018, Finisar is demonstrating several 200G and 400G transceivers, including 400G QSFP-DD DR4, 400G QSFP-DD eLR8 (extended-reach), 200G QSFP56 FR4 and 200G QSFP56 eFR4.

In addition, Finisar is showing the industry’s first 64 Gbaud Integrated Tunable Transmitter and Receiver Assembly (ITTRA) and a new Flextune self-tuning feature for tunable DWDM modules.

Some highlights:

400G QSFP-DD DR4 Transceivers -- a new 400G QSFP-DD DR4 transceiver targets parallel single mode fiber (SMF) links in hyperscale cloud data centers. Finisar is demoing an optical module transmitting data point-to-point over parallel single mode fiber (SMF) using four 100G PAM4 optical lanes, per the IEEE 802.3bs 400GBASE-DR4 standard. These DR4 modules can also be used in break-out applications to four 100G QSFP28 DR transceivers.

400G QSFP-DD eLR8 Transceivers -- Finisar is performing the industry's first public demonstration of a 400G QSFP-DD eLR8 extended-reach transceiver, transmitting data over 30km of duplex SMF. These modules provide a cost-effective option for router-to-router, or router-to-transport interconnections and use a DML-based 8x50G PAM4 optical architecture. This demonstration shows an extension of the technology which is already in production in Finisar’s 400G CFP8 LR8 modules and which has been demonstrated in Finisar’s 400G QSFP-DD LR8 modules over 10km at OFC 2018.

200G QSFP56 FR4 and eFR4 Transceivers -- for hyperscale cloud data centers that require 200G optical connectivity, Finisar is demonstrating both an IEEE Standard-based 200G QSFP56 FR4 module operating over 2km of duplex SMF and an extended-reach eFR4 version operating over 10km of duplex SMF. Both types of modules employ low-cost DML transmitters, providing cost-effective options for both standard and longer reaches.

64 Gbaud ITTRA demonstration-- Finisar is showing 64 Gigabaud Integrated Tunable Transmitter and Receiver Assembly (ITTRA) transmitting and receiving data error-free at 400 Gbps using DP-16QAM modulation. The ITTRA is a complete coherent optics assembly, which integrates a transmitter and a receiver into the smallest 64 Gbaud footprint in the market. It can be integrated into coherent line cards or 400G Digital Coherent Optics (DCO) transceivers, accelerating time to market and decreasing development and manufacturing labor costs due to fewer assembly steps and lower test times. This 64 Gbaud ITTRA product complements the 32 Gbaud ITTRA introduced by Finisar earlier this year at OFC.

Flextune Automatic Wavelength Tuning Feature Demonstration -- Finisar's Flextune is an automatic transceiver wavelength tuning feature which can significantly reduce provisioning time and operating expenses when deploying tunable DWDM transceivers. Using Finisar-patented technology, each transceiver on a DWDM optical link can self-tune to the correct wavelength determined by its physical connection to the passive mux/demux infrastructure, and without intervention by the host system or technicians. Finisar will perform a functional demonstration of Flextune™ on duplex Tunable SFP+ transceivers this week, and the feature is also being implemented on bidirectional Tunable SFP+ as well as on coherent transceivers.

Measurement Capabilities Added to Optical Instrumentation Portfolio -- Finisar's new WaveAnalyzer GUI release 1.8 now supports measurements of the Side Mode Suppression Ratio (SMSR) of lasers, an important performance characteristic for such devices operating in optical communication systems. Also, release 1.8 provides an in-channel Optical Signal to Noise Ratio (OSNR) measurement technique which is important in networks with filter elements like ROADMs.

Finisar -- booth #400

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ECOC 2018: Finisar shows transceivers with Flextune self-tuning

At ECOC 2018, Finisar is demonstrating its new Flextune self-tuning feature for tunable DWDM transceiver modules. 

Finisar says its new Flextune automatic transceiver wavelength tuning feature can significantly reduce provisioning time and operating expenses when deploying tunable DWDM transceivers.  Using Finisar-patented technology, each transceiver on a DWDM optical link can self-tune to the correct wavelength determined by its physical connection to the passive mux/demux infrastructure without intervention by the host system or technicians.

