Fujitsu FLASHWAVE Supplies 40G Connectivity for SC08

Fujitsu Network Communications has supplied a three-node configuration of its FLASHWAVE 7500 Reconfigurable Optical Add/Drop Multiplexer (ROADM) platform to provide two 40 Gbps wavelengths for the SCinet WAN network at the upcoming Supercomputing Conference 2008 (SC08).

This network is created each year during the SC conference by volunteers from universities, government, and industry to highlight cutting-edge platforms in high-performance computing (HPC), networking, storage and analysis.


One FLASHWAVE 7500 node will be co-located with the Ranger supercomputer, one of the top five supercomputers in the world, at the Texas Advanced Computer Center (TACC) at The University of Texas at Austin. A second FLASHWAVE 7500 node residing at the Austin point-of-presence (POP) will receive 10 Gbps transmissions from other ROADM devices that provide connectivity from as far away as Amsterdam, Holland. The third FLASHWAVE 7500 node will be on display in the SCinet NOC at SC08. The three nodes will be interconnected to highlight 40 Gbps optical transmission and 4 x 10 Gbps multiplexing into separate wavelengths, each operating at 40 Gbps.http://us.fujitsu.com/telecom

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Huawei Delivers 40 Gbps Gear to Telefónica

Huawei Technologies has delivered to Telefónica de España the first 40G nodes for its optical transmission network. Huawei's solution uses ROADM technology, which guarantees flexible provisioning, and is ready to activate advanced network Control and Management Planes based on GMPLS. Financial terms were not disclosed.
http://www.huawei.com

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Telstra Implements IPsphere Framework with Juniper

Telstra announced the first multi-site carrier field implementation of the TM Forum's IPsphere framework. The implementation, which was built on a solution powered by Juniper Networks and partner Net One Systems, was completed in Sydney and Melbourne and will play an integral role in developing Telstra's Application Assured Network (AAN) initiative. Telstra's AAN initiative defines a vision for a network capable of dynamically dimensioning itself to support any customer application requirement, such as bandwidth, delay, jitter and QoS. IPsphere capabilities complement and extend the AAN vision by enabling new ways of creating advanced services across partner boundaries.


The TM Forum IPsphere Field Trial brings together leading service providers, hardware and software suppliers and systems integrators, to demonstrate a new level of business flexibility for advanced IP services -- with the assurance of a standards-based approach. The TM Forum's IPsphere framework enables frictionless collaboration between all service providers in the value chain, including network service providers and content providers.


Telstra's implementation combines Net One Systems' integration and software customization capabilities and Juniper Networks routing and Session and Resource Control (SRC) portfolio. Key features of Telstra's IPsphere field deployment include:

• A unique multi-site deployment in Sydney and Melbourne, enabling Telstra to test and validate any IPsphere use case that supports the AAN initiative.



• A validation of the Juniper Networks IPsphere-ready "S5" interface; based on the SRC portfolio leadership in delivering standards-based application-to-network interfaces, S5 enables direct interaction between the SRC and an IPsphere environment for advanced service control.



• IPsphere Service Management System (SMS) software developed by Juniper Networks Open IP Service Creation Program (OSCP) partner, Net One Systems. Juniper's unique OSCP program enabled rapid customization and integration of the Net One Systems software with Juniper Networks infrastructure.



• IPsphere-ready control and data plane interfaces to other participating service providers to create a true global federation of providers.



• A low-touch API driven model for content partnerships, which allows content providers to collaborate with IPsphere partners - and leverage premium bandwidth for competitive differentiation.

http://www.telstra.comhttp://www.juniper.com

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Japan's UQ Selects Mformation to Support Mobile WiMAX

Japan's UQ Communications, a joint venture between KDDI, Intel Capital, East Japan Railway, KYOCERA, Daiwa Securities and The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd, has selected Mformation Technologies' platform to provide seamless device management capabilities for new WiMAX-capable devices as part of the rollout of its WiMAX network.


The MFORMATION SERVICE MANAGER ensures that WiMAX-capable devices can be remotely activated and provisioned irrespective of their source.


