MEF releases LSO Sonata APIs for inter-carrier services

MEF released four LSO (Lifecycle Service Orchestration) Sonata API technical specifications and Software Development Kits (SDKs) for inter-provider orchestration of current and emerging MEF 3.0 services (e.g., Carrier Ethernet, IP, SD-WAN, Optical Transport, security, and other virtualized services).

The four LSO Sonata technical specifications related to serviceability, product inventory, quoting, and ordering cover business requirements, use cases, and attributes that serve as the basis for the associated LSO Sonata API SDKs and data models.

Each SDK includes an API developer guide, a Swagger data model, and other artifacts that enable a developer to rapidly build out these Sonata LSO APIs within their business systems. The four LSO Sonata SDKs currently available on the MEF public GitHub allow service providers and business system vendors to start developing their use of the LSO Sonata APIs for serviceability, product inventory, quoting, and ordering.

MEF notes that more than 40 service and technology companies have contributed to or supported the MEF LSO Sonata standardization and certification effort, participated in MEF 3.0 LSO Sonata implementation work, and/or participated in the LSO Sonata-related PoCs at MEF18.

“The LSO Sonata Developer Release celebrated this week at MEF18 involves technical specifications and SDKs with the progression towards standardization related to serviceability, product inventory, quoting, and ordering APIs,” said Nan Chen, President, MEF. “We are delighted to advance the LSO Sonata API standardization with an eye toward production deployments for inter-provider orchestration of MEF 3.0 Carrier Ethernet services starting in early 2019. We appreciate the dedication of key contributors who have been working hard to meet aggressive development targets. Further advancements to the set of LSO Sonata APIs will include support for the full range of MEF 3.0 services without changing the basic API structure itself thanks to the polymorphic approach used in collaboration with ONAP and TM Forum.”

In addition, the MEF 3.0 certification program for service providers and technology solution providers will be expanded on a pilot basis in 1Q 2019 to include cloud-based testing of LSO APIs, beginning with certification of LSO Sonata APIs for serviceability, product inventory, quoting, and ordering.

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MEF circulates SD-WAN Service draft specification

MEF completed a draft technical specification that defines an SD-WAN service and its various attributes. The draft spec is circulating among MEF members. A complete MEF 3.0 SD-WAN Service Attributes and Service Definition standard is expected in 1Q 2019.

SD-WAN service standardization will enable a wide range of ecosystem stakeholders to use the same terminology when buying, selling, assessing, deploying, and delivering SD-WAN services. The SD-WAN service definition is a foundational step for accelerating sales, market adoption, and certification of MEF 3.0 SD-WAN services orchestrated across a global ecosystem of automated networks.

“MEF’s groundbreaking work in standardizing an SD-WAN service addresses one of the biggest obstacles impacting SD-WAN service market growth,” said Nan Chen, President, MEF. “In a recent joint MEF and Vertical Systems Group survey of service providers worldwide, nearly 80% of respondents identified the lack of an industry-standard service definition as a significant challenge for service providers to offer or migrate to SD-WAN services. MEF’s SD-WAN service standardization will undoubtedly accelerate sales of SD-WAN products and services like MEF accomplished with Carrier Ethernet service standardization.”

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Two big announcements at MEF18 - SD-WAN and LSO Sonata API

MEF's mission is to accelerate the adoption of assured services across automated networks. Nan Chen, president of MEF, makes two important announcements:

1. The industry's first SD-WAN service definitions, which provide common terminology for buying, selling and delivering standardized SD-WAN services. Look for these in Q1 2019.

2. LSO Sonata API - providing the ability to automate MEF services end-to-end globally. A developer release is now available.

https://youtu.be/MnbhmGAu-2A

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Nokia intros WaveSuite software for Optical Transport Services

Nokia introduced its WaveSuite software for optimizing and virtualizing the optical networks of service providers, wholesalers, and large enterprises.

Nokia describes WaveSuite as a new breed of intelligent software applications driven by real-world use cases.

