Korea's SK Telecom and China Unicom Sign Wireless Internet Pact

SK Telecom, the largest wireless carrier in South Korea, will form a joint venture with China Unicom to develop wireless Internet content and services for the Chinese market. Under the deal, SK Telecom will provide the key technology for the venture.
http://www.sktelecom.com

• SK Telecom has a subscriber base of nearly 17 million mobile users. In October 2000 it began to offer a CDMA 2000 commercial service supporting up to 153.6 Kbps data rates. In January 2002, SK Telecom launched the first commercial IMT-2000 (CDMA2000 1X EV-DO) service.

Read More

UTStarcom Announces First IP-DSLAM Contract with China Netcom

UTStarcom was awarded its first IP-DSLAM contract with China Netcom. The deal covers 25,000 lines in the Shandong and Shanxi provinces using UTStarcom's AN-2000 IB platform. The company also announced that it has secured a new contract with China Telecom to deploy an additional 80,000 ADSL lines in the Zhejiang province. The new contracts bring UTStarcom's IP-DSLAM deployments to 200,000 ADSL lines within multiple provinces in China. UTStarcom said it believes China's total broadband market will increase to five to six million ADSL users this year, compared to approximately two million ADSL lines at the end of 2002.
http://www.utstar.com

Read More

AMCC Shows Electronic Compensator for Extending Laser Reach

Applied Micro Circuits Corp. (AMCC) is demonstrating electronic compensation technology in combination with 1310 nm and 1550 nm distributed feedback lasers (DFB) as a viable means for extending link distances to greater than 60 km. AMCC is also showing a Physical Layer (PHY) evaluation system featuring off-the-shelf 10 Gbps, small form factor, pluggable modules (XFP). The PHY with XFP evaluation system verifies the interoperability and performance of AMCC's 10G PHY devices.
http://www.amcc.com

Read More

Phasebridge Shows 10 Gbps Tunable Laser-Modulator Module

Phasebridge, a start-up based in Pasadena, California, will demonstrate a 10Gbps Tunable Integrated Laser Transmitter-Modulator Module at OFC. The module is a chip-scale system-in-packing solution that replaces discretely packaged CW laser, wavelength locker, lithium-niobate modulator, modulator driver-amplifier, and variable optical attenuator (VOA) combinations.
http://www.Phasebridge.com

Read More

NYT: Pentagon Advisor is Also Advising Global Crossing

The New York Times reported that Richard N. Perle, chairman of the influential Defense Policy Board, has been retained by Global Crossing to help overcome Defense Department resistance to its proposed sale to a foreign firm. Perle reportedly is close to many senior officials, including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who appointed him to lead the policy board in 2001.
http://www.nyt.com

Read More

Path1 and Level 3 Complete Transatlantic Video-over-MPLS Transport Trials

Path 1 Network Technologies and Level 3 Communications announced favorable results in a video-over-MPLS transport trial between the US and Europe. The test combined Level 3's Packet Gigabit Ethernet Service and international MPLS network with Path 1 Network's Cx1000 Video-over-IP Gateways to transport 270 Mbps SDI (uncompressed video) and variable bit rate ASI transmissions between the Denver and London. The video traveled on a circuitous route through North America, passing through 12 MPLS switches before reaching London. The video was then looped back to Denver where total transport time was measured at under 0.25 seconds, essentially the speed of light plus a few milliseconds for network switching.
http://www.path1.com

Read More

European Commission Calls for Public WLAN Support

The European Commission approved a recommendation for promoting Wi-Fi public services. The recommendation asks EU member states to subject the use of available radio spectrum to the least onerous authorization system, calls for a policy of technological neutrality; and promotes security and confidentiality of communications across public networks and services. In a latter phase, the European Commission plans to identify radio spectrum issues and harmonize the necessary frequency usage parameters and requirements. This second phase is timed to follow the forthcoming ITU negotiations at the World Radiocommunication Conference 2003 in June, which will seek additional radio spectrum for public WLANs in the 5 GHz band.http://europa.eu.int/

• In February 2003, the European Commission officially adopted a New Regulatory Framework that requires national regulators in EU member states to review and/or adapt policies governing electronic communications by 24 July 2003. The framework covers regulations for fixed and mobile wireless networks, cable television networks, satellite networks, and IP networks, whether used for voice, fax, data or video. Specific directives address unbundled access to the local loop, differentiating between existing metallic loops and new optical builds, while guaranteeing universal service and affordable access for all citizens. The Commission also defines a market for wholesale broadband access, covering “bit-stream�? services and equivalent wholesale services provided over other infrastructures that permit the transmission of broadband data in both directions. http://www.convergedigest.com/regulatory/regulatoryarticle.asp?ID=6405