"Working with UQ on this very important mobile broadband initiative is great validation of the power of our comprehensive MDM platform," said Mark Edwards, CEO for Mformation. "UQ Communications had very demanding requirements; we have consistently demonstrated our ability to support these requirements as UQ Communications moves forward with its aggressive plans for rollout of WiMAX-based services. We look forward to supporting UQ on this important initiative."http://www.mformation.com

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Deutsche Telekom Installs ISE Line Cards in Cisco 12000 Routers

Deutsche Telekom is deploying Cisco IP Service Engine (ISE) technology in its Cisco 12000 Series Routers in order to support new multimedia services. The project is part of Deutsche Telekom's network optimization program to converge services from multiple platforms onto IP/ MPLS.


Cisco said the modular configuration of the ISE linecards provides a cost-effective solution to Deutsche Telekom as each linecard can deliver the capacity of up to three existing routers. This simplifies the network architecture, leading to considerable savings in maintenance costs, space requirements and power consumption. Each ISE linecard is able to support additional capacity, allowing Deutsche Telekom to extend its investment and facilitate future expansion plans.
http://www.cisco.com

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USB 3.0 Specification Completed -- Promising 4.8 Gbps Local Connections

The USB 3.0 Promoter Group, which is backed by Intel, HP, Microsoft Corporation, NEC Corporation, ST-NXP Wireless and Texas Instruments among others, announced the completion of the USB 3.0 specification.


Otherwise known as SuperSpeed USB, the new spec offers data transfer rates up to ten times faster than Hi-Speed USB (USB 2.0) -- roughly 4.8 Gbps -- along with backwards compatibility with the billions of USB-enabled PCs and peripheral devices currently in use.


It is anticipated that initial SuperSpeed USB discrete controllers will appear in the second half of 2009 and consumer products will appear in 2010, with adoption continuing throughout 2010. The first SuperSpeed USB devices will likely include data-storage devices such as flash drives, external hard drives, digital music players and digital cameras.


The group now has transitioned the specification's management to the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the managing body of USB specifications. The USB 3.0 Promoter Group is now accepting adopters of the USB 3.0 specification, which has been finalized at the 1.0 level.http://www.usb.org

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Tellabs Appoints Vikram Saksena as CTO

Tellabs named Dr. Vikram Saksena as its new chief technology officer. He will focus on strategic technology initiatives including optical networking, Carrier Ethernet and IP, and mobile backhaul. Dr. Saksena recently served at Sonus Networks as chief technology officer and chief scientist. He has held a series of engineering positions, including positions at Cisco and AT&T. He is an AT&T Fellow and a finalist at the 2008 CTO of the Year Award given by the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council.
http://www.tellabs.com

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Marvell Unveils Silicon Family for 40GbE and 100GbE

Marvell unveiled its Prestera CX family of high performance 40GbE and 100GbE switching silicon aimed at next gen datacenter applications such as server virtualization, cloud computing, and Software as a Service.


The first implementations of the Marvell Prestera CX family will provide 40GbE support, fiber channel over Ethernet (FCoE) support, Data Center Bridging (DCB), Converged Enhanced Ethernet (CEE) features and a low latency mode. Marvell will offer port capacities ranging from 8 to 48 ports of 10GbE as well as multiple 40GbE ports. Pricing is expected to range from $200 to $900 depending on the device and application. Samples are expected in the late fourth quarter of this calendar year.


"Ethernet is evolving from a LAN interconnect to a converged and enhanced services fabric," said Awais Nemat, vice president, Enterprise Business Unit, Communications and Consumer Business Group at Marvell. "Continuous advancements in data center and compute architectures are creating new paradigms for service delivery, reliability and resiliency that we believe are necessary for next generation applications. The Prestera CX family is purpose-built to provide Marvell's customers the necessary silicon platform for building the next generation infrastructure."http://www.marvell.com

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XO Partners with VIXXI on E-911

XO Communications has agreed to refer its current and future VoIP customers to VIXXI as an E911 provider. The companies said VIXXI's IP-based, geospatial technology is well-matched for VoIP vendors who are required by the FCC to provide their customers with an E911 Solution that identifies caller location information and correctly routes emergency calls to the appropriate PSAP. In addition, the VIXXI web portal supports real-time location updates of nomadic VoIP users, and location detail can be tied to any data element; it does not need to be tied to a telephone number. VIXXI makes dynamic updates to PSAP boundary changes for accurate call-routing.