Nokia’s WaveSuite applications are organized into three categories:

WaveSuite Node Automation: an approach to streamline service supporting equipment, leading to faster deployment, task automation and faster time to revenue

WaveSuite Service Enablement: virtualizes network infrastructure, enabling the support of new customers and new market channels

WaveSuite Network Insight: provides real-time network intelligence and contextual analysis to ensure networks are running at their maximum potential

WaveSuite complements Nokia’s Network Services Platform carrier SDN solution and its FlowOne OSS by providing enhanced services orchestration and operational tools for the optical networking domain. Support for open northbound and southbound interfaces ensure its functionality in multi-vendor environments.

Sam Bucci, head of optical networks for Nokia, said: “As part of Nokia’s already rich portfolio of network software, WaveSuite applications provide the tools operators need to accelerate their business transformation. These innovations are the result of years of working closely with our customers to address all aspects of optical networking with open applications enhancing not just operations, but opening up new services and business models.

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Ciena launches cloud-based analytics-as-a-service

Ciena is launching a cloud-based analytics-as-a-service offering to help network providers translate network performance data into actionable insights.

Ciena said its Insights Service, which builds on its existing consulting practice, consolidates a wide array of analytics-based capabilities into a single, multi-tiered service offering designed to ensure networks are securely “fit for flexibility” today and into the future.

The offer is available in three tiers of service and through a subscription-based model. Highlights:

• Discover: gives network operations personnel greater visibility into network assets, service availability, network health, and areas of risk.
• Analyze: uses machine learning capabilities to process trend information to create actionable insights for network optimization.
• Predict: helps network operators head off issues before they occur to prevent customer churn or costly outages and preemptively determines the best direction for optimizing and transforming the network to further improve network availability, customer satisfaction, lower operational costs and more.

“Our holistic analytics approach enables a smooth transition path for network providers to evolve toward building more adaptive networks. Each customer’s analytics needs are unique in this journey. We’ve designed our Analytics portfolio so customers can easily choose and deploy the analytics services and/or software applications that best meet their needs today, while gaining the flexibility to add capabilities as their analytics strategy evolves,” stated Ricardo Warfield, Vice President of Global Services, Ciena.

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NTT DATA acquires Canada's Sierra Systems for IT consulting

NTT DATA Services, the global technology services arm of the NTT Group, agreed to acquire Sierra Systems Group, Inc., the Canadian subsidiary of The Sierra-Cedar Group, Inc. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, Sierra Systems is a leading IT services and consulting firm offering a full range of IT consulting, systems integration, and application managed services across Canada.

In addition to industry and geographical expansion, Sierra Systems will expand NTT DATA’s digital services capabilities and bolster its talent in core areas, such as Microsoft Dynamics, Oracle and ServiceNow. Through its global capabilities and strength in infrastructure, application and digital services, NTT DATA will bring a broader portfolio of services to Sierra Systems’ existing clients as well as other Canadian companies.

“Sierra Systems’ reputation as a trusted advisor in Canada is evidenced by the strength of their client relationships, many of which have spanned decades,” said Bob Pryor, CEO, NTT DATA Services. “With the addition of Sierra Systems’ talented team, we’ll expand our ability to deliver innovation and business outcomes to clients in Canada and extend our North American delivery capabilities. Growth prospects are very strong in Canada, so this is an attractive market as we continue to grow globally.”

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Deutsche Telekom approves Sprint+T-Mobile deal

T-Mobile received a written consent of Deutsche Telekom Holding B.V., holder of approximately 63.5% of T-Mobile Common Stock, in favor of the Sprint transaction.

Regulatory approvals are still pending. T-Mobile expects the deal will be completed in the first half of 2019.

“This is another step forward in creating the New T-Mobile, so we can deliver on our promise to bring robust competition to the 5G era, giving consumers more for less and creating jobs,” said John Legere, Chief Executive Officer of T-Mobile. “For more than five years, T-Mobile’s Un-carrier strategy has disrupted the wireless industry, and together with Sprint we will continue our mission by securing U.S. leadership in nationwide 5G, creating a real alternative to fixed broadband and bringing a consumer-first mentality to entrenched giants. We can’t wait to continue improving the wireless industry for all consumers as the New T-Mobile.”