This industry-first feature by Finisar allows up to 96 wavelength-tunable optical transceivers in a network to self-tune their wavelengths and operate over the DWDM infrastructure. Technicians simply insert the tunable DWDM transceivers into any host port on both ends of the link, and connect them to any of the optical mux/demux ports with fiber optic patch cables. Firmware contained in the transceivers determines the proper wavelengths to connect each host port to its remote end of the link, which can reduce provisioning time from hours to minutes. This can result in significant OpEx savings for service providers in DWDM metro and access applications such as mobile front-haul, Remote PHY, and data center interconnections (DCI).

“The Flextune functionality is an example of adding value through real innovation in the transceiver market,” said Vladimir Kozlov, founder and CEO of LightCounting. “Eliminating manual wavelength configuration and patching not only saves cost by minimizing deployment time and human errors, but it also enables DWDM in access topologies like passive front haul where equipment from different vendors can more easily interoperate.”

The Flextune feature is expected to be implemented on Finisar’s duplex and bidirectional Tunable SFP+, as well as on coherent transceivers. Samples are available now.

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ECOC 2018: Source Photonics and Huawei showcase PAM4-based transceivers

At ECOC 2018, Source Photonics is partnering with Huawei in showcasing 50G and 400G optical transceivers based on PAM4 technology.

The companies are participating in the Ethernet Alliance Interoperability Demonstration, which consists of multiple 400G and 50G links among participating network and test equipment manufacturers including Huawei.

Source Photonics said it is working with Huawei in providing operators an environmentally friendly and energy-efficient technology. The companies took the initiative this year in driving the development of optical modules based on 50G PAM4 technology. The PAM4 technology coupled with faster Baud Rates and higher density transceiver types are enabling 400G which is known to be key in migrating to higher speed networks.

“We took the lead worldwide when we successfully demonstrated interoperability of the first 400G QSFP-DD LR8 and 400G CFP8 LR8 transceivers at OFC 2018 in March. Source Photonics continues to take initiative as it collaborates with Huawei in developing IEEE optical standards for 50G PAM4 technology,” said Andy Xiao, PLM.

Source Photonics’ 400G CFP8 supports the IEEE 400GBASE-LR8 optical standard and 400GAUI-16 electrical interface. The module operates from 0°C to 70°C and complies with the CFP8 MSA and allows connections of up to 10km. The 50G LR QSFP28 uses a DML laser with mature TO package as a cost-effective solution for network migration.  This product will be available for purchase this month and will also be key in enabling 5G commercialization and other services requiring higher network bandwidth.

Source Photonics -- booth #416
Ethernet Alliance -- booth #618

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Arista integrates with Microsoft Azure Stack

Arista Networks' Any Cloud software platform is now supported in Microsoft Azure Stack.  This includes the virtualized Arista vEOS Router combined with CloudVision with Cloud Tracer functionality.

Arista's vEOS Router leverages a cloud-grade routing stack and IPsec VPN tunnels to reliably and securely interconnect workloads across multi-cloud deployments. As a virtual network appliance, it runs identically in both Azure Public Cloud and on premises Azure Stack as well as other major cloud platforms. Arista said this approach provides a consistent and familiar operational experience via its industry-standard Command Line Interface (CLI), open APIs, value added-extensions, cloud-grade routing, telemetry, and orchestration tools in both on-premises and public cloud locations as well as across multiple clouds. Arista vEOS Router provides improved scaling and visibility for enterprise customers adopting hybrid cloud deployment architectures with a single-image routing stack.

“Arista has had a long-standing relationship with Microsoft. The combination of Arista EOS with both Azure and Azure stack brings the best of secure connectivity and cloud principles to top enterprises around the world,” said Jeff Raymond, Vice President EOS Software and Services for Arista Networks."