VIXXI Solutions is located in Greenwood Village, Colorado.http://www.xo.comhttp://www.vixxisolutions.com

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PCMCIA Announces Release 2.0 of ExpressCard Standard

The ExpressCard Standard 2.0 standard has been officially released by PCMCIA, the technology trade association for PC Card and ExpressCard technology. The new ExpressCard Standard will support transfer rates ranging from two to 10 times faster than ExpressCard Standard 1.2, depending on the data protocol used. Some of the applications that benefit from the improved performance are:

• Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) 2.0 adapters supporting large file transfers between computers and various storage devices;



• USB 3.0 adapters supporting large file transfers between computers and peripheral devices;


• Very high-performance streaming media and video adapters; and



• Very high-performance storage modules based on flash memory technologies, e.g. solid-state drive applications.

The ExpressCard Standard is based on the advanced serial I/O technologies, PCI Express and USB. The Standard is being updated to comply with the recent release of the PCI Express specification, Version 2.0, which offers transfer rates of up to 5Gbps, two times faster than its previous version. The ExpressCard 2.0 Standard also supports the new USB 3.0 specification released today. SuperSpeed USB will support speeds of up to 10 times faster than Hi-Speed USB.http://www.expresscard.orghttp://www.pmcia.org

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Comcast Expands 50 Mbps DOCSIS 3.0 Rollout

Comcast will launch DOCSIS 3.0 service in Oregon and in Washington state in December. The residential options will include:

• Extreme 50, offering up to 50 Mbps of downstream speed and up to 10 Mbps of upstream speed at $139.95/month.



• Ultra, offering up to 22 Mbps of downstream speed and up to 5 Mbps of upstream speed at $62.95/month.



• Performance tier customers will benefit from doubled downstream and upstream speeds, offering up to 12 Mbps and 2 Mbps, respectively.



• Performance Plus customers will be upgraded to Comcast's Blast! tier, which will double their download speeds to up to 16 Mbps and provide up to 2 Mbps of upload speed.

http://www.comcast.com

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Three Executives Killed at SiPort in Santa Clara, California

Tragedy struck on Friday afternoon at SiPort, a start-up based in Santa Clara, California, when three senior executives were murdered by a disgruntled employee who had been laid off earlier in the day. According to police reports, Sid Agrawal (CEO), Brian Pugh (vice president of operations) and Marilyn Lewis (head of human resources) were shot to death after the fired employee returned to confront the company executives. The alleged suspect, Mr. Jing Hua Wu, a lead product test engineer, has been taken into custody and charged with three counts of murder.


SiPort was founded in 2004 and received its first round of funding in 2005 with backing from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Morgenthaler, New Venture Partners and Intel Capital. The company has been developing a line of mixed signal RF and digital baseband wireless receiver chips supporting multiple digital broadcast standards. SiPort's target customers include leading OEMs selling MP3, cell phones and other portable media players.http://www.siport.com

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Dune Networks 80Gbps Full-duplex Line Card

Dune Networks has begun sampling a new member in its PETRA family that integrates complete 80Gbps full-duplex line card functionality into a single device addressing Data Center and Carrier Access requirements. The solution is aimed at high-density switching line cards ranging from 24 to 48 10GE ports. Such line cards could enable a switching system design featuring a non-blocking fabric, 100ms packet buffer and densities of up to 768 ports of 10GE or 40GE/100GE equivalent with a single stage fabric.