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A10 Networks posts Q3 sales of $60 million, better than expectations

A10 Networks reported Q3 2018 revenue of $60.5 million, compared with $62.0 million in third quarter 2017. GAAP gross margin of 78.5 percent, non-GAAP gross margin of 78.8 percent. There was a GAAP net loss of $1.8 million, or $0.02 per share, non-GAAP net income of $2.3 million, or $0.03 per share.

“We delivered a solid third quarter achieving revenue of $60.5 million, which exceeded the high-end of our guidance range. In the quarter, we continued to execute on our initiatives to transform our sales team, sharpen our focus on execution and expand our advanced suite of 5G, security and cloud solutions, and we are pleased with the initial results of our efforts,” said Lee Chen, president and chief executive officer of A10 Networks.

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CyrusOne reports continued growth in data center colocation

CyrusOne reported revenue was $206.6 million for the third quarter, compared to $175.3 million for the same period in 2017, an increase of 18%. The increase in revenue was driven primarily by a 26% increase in occupied CSF and additional interconnection services.

Net loss was $(42.4) million for the third quarter, compared to net loss of $(55.1) million in the same period in 2017. Net loss for the third quarter included a $(36.6) million unrealized loss on the company’s equity investment in GDS Holdings Limited (“GDS”), a leading data center provider in China, due to a decrease in GDS’s share price during the quarter.

Some highlights:

• Leased 15 megawatts (“MW”) and 114,000 colocation square feet (“CSF”) in the third quarter, totaling $27 million in annualized GAAP revenue
• Backlog of $89 million in annualized GAAP revenue as of the end of the third quarter, representing nearly $850 million in total contract value
• Closed acquisition of Zenium, establishing a presence in London and Frankfurt, the two largest data center markets in Europe
• Acquired 15 acres of land in Santa Clara, California, establishing a presence in a key West Coast market with an onsite power cogeneration facility
• Also acquired 40 acres of land in Northern Virginia (in addition to previously announced acquisition of 154,000 square foot powered shell) and 24 acres of land in Dallas to support continued strong growth in these markets
• Added seven Fortune 1000 companies as new customers (three through third quarter leasing, four through the acquisition), increasing the total number of Fortune 1000 customers to 208 as of the end of the quarter
• Raised nearly $400 million in net proceeds through a common stock offering of 6.7 million shares in late September and entered into a forward sale agreement with respect to an additional 2.5 million shares resulting in estimated net proceeds of nearly $150 million upon settlement by September 15, 2019

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MEF18 is underway this week in Los Angeles

Kevin Vachon, COO of MEF, previews the workshops, the LSO hackathon, an enterprise WAN session, and Proof-of-Concept demonstrations underway this week in Los Angeles.

https://youtu.be/L1tNS_-NZMY

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Telia Carrier tests 600G wavelengths with Infinera

Telia Carrier achieved real-time transmission of 600 Gbps wavelengths in its live production network from Palo Alto to San Francisco using Infinera’s FlexILS flexible grid open line system.

Infinera said this milestone was achieved with the latest generation of the Infinera Infinite Capacity Engine, ICE5, demonstrating its continued rapid cadence in the development of vertically integrated optical engines with industry-leading optical performance and economics.

The ICE5 600G technology, including 64 QAM (quadrature amplitude modulation) and 69 gigabaud operation, also sets the foundation for the next generation, ICE6, which is on track to deliver 800G. Infinera plans to deliver commercial products capable of 600G per wavelength in early 2019.

“We are pleased to partner with Infinera to yet again demonstrate industry-leading innovation,” said Mattias Fridström, Chief Evangelist at Telia Carrier. “Working together, our companies have a strong history of optical performance leadership, stretching back to the world’s first terabit super-channel trial almost seven years ago. Infinera’s 600G technology can be readily deployed across our existing FlexILS networks, helping us to increase fiber capacity while satisfying our customers’ growing capacity requirements.”

“Infinera continues to deliver optical engine innovation on a rapid cadence,” said Parthi Kandappan, Chief Technical Officer at Infinera. “Our ICE4 optical engines are delivering industry-leading performance in deployed networks from metro data center interconnect to subsea, and this 600G trial  showcases the next step function in ICE performance, leading toward 800G wavelengths and beyond in the future.”