Natalia Mackevicius, Director, Azure Stack, Microsoft Corp. said, “As Microsoft expands the footprint of Microsoft Azure, we are pleased to have Arista Networks join us as an ISV partner with cloud networking platforms now available for Azure Stack in the Azure Marketplace. Since 2010, Arista and Microsoft have collaborated to bring our mutual clients the benefits of Azure and Azure Stack in cloud networking environments.”

Arista vEOS Router includes Arista A-Care support and is sold as a monthly subscription. vEOS Router is available now in the Microsoft Azure Marketplace for Azure Public Cloud and Azure Stack. The complete Any Cloud platform, including CloudVision and vEOS Router is available for most common hypervisors (Linux KVM and VMware ESXi) and for public cloud platforms including Azure, AWS, GCP and other clouds.

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NBN Co doubles national transit network capacity with Coriant CloudWave Optics

Australia's NBN Co. has begun deployment of Coriant CloudWave Optics technology across its 60,000-kilometer transcontinental optical transport backbone network. The network upgrade enables NBN Co to double bandwidth capacity using coherent optical technology that supports per-wavelength transmission rates of 200 Gbps.

Coriant CloudWave Optics is an ultra-compact coherent interface solution that supports software programmable high-speed transmission to lower cost per bit as networks scale.

Coriant said the upgrade to CloudWave Optics will allow NBN Co to increase maximum capacity on its transit network from 9.6 Tbps to 19.2 Tbps per fiber link while reducing capital and operating expense as a result of smaller footprint requirements, reduced power consumption, and greater throughput density. Coriant's technology also supports a seamless upgrade to 400G, as needed. Initial upgrade sites span high-traffic fiber links between Eastern Creek and Asquith in Sydney and the 3,600 km route between Brisbane, Queensland, and Darwin in the Northern Territory.

“Our transit network is the backbone of the nbn™ Multi-Technology Mix that aims to provide Australians with access to fast services,” said Kathrine Dyer, Chief Network Deployment Officer, NBN Co. “This upgrade will ensure we can continue to deliver a reliable and high-quality broadband access network for our wholesale customers even as high-bandwidth applications and the growth of internet usage continue to drive demand for network capacity.”

NBN Co’s backbone network – known as the Transit Network – was originally built using the Coriant hiT 7300 Multi-Haul Transport Transport Platform and spans over 60,000 kilometers of fiber around Australia to connect access nodes to NBN Co’s 121 Points of Interconnect (POI) where traffic is transferred to service providers.

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Keysight intros 5G Base Station manufacturing test solution

Keysight Technologies introduced a compact and scalable 5G base station manufacturing test solution that enables network equipment manufacturers (NEMs) to streamline volume test of 5G New Radio (NR) infrastructure equipment.

The Keysight S9100A 5G multi-band vector transceiver (S9100A) uses common hardware and software platforms (including Keysight's PathWave) which support the latest 3GPP 5G NR Rel. 15.2.0 standards.  It also uses Keysight's new PXIe vector transceiver (VXT) (Keysight M9410A) to provide industry-leading RF performance in a compact modular design, for improved efficiency and scalability in manufacturing test. Keysight's VXT offers wide bandwidth support of up to 1.2 GHz, combined with high-performance mmWave transceiver heads, to deliver Error Vector Magnitude (EVM) and Adjacent Channel Leakage Ratio (ACLR) performance across FR1 and FR2 in a small footprint.

"The introduction of Keysight's 5G base station manufacturing test solution enables network equipment manufacturers around the world to ramp up 5G manufacturing," said Giampaolo Tardioli, vice president of Keysight's Network Access group. "The scalability across sub-6GHz and mmWave frequencies, compact design and superior RF performance of the S9100A, offer users a clear and rapid path from design validation to volume manufacturing."

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Chef integrates its automation tools with Microsoft Azure #msignite

Chef introduced several automation tools to help customers migrate legacy applications onto and manage configuration and compliance of their Microsoft Azure infrastructure.

The company said the integration of its suite of automation tools with Azure gives users the computing power needed to continuously automate infrastructure, applications and compliance across their environments, regardless of their size. This results in increased velocity with reduced risk.