The P330 incorporates a flexible packet processor using micro-code engines. Packet-processing features include L2 bridging, L3 IPv4 and IPv6 unicast and multicast routing, flexible L2/L3/L4 aware ACLs. For Data Centers, the P330 offers additional benefits such as enhanced TCP performance, TCP starvation avoidance, Lossless Ethernet support, high fan-out ECMPs and LAGs, security and policing, and virtualization support.
http://www.dunenetworks.com/

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Telefónica Reports Solid Q3 and Confirms 2009 Guidance

Citing its strong diversification geographically and across wired and wireless networks, Telefónica reported solid financial results for Q3 2008 and a sharp growth in the total number of access accounts across all businesses and regions. As of 30-September-2008, the Telefónica Group was serving 252 million accesses (up 15.2% on the first nine months of 2007). The growth in mobile telephony (+19.0%), broadband (+24.5%) and Pay TV (+54.0%) accesses was particularly
noteworthy.


Telefónica's organic revenue growth accelerated to 7.0% in the first nine months of 2008 (up from 6.7% in the first half), driven by solid growth at Telefónica Latinoamérica, which increased its contribution to the Group's organic growth (contributing 4.6 percentage points in the first nine months, up from 4.3 percentage points in the first half).


Operating cash flow (OIBDA-CapEx) amounted to 11,621 million euros in January-September 2008. The healthy cash flow generation in Europe (7,995 million euros including Spain) was boosted by the growing contribution from the Latin American operations (3,626 million euros). Net income rose 23.5% on January-September 2007 on like-for-like terms2 to 5,596 million
euros.


Some additional highlights from the financial report:


TELEFÓNICA ESPAÑA

• In its home market, Telefónica maintained its competitive strength with 47.2 million accesses (an increase of 3.3% year-on-year)



• Telefónica holds an estimated market share of over 57%. Retail broadband Internet accesses stood at over 5.1 million (+16.8% year-on-year), with solid performance in broadband ARPU (-3.4% year-on-year).



• Pay TV customers reached more than 589,000, up 25.7% vs. September 2007.



• In a market characterised by a high rate of penetration, Telefónica's mobile contract customer base grew by 9.0% year-on-year, which drove the total customer base to more than 23.4 million lines (an increase of 4.5% from a year earlier).

TELEFÓNICA LATINOAMÉRICA

• Telefónica Latinoamérica significantly boosted its customer base to more than 150 million subscribers at the end of September (+21.1% vs. September 2007)



• The mobile telephony business continued to grow strongly, at 26.7% year-on-year, with organic net adds5 for the nine-month period rising by 20.4% on the previous year, driven by the higher number of gross adds and contained churn, to a total of 118.3 million accesses.



• The company boosted outgoing ARPU by 1.2% in organic terms6 in constant euros in the first nine months of 2008, despite rapid growth in the customer base.



• Retail broadband Internet accesses were close to 5.9 million (+24.9% year-on-year), with a strong ramp-up in net adds in the third quarter (+21.2% compared to the second quarter of 2008) to 839,830 in the nine-month period. Pay TV customers reached 1.5 million (+66.0% vs. September 2007) and the number of fixed telephony accesses7 grew 1.4% year-on-year.



• The average revenue per fixed telephone access rose 5.5% in constant euros, on the back of
  a greater penetration of bundled products.



• Telefónica Latinoamérica consolidated its role as the Group's key growth driver. Organic revenue growth8 ramped-up to 12.9% in January-September 2008 (vs. +12.2% in the first half of 2008) while the OIBDA showed an outstanding growth, which in organic8 terms was up 15.6% year-on-year



• Wireless revenues continued to post year-on-year growth exceeding 20% in local currency in the majority of markets, thanks to the good performance of outgoing revenues.



• The third quarter saw a significant acceleration in wireline revenues growth rates, helped by the growing contribution of Internet and Pay TV revenues (18.3% of the total at the end of September; +3.1 percentage points on September 2007) and improved performance among traditional services.

TELEFÓNICA EUROPE

• During the first nine months of the year, mobile had net adds of 2.2 million customers (+8.3% year-on-year), to reach 44.9 million total accesses at September 2008 (+9.9% year-on-year).