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Fujitsu unveils MicroApplications Practice for network operators

Fujitsu Network Communications is launching a MicroApplications Practice to help network operators transform their software approach, allowing faster and more cost-effective solutions for networking challenges.

The idea is to help network operators to evolve from monolithic software stacks to container-based, modular pieces of code based on microservices architecture.

This agile approach allows flexible, automated applications to be developed for specific functions and deployed quickly, reducing time to market and increasing scalability across the cloud on a global level, while using fewer hardware resources for greater cost-efficiency. Fujitsu said its MicroApplications Practice leverages the benefits of microservices architecture with a collaborative approach for developing applications tailored to a provider’s unique needs. In some cases, a single microservice is sufficient to address a particular need. For other circumstances, a more robust MicroApplication is required.

Key Elements:

Microservices — Fujitsu microservices are standalone, container-based, single-function software modules designed to speed development cycles to meet today’s networking challenges. Each service is developed, tested and scaled independently to optimize its performance.

MicroApplications — MicroApplications are pre-packaged microservices, bundled with workflow automation and application programming interface (API) integration tailored to a customer’s ecosystem. Fujitsu MicroApplications also include a user interface to address the functions required to administer the solution. 

Warrior Framework — Fujitsu’s open-source automation framework enables the flexible development and deployment of MicroApplications. In addition to a basic framework for administration and configuration of applications, it includes an extensive library of pre-developed scripts to speed development, as well as a robust set of networking protocol support.

Network Services — Fujitsu offers a full suite of services for MicroApplications, including design and build, multivendor integration, deployment, and maintenance and support, using a consultative approach to develop the use cases and define the requirements. After deployment, Fujitsu provides software configuration and lifecycle management services as well as technical support and NOC services.

"Through the power of collaboration and advanced, open-source digital technologies, Fujitsu delivers the most effective MicroApplications solutions for each unique customer challenge," said Rod Naphan, chief technology officer at Fujitsu Network Communications, Inc. "Our MicroApplications Practice provides network operators a simplified path to more efficient network operations and increased service agility."

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NTT improves GPS Time Synchronization

NTT and FURUNO ELECTRIC CO. have developed a receiver for GPS and other global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) that significantly improves time-synchronization accuracy in areas with severe reception conditions such as among buildings and in mountainous areas.

NTT said its new satellite signal selection algorithm and a time synchronization GNSS receiver from FURUNO makes it possible to use multi-path satellite signals (reflected or diffracted from buildings and other structures), which previously inhibited accuracy of time synchronization. In a real multi-path reception test environment, time error was reduced to approximately 1/5 of earlier values. This is a remarkable result in that it promises to enable time synchronization accuracy close to that obtained in open-sky reception environments with no obstructions, even in environments previously considered poor and unsuitable for accurate time synchronization, such as among buildings or in mountainous areas.

FURUNO plans to begin sales of their new GF-88 series time synchronization GNSS receivers incorporating this new technology in April of 2019. Potential applications include  4G/5G mobile base stations, financial trading, power grids, and data centers.

http://www.ntt.co.jp/news2018/1810e/181023a.html

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Trend Micro and NTT DOCOMO collaborate on 5G security

Trend Micro announced a partnership with NTT DOCOMO to develop a new solution for the demands of the 5G era built upon the recently announced Trend Micro Virtual Network Function Suite (VNFS) on NTT DOCOMO’s “docomo 5G open cloud.”

Specifically, this solution works together when the Trend Micro VNFS executes on “docomo 5G open cloud.” Then the security threats hidden in traffic of various services executed on the cloud are visualized, detected, and ultimately blocked by Trend Micro. This provides a secure 5G environment to users and protects against IoT devices that don’t incorporate additional security.

The “docomo 5G open cloud” is a 5G technology verification environment provided to business partners for the purpose of creating a new solution in the 5G era. Trend Micro VNFS is the network security solution that implements network security functions on virtualized environments such as NFV and cloud, and can dynamically apply the necessary security functions for each IoT device.