Read More

Telia Denmark Offers “Youth�? Service with Unlimited SMS

Telia Denmark began offering a "youth" mobile subscription service featuring unlimited SMS service. In addition, the subscription is supplemented by GPRS access to Telia content services such as java games in color, news, TV-guides, and information about concerts and movies. The price of GPRS depends on bandwidth consumption.
http://www.telia.com

Read More

Global Crossing Launches Managed Services

Global Crossing announced new managed services, including pre-sales engineering and CPE design, equipment procurement, provisioning and installation, and network monitoring and management backed by global SLAs. The service also provides ongoing end-to-end CPE and network management and maintenance support for corporate locations around the globe. The Global Crossing Managed Services portfolio will initially include support for Frame Relay, ATM and Internet access services, with continued enhancements planned for additional product offerings, including IP VPN in the second quarter, and voice and video services in the latter half of 2003.
http://www.globalcrossing.com

Read More

Telecom Egypt Awards US$60 Million Contract to Nortel Networks

Telecom Egypt and the Egyptian Ministry of Communications and Information Technology awarded a five year contract valued at up to US$60 million to Nortel Networks for expansion and modernization of Egypt's national telecommunications infrastructure. Key elements of this network expansion are expected to include Nortel Networks Univity CDMA2000 1X Wireless Data Network solutions, Nortel Networks Succession Communication Server 2000 superclass softswitches, and Nortel Networks DMS circuit switches. The company said the Succession Communication Server 2000 superclass softswitches and DMS-100 local switching systems will enable Telecom Egypt to migrate to voice over packet technology at its own pace.
http://www.nortelnetworks.com

• As of October 2001, Telecom Egypt was serving 8.6 million telephone access lines. The country had a teledensity of 10.2%. http://www.telecomegypt.com.eg/english/

Read More

Essex WDM Devices Sold to Telcordia for DoD Optical-CDMA Project

Essex Corporation will supply five of its hyperfine WDM devices to Telcordia Technologies for use in a DARPA project to build an Optical Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) system that would enable secure, multi-user high bandwidth sharing of the same optical channel. Later this year, Essex will team with Telcordia and the University of Central Florida, School of Optics/CREOL on the project. Essex said the primary advantage of O-CDMA would be that a user's connection could be dynamically reconfigured by assignment of a code rather than being dedicated to a WDM channel. Today, WDM channels are statically configured making it difficult and expensive to reconfigure connections between users. Essex's Hyperfine WDM technology has the ability to dynamically encode and decode an optical signal.
http://www.essexcorp.com

Read More

Agility Awarded Multimillion Dollar Government Contract for Tunable Lasers

Agility Communications announced a U.S. government contract for the development of widely tunable lasers with monolithically integrated modulators (EMLs). The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) contract, valued at $5.5 million if fully funded through three phases, is part of the Chip-Scale Wavelength Division Multiplexing program aimed at developing multifunctional photonic chips for WDM networks on military platforms. Agility said DARPA tests of its widely tunable EMLs demonstrated that over a distance of 1,080 kilometers, Agility's 2.5 Gbps EML performed as well as a distributed feedback laser (DFB) with an external lithium niobate modulator.
http://www.agility.com

Read More

Bookham Debuts 20 Gbps Optical Transmitter Using DQPSK

Bookham Technologies described a new design of 20 Gbps optical transmitter with high tolerance to chromatic and polarization-mode distortion and with improved spectral efficiency. The company said the transmitter can double the operating distance on uncompensated SMF28 fiber compared with on/off keying (OOK) at the same bit rate. The new device leverages a new technique of differential quadrature phase-shift keying (DQPSK) and Bookham's GaAS technology. The transmitters can operate at 20 Gbps, providing parallel transmission of two SONET OC-192 data streams on a single optical channel. Bookham said this allows the potential to increase capacity while maintaining a standard 10 Gbps interface. The technology could be used for increasing the capacity of installed, long-haul, point-to-point transmission systems using expensive dispersion managed fiber.
http://www.bookham.com

Read More

Ixia Introduces Significantly Enhanced 40 Gbps BERT

Ixia introduced four new interface modules to its 40 Gigabit Bit Error Rate Testing (BERT) system. The four new modules include a 40 Gbps serial transmitter, a 40 Gbps serial receiver, an advanced 40 Gbps serial transmitter with programmable output amplitude, and an advanced 40 Gbps serial receiver with extended dynamic range capabilities. Each of the four new interface modules is hot-swappable and fully compatible with Ixia's existing 40Gbps BERT Load Module. Ixia said its modular design approach significantly lowers the cost of 40 Gbps test systems.
http://www.ixiacom.com