The announcements include:

• Public preview of Chef Automate Managed Service for Azure accelerates organizations’ time-to-value by removing the effort of deploying and managing Chef Automate on their own. This includes full support for Chef Automate 2.0 as a fully-managed service including automatic updates.
• Chef Workstation integration with Azure Cloud Shell provides a quick method for applying configuration changes to users’ systems, regardless of whether they are managed by Chef, and without requiring any pre-installed software -- all within the Azure portal. Access to Chef Workstation in Azure Cloud Shell, coupled with InSpec, lets users run configuration commands and compliance checks on nodes that were previously not managed by Chef for continuous automation across their entire Azure platform.
• Integration of InSpec with Azure’s cloud infrastructure (beta), in combination with Chef Automate 2 compliance profiles for Azure’s CIS Benchmark, gives users the ability to automate compliance audits for all application environments directly from Azure Cloud Shell. Microsoft's newly released Azure Policy Guest Configuration uses InSpec for all Linux VMs that are managed by Azure Policy.

“Chef gives companies the tools they need to confidently migrate to Microsoft Azure so users don’t just move their problems when migrating to the cloud, but have an understanding of the state of their assets before the migration occurs,” said Corey Scobie, senior vice president of products and engineering at Chef. “Being able to detect and correct configuration and security issues to ensure success after migrations gives our customers the power to migrate at the right pace for their organization. Today’s news builds on our long-established collaboration with Microsoft and our commitment to delivering new automation solutions that will help Azure and Azure Stack customers accelerate digital transformation.”

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Lattice Semiconductor pushes ahead with AI software stack for edge

Lattice Semiconductor is boosting the capabilities of its "sensAI" stack designed for machine learning inferencing in consumer and industrial IoT applications.

Specifically, Lattice is releasing new IP cores, reference designs, demos and hardware development kits that provide scalable performance and power for always-on, on-device artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The release includes an updated neural network compiler tool with improved ease-of-use and both Caffe and TensorFlow support for iCE40 UltraPlus FPGAs.

“Flexible, low-power, always-on, on-device AI is increasingly a requirement in edge devices that are battery operated or have thermal constraints. The new features of the sensAI stack are optimized to address this challenge, delivering improved accuracy, scalable performance, and ease-of-use, while still consuming only a few milliwatts of power,” said Deepak Boppana, Senior Director, Product and Segment Marketing, Lattice Semiconductor. “With these enhancements, sensAI solutions can now support a variety of low-power, flexible system architectures for always-on, on-device AI.”

Examples of the architectural choices that sensAI solutions enable include:

• Stand-alone iCE40 UltraPlus / ECP5 FPGA based always-on, integrated solutions, with latency, security, and form factor benefits.
• Solutions utilizing iCE40 UltraPlus as an always-on processor that detects key-phrases or objects, and wakes-up a high performance AP SoC / ASIC for further analytics only when required, reducing overall system power consumption.
• Solutions utilizing the scalable performance/power benefits of ECP5 for neural network acceleration, along with IO flexibility to seamlessly interface to on-board legacy devices including sensors and low-end MCUs for system control.

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Intel adds to portfolio of FPGA programmable acceleration cards

Intel is expanding its line of field programmable gate array (FPGA) acceleration cards with a new model based on its most powerful Stratix 10 SX FPGA.

The card leverages the Acceleration Stack for Intel Xeon CPU with FPGAs, providing data center developers a robust platform to deploy FPGA-based accelerated workloads. Hewlett Packard Enterprise* will be the first OEM to incorporate the Intel PAC with Stratix 10 SX FPGA along with the Intel Acceleration Stack for Intel Xeon Scalable processor with FPGAs into its servers.

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Microsoft rolls out big upgrades to Azure networking

Microsoft announced major upgrades to Azure networking capabilities, including the launch of ExpressRoute 100Gbps Direct, ExpressRoute Global Reach, and the general availability of Azure Virtual WAN.  There are also enhancements to Azure Virtual Networks and DNS. The Azure Networking Fall 2018 update comes as part of the company's #MSIgnite conference underway this week in Orlando, Florida.