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Fujitsu and Ericsson enter 5G partnership

Fujitsu and Ericsson announced a partnership to deliver end-to-end 5G network solutions and related services initially in Japan and later expanding globally.

The two companies said they will join forces to develop this based on their combined portfolios – spanning radio access and core network – for the dynamic 5G market in Japan, connecting communications service providers to the global 5G ecosystem.

Tango Matsumoto, Executive Vice President, Head of Network Business Group at Fujitsu, says: "Through this partnership with Ericsson, we will provide flexible 5G network systems that are open and standard compliant, and will leverage our expertise in wireless technologies and network integration to a wide range of customers in and outside of Japan. From mobile broadband, expected to be the first widespread use case of 5G, to the Internet of Things (IoT) and beyond, this partnership holds out the promise of exciting new business opportunities."

Fredrik Jejdling, Executive Vice President and Head of Business Area Networks at Ericsson says: “Our global expertise in 5G combined with our understanding of the local market puts us in an excellent position to support the introduction of 5G in Japan. By working closely with operators and partners, we are creating solutions that will bring successful use cases and applications to the market. With Fujitsu we get an excellent partner to accelerate this development.”

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Accedian intros service analytics

Accedian introduced its service analytics solution, SkyLIGHT DataHUB IQ, for providing network and IT operations teams a single, unified view of how their network is behaving and how subscribers are experiencing the network, enabling the prioritization of the most severe customer-impacting issues for immediate resolution.

Accedian said its software can provide full stack views into service availability and performance—in real time and in context. DataHUB IQ combines and correlates highly granular active and passive monitoring metrics from the SkyLIGHT portfolio with network data from other vendors and sources. Machine learning capabilities are used to detect anomalies from baseline performance, to provide insight into network behavior and issues, and to predict future network issues before they occur. This real-time, contextual insight can be used to automate the performance of virtual and hybrid networks, particularly for closed-loop automation and self-healing networks.

DataHUB IQ provides a unified view of the behavior and performance of a network, the services running on it, and the quality customers are truly experiencing. It ensures that network and IT operations teams save time and costs to obtain performance insight, to reduce resources consumed by multiple reporting tools, and to increase the effectiveness of closed-loop automation and self-healing.

“The move towards cloud networks and architectures puts immense strain on those tasked with managing their performance,” said Patrick Ostiguy, Founder, President and CEO of Accedian. “SkyLIGHT DataHUB IQ provides a ‘single pane of glass’ through which network and IT operations can troubleshoot network and service problems, using machine learning to identify, predict and prevent issues soon to occur. SkyLIGHT DataHUB IQ will dramatically alter the economics of network and service management going forward.”

Accedian and Colt will take part in a live demonstration of the platform during the Service Assurance Proof of Concept showcase at MEF18. The demonstration will show how SkyLIGHT DataHUB IQ leverages machine learning and artificial intelligence to detect service issues and then dynamically adjust MEF 3.0 service parameters in a closed-loop system—across domains, between vendors, and using open APIs aligned with MEF LSO standards.

http://www.accedian.com/datahubiq

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IBM bets $34 billion on Red Hat as its pathway to multi-cloud

IBM agreed to acquire all of the issued and outstanding common shares of Red Hat for $190.00 per share in cash, representing a total enterprise value of approximately $34 billion.

IBM and Red Hat said that as a combined company tthey will be strongly positioned to address the migration of all businesses to multi-cloud environments in an open and secure way. They estimate that 80% of business workloads have yet to move to the cloud. The merger will draw on their shared leadership in key technologies, such as Linux, containers, Kubernetes, multi-cloud management, and cloud management and automation

IBM  was an early supporter of Linux, collaborating with Red Hat to help develop and grow enterprise-grade Linux and more recently to bring enterprise Kubernetes and hybrid cloud solutions to customers.

IBM said it will remain committed to Red Hat’s open governance, open source contributions, participation in the open source community and development model, and fostering its widespread developer ecosystem. It also promises to build and enhance Red Hat partnerships, including those with major cloud providers, such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, Alibaba and more, in addition to the IBM Cloud.