Read More

Telcordia Releases MPLS LDP and RSVP-TE Protocol Conformance Test Suites

Telcordia Technologies has released MPLS Forum compatible LDP/CR-LDP and RSVP-TE Conformance Test Suites. The release covers the tests specified in the MPLS Forum LDP Conformance Implementation Agreement, and MPLS Forum 3.0. The Telcordia MPLS Conformance Test Suites are available directly from Telcordia, as well as from Spirent Communications and Navtel Communications.
http://www.telcordia.com

Read More

FCC Approves Verizon InterLATA Service for Maryland, West Virginia, DC

The FCC approved Verizon's application to provide in-region, interLATA service originating in Maryland, Washington D.C., and West Virginia. Verizon stated in its application that competitive carriers serve 533,000 lines in Maryland, 193,000 in Washington, and 32,000 lines in West Virginia.
http://www.verizon.com

Read More

FCC's Kevin Martin Applauds Verizon's Broadband Announcement

In response to Verizon's announcement that it will accelerate its broadband rollout, FCC Commissioner Kevin Martin said he is pleased with the pledge and looks forward to working with company as it implements the network upgrades.
http://www.fcc.gov

Read More

Cisco to Acquire Linksys, Enter the Home Networking Business

Cisco Systems will acquire The Linksys Group, one of the leading providers of home networking products, for approximately $500 million in Cisco common stock. Linksys currently offers more than 70 products, including wireless routers and access points for simultaneous sharing of broadband Internet connections, wireless network adapters and wireless print servers as well as traditional wired products such as Ethernet routers and cable modems, unmanaged switches and hubs, print servers and network attached storage for easy sharing of digital music, photo and video media files. Linksys' sales are made through retail, e-commerce, catalog and distributor channels. Linksys claims to be the market leader in worldwide, consumer WLAN sales. Cisco said the deal represents its entry into the high-growth consumer/SOHO networking market. Charles Giancarlo, senior vice president of Switching, Voice and Carrier Systems, said the Linksys WLAN products do not overlap with its Aironet brand because the existing Cisco products are designed for business networks. Cisco plans to continue using the Linksys brand for its existing retail, distributor and e-commerce channels. The company noted that growth in the home networking market has been closely tracking growth in broadband penetration.
http://www.cisco.com
http://www.linksys.com

• Linksys was founded in 1988 in Taiwan and now has its headquarters in Irvine, California. Linksys has 308 employees worldwide. It recorded $429 million in annual revenue for 2002. The company is led by Victor Tsao.
• 
  
  Earlier this month, Linksys announced the first shipment of a dual band 802.11 a+g product. The Linksys Wireless Dual Band A+G Wireless PC Card is available for a list price of $99. The card will communicate with all IEEE standardized products including 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g draft solutions. Linksys also plans to offer a Wireless A+G Router, A+G Access Point and PCI Adapter for desktop computers later this month.
• 
  
  In January 2003, Linksys rolled out a new line of full-featured Layer 2 and Layer 3 Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet managed switches aimed at small to medium-sized businesses. Pricing starts at $500 for a Layer 3 Management 4-Port 10/100/1000 Gigabit Switch that provides 8 Gbps non-blocking switching performance and supports up to 256 port-based VLANs.

Read More

3Com Reports Quarterly Revenue of $245 Million

3Com reported quarterly revenue of $245 million. The net loss was approximately $79 million, or $0.22 per share. This compares to a net loss of $69 million, or $0.19 per share, in the previous quarter and a net loss of $227 million, or $0.65 per share, in the same period last year. The company ended the quarter with $1.44 billion in cash and short-term investments, an increase of $7 million from the previous quarter.
http://www.3com.com

Read More

New Scientist: Spider Silk Delivers Finest Optical Fiber

New Scientist magazine reports that researchers at the University of California at Riverside have created the finest hollow optical fibers to date by using the silk from Nephila madagascariensis, the giant orb-weaving spider of Madagascar. The hollow optical fiber has a core of just two nanometres wide and potentially could be used in future, nanoscale optical circuits. New Scientist reports that hollow, spider-based fiber offers a wider range of structures and can be more easily shaped than carbon nanotubes, which have also be researched for this potential application.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993522

Read More