Here are the highlights:

Azure ExpressRoute Direct 100Gbps connectivity -- a first for a global cloud provider. ExpressRoute Direct with 100G connectivity provides massive data ingress for scenarios such as telemedicine, content distribution, and IoT. The service allows 100 Gbps of network traffic to be directed at Azure Storage and Azure Virtual Networks. The traffic can be on a single 100G ExpressRoute Circuit or the 100G can be subdivided by the customer's business units in any combination of 40G, 10G, 5G, 2G, and 1G ExpressRoute circuits. Microsoft notes that because ExpressRoute is for mission-critical workloads, ExpressRoute Direct, like ExpressRoute, provides physical connectivity via two physical routers in an active-active configuration.

ExpressRoute Global Reach – allows enterprise customers to connect two ExpressRoute circuits together. This allows sites that are already connected to ExpressRoute to now privately exchange data via their ExpressRoute circuits. Customers can thereby use Microsoft's global network to privately send traffic between their sites, for instance between London and Tokyo if both sites are currently served by ExpressRoute. ExpressRoute Global Reach is available in the following locations: Hong Kong, Ireland, Japan, Netherlands, United Kingdom, and the United States with Korea and Singapore coming soon. As Microsoft adds locations, it becomes more like a global carrier.

Big expansion of the Azure Virtual WAN ecosystem. Microsoft is now recommending that Office 365 customers use local Internet breakouts to get onto Microsoft’s global network as quickly as possible and take advantage of the Office 365 distributed edge node ecosystem. The company has previously announced virtual WAN partnerships with Citrix and Riverbed. This has been expanded to include Virtual WAN solutions from 128 Technology, Barracuda, Check Point, NetFoundry, and Palo Alto. Coming soon Azure will include Virtual WAN solutions from CloudGenix, Nuage Networks, Silver Peak, Versa Networks, and VeloCloud.

New Zone Redundant VPN and ExpressRoute Gateways -- customers are now able to deploy Azure VPN and Azure ExpressRoute gateways in Azure Availability Zones, thus making them physically and logically separate within a region to protect on-premises network connectivity to Azure from zone-level failures.

Enhanced Azure Container Networking Interface (CNI) --a plugin brings Azure Networking capabilities to containers by utilizing the same SDN stack that powers Azure VMs. Containers can now connect to peered VNets and to on-premises over ExpressRoute or site-to-site VPN and access services such as Storage and SQL protected by VNet Service Endpoint. Network Security Group (NSG) and User Defined Routing (UDR) rules can be applied directly to containers. Azure CNI is utilized by the Azure Kubernetes Service.

Azure Firewall enters general availability status -- this GA, offers fully stateful network and application level traffic filtering for VNet resources, with built-in high availability and cloud scalability delivered as a service. Customers can protect their VNets by filtering Outbound, Inbound, Spoke-Spoke, VPN and ExpressRoute traffic.

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ECOC 2018: Intel announces 100G silicon photonics transceivers for 5G

At ECOC 2018, Intel announced new 100G silicon photonics transceivers targetted at 5G wireless fronthaul applications. The new transceivers are designed to meet the harsh outdoor conditions of cellular towers with the capability to support optical transport to the nearest baseband unit or central office (up to 10 km). Commercial availability is expected in Q1 2019.

“Our hyperscale cloud customers are currently using Intel’s 100G silicon photonics transceivers to deliver high-performance data center infrastructure at scale. By extending this technology outside the data center and into 5G infrastructure at the edge of the network, we can provide the same benefits to communications service providers while supporting 5G fronthaul bandwidth needs,” stated Dr. Hong Hou, vice president and general manager of Intel’s Silicon Photonics Product Division.

Intel's first 100G silicon photonics product was introduced in 2016. The company says its 100G data center products are now shipping at a run rate of more than a million units per year.

Intel projects the total market opportunity for its connectivity business, which includes silicon photonics, to grow from $4 billion today to an estimated $11 billion total addressable market by 2022.

From this year's Intel Data Center Innovation Summit in August

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