“The acquisition of Red Hat is a game-changer. It changes everything about the cloud market,” said Ginni Rometty, IBM Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer. “IBM will become the world’s #1 hybrid cloud provider, offering companies the only open cloud solution that will unlock the full value of the cloud for their businesses.

“Open source is the default choice for modern IT solutions, and I’m incredibly proud of the role Red Hat has played in making that a reality in the enterprise,” said Jim Whitehurst, President and CEO, Red Hat. “Joining forces with IBM will provide us with a greater level of scale, resources and capabilities to accelerate the impact of open source as the basis for digital transformation and bring Red Hat to an even wider audience – all while preserving our unique culture and unwavering commitment to open source innovation.”

https://www.redhat.com

Red Hat continues to grow at double digit clip - up 14% in Q2

Wednesday, September 19, 2018  Red Hat  

Red Hat reported revenue of $823 million, up 14% in USD year-over-year, for its second quarter of fiscal year 2019 ended August 31, 2018. GAAP operating income for the quarter was $135 million. Non-GAAP operating income for the second quarter was $197 million, up 3% year-over-year. For the second quarter, GAAP operating margin was 16.4% and non-GAAP operating margin was 23.9%.

“Our second quarter results were consistent with our guidance and we drove 20% growth in total backlog to $3.3 billion,” said Eric Shander, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer for Red Hat. “

• Subscription revenue from Infrastructure-related offerings for the quarter was $527 million, an increase of 8% in USD year-over-year, or 8% measured in constant currency. 
• Subscription revenue from Application Development-related and other emerging technology offerings for the quarter was $196 million, an increase of 31% in USD year-over-year, or 31% measured in constant currency.

Red Hat OpenStack Platform 13 containerizes all OpenStack services

Monday, May 21, 2018  Redhat  

Red Hat OpenStack Platform 13, the newest version of Red Hat’s cloud Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) solution provides the capability to containerize all OpenStack services, including networking and storage, for the first time in a Red Hat OpenStack offering.

Some key features of Red Hat OpenStack Platform 13:

• Red Hat Ceph Storage for massively scalable, integrated storage, which enables organizations to more quickly provision hundreds of virtual machines from a single snapshot and build a fully-supported storage solution.
• Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform helps Red Hat OpenStack Platform 13 serve as an extensible platform for cloud-native workloads, providing a single architecture that brings the power of Linux containers on Kubernetes orchestration to scalable OpenStack infrastructure.
• Fast Forward upgrades -- gives customers the option to stay on a faster upgrade path and receive new features from the upstream community every six months, or remain on a supported release for a longer period of time. 
• Integration of security related projects such as OpenStack Barbican, providing tenant level lifecycle management of secrets, such as passwords, security certificates and keys. With the introduction of Barbican, encryption related use cases are now available, such as Cinder encrypted volume support, Glance image signing and Swift object encryption. 
• Increased TLS coverage for internal communication flows for services such as VNC, OpenDaylight and Redis. The introduction of these features can enable customers to better comply with security standards such as FedRAMP, SecNumCloud, and other industry specific risk management frameworks.

IBM to adopt Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform for all its software

Tuesday, May 08, 2018  Containers, IBM, Red Hat  

IBM will extend its private cloud platforms (IBM Cloud Private and IBM Cloud Private for Data) and its middleware offerings to Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform as Red Hat Certified Containers.
The agreement builds on IBM’s recent move to re-engineer its entire software portfolio with containers, including WebSphere, MQ Series and Db2.

The companies said there is growing consensus that container technologies are the best way to move applications across multiple IT footprints, from existing data centers to the public cloud and vice versa.

Under their agreement, enterprise customers will be able to more easily adopt a hybrid cloud strategy with IBM Cloud Private and Red Hat OpenShift serving as the common foundation. This will enable the IBM Cloud Private container platform to provide a single view of all enterprise data.

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5G Americas details 3GPP Release 14, 15, 16

5G Americas, which is an industry trade association, published a 271-page whitepaper detailing the extensive standards work by 3GPP in the development of 5G wireless technology.