• Telefonica O2 UK recorded its best ever third quarter with 278,000 contract net adds, mainly leveraged on customer propositions such as Simplicity, iPhone and improvements in churn, leading to a best-in-class 1.3% rate.



• Telefonica O2 Germany added 402,405 mobile customers in the quarter, with an improved mix of higher value customers on contract, bringing the total mobile customer base to 14.0 million (+14.9% year-on-year).

http://www.telefonica.com

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Alcatel-Lucent and Thales Supply Traffic System for Poland's A2 motorway

Poland's General Directorate for National Roads and Motorways awarded a EUR 80 million contract to Alcatel-Lucent and Thales consortium to design, integrate, install and deploy the systems that will bring the A2 motorway up to EU commercial motorway standards. Alcatel-Lucent ,as the leader of the consortium, will project manage the integration, testing and deployment of a toll collection, emergency communications, traffic management, and a traffic statistics collection system, along the 100 kilometer section between Konin and Strykow. Alcatel-Lucent will also design and build a fiber optic communication system, which will be the transmission backbone for all the systems placed along the motorway. The project is targeted to be in service by the end of 2010.http://www.alcatel-lucent.com

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Motorola Supplies MPEG-4 Network Encoder to Midwest Video Solutions

Midwest Video Solutions, an IPTV headend services provider serving 16 member companies throughout the Upper Midwest, has selected Motorola's MPEG-4 Network Encoder for deployment by the end of the year. This upgrade to the Motorola multi-channel MPEG-4 AVC network encoder family will enable MVS to migrate two diverse MPEG-2 headend platforms at separate locations to a single consolidated MPEG-4 platform, streamlining the delivery of content while accelerating the delivery of personalized media experiences and increasing programming choice for customers. Financial terms were not disclosed.


Motorola's NE-4012 is a high-density solution designed to deliver purely IP-based multi-channel video compression capabilities and services. It combines the decoding of IP video services with advanced MPEG-4 AVC video encoding. The platform is able to deliver two channels of video compression in a 1RU package.http://www.motorola.com

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Nokia Sees Drop in Global Consumer Spending for Mobiles

Nokia issued new financial guidance for its fourth quarter 2008 and full year 2009, saying that the global economic slowdown, combined with unprecedented currency volatility, has resulted in a sharp pull back in global consumer spending including for mobile devices. Nokia said the mobile device market has also been negatively impacted by the more limited availability of credit, which has limited the purchasing ability of some of its trade customers.


As a result, Nokia now expects that the industry mobile device volumes will be lower in the fourth quarter 2008 than previously anticipated at approximately 330 million mobile devices. This is sequentially up from the estimated 310 million in the third quarter of 2008. This would result in a current estimate of industry mobile volume of 1.24 billion in 2008, instead of the earlier estimated 1.26 billion units, up from 1.14 billion units Nokia estimated for 2007. - Nokia continues to expect its mobile device market share in the fourth quarter 2008 to be at the same level or slightly up, sequentially.


For 2009, Nokia is now predicting that the industry mobile device volumes will be down compared to 2008, impacted by the continuing overall economic slowdown. Nokia Siemens Networks' preliminary estimate is that the mobile infrastructure and fixed infrastructure and related services market will be down in euro terms in 2009 compared to 2008.


Nokia and Nokia Siemens Networks both plan to take steps to reduce their costs appropriately to the market conditions.
http://www.nokia.com

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ITU to Increase Focus on CyberSecurity, Climate Change

In an address to the 63rd Session of ITU Council, which is currently underway in Geneva, ITU Secretary-General, Dr Hamadoun Touré urged the ICT sector to do more to ensure cyber security and to leverage telecommunications technology for the protection of the world's climate.


For the past year, the ITU has hosted a High-Level Experts Group (HLEG) which has developed proposals to promote cybersecurity. The ITU is now moving into its operational phase and is undertaking a partnership in conjunction with IMPACT -- the International Multilateral Partnership Against Cyber-Threats -- hosted by the