Some highlights of Wireless Technology Evolution: Transition from 4G to 5G

3GPP Release 14, which was frozen by mid-2017, produced LTE-Advanced Pro features. It also focused on the study items towards 5G mobile wireless technology and architecture including Cellular Vehicle to Everything (C-V2X) communications.

3GPP Release 15, the first phase of normative specifications for 5G, provided specifications for a wider range of spectrum bands, from below 6 GHz to millimeter (mm) Wave bands up to 100 GHz enabled by a New Radio (NR) access technology.  3GPP Rel-15 Non-Standalone 5G New Radio (NSA 5G NR) specifications were completed in December 2017. The 5G NSA specifications have an LTE anchor for the control plane communications with a 5G NR cell to boost user data. The Rel-15 Standalone 5G NR specification will work without any reliance on LTE and those specifications were completed in June 2018 along with specifications of the new core network. The new core network specified in Rel-15 will provide interaction with the Evolved Packet Core (EPC) 4G system with orchestration, virtualization, a clearly separate control and user plane, and signaling architecture. Network slicing and Service Level Agreement (SLA) for groups of devices of new vertical industries and services will be provided for by the 5G core specification.

3GPP Release 16 definition of work study items was completed on schedule in July 2018. Release 16, described as phase 2 of 5G, will primarily address any outstanding issues in Rel-15, expansion of 5G NR based on C-V2X capabilities, Industrial Internet of Things (IoT), enhancements to Ultra-Reliable Low Latency Communication (URLLC), and 5G in operation in unlicensed spectrum and above 52.6 GHz. 5G efficiency improvements in Rel-16 will include enhancements to 5G Self-Organizing Networks (SON) and Big Data capabilities, MIMO enhancements, improved power consumption, support for device capabilities exchange, and a study of support for non-orthogonal multiple-access (NOMA). The Release 16 standards will be completed before the end of 2019 to target the ITU IMT-2020 submission.

Michael Recchione, Principle Engineer, Mobility CTO Group, Cisco and leader of the 5G Americas working group, explained, "We are looking upon a newly defined era in mobile technology. 3GPP Release 15 marks the start of that new 5G era, the new horizon technology enablers for the Internet of Things, autonomous vehicles and ultra-reliable low latency communications that will enable connectivity previously unimaginable."

The full 271-page whitepaper is here:
http://www.5gamericas.org/files/8015/4024/0611/3GPP_Rel_14-16_10.22-final_for_upload.pdf

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AT&T previews NETGEAR Nighthawk 5G Mobile Hotspot over mmWave

AT&T took another step toward 5G with completion of the first millimeter wave mobile 5G browsing session.

The test used NETGEAR Nighthawk 5G Mobile Hotspot and was occurred in Waco, Texas over network infrastructure from Ericsson. This is the first standards-based mobile 5G device in the world able to access a live millimeter wave 5G network.

“This proves we are well on our way to the promise of mobile 5G for consumers,” stated David Christopher, president, AT&T Mobility and Entertainment.

AT&T plans to launch 5G in at least 12 cities this year and 19 cities in early 2019.

http://att.com/5Gnews

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Broadcom confirms mass production of 12.8 Tbps Tomahawk 3 Switch

Broadcom's StrataXGS Tomahawk 3 switch series is now in mass production.

The Tomahawk 3 series supports high-density, line-rate 400GbE, 200GbE, 100GbE, and 50GbE interconnect for massive scale-out of software-defined cloud data centers. The Tomahawk 3 switch series features multiple devices at 12.8Tbps, 8.0 Tbps, and 6.4 Tbps based on the industry’s most performant 50G PAM4 / 25G NRZ SerDes technology. All devices in the series have completed extensive functional, performance, and reliability testing and have been qualified for volume production.

“We are delighted and humbled by the widespread adoption of Tomahawk 3 based switching solutions in cloud infrastructure,” said Ram Velaga, senior vice president and general manager, Switch Products at Broadcom. “Our engineering team has executed to the demands of the largest cloud operators globally, including the most rigorous system and network-level qualification requirements – both in our labs and in customer testbeds. Network operators are able to immediately deploy Tomahawk 3 based fabrics, at scale, and with confidence.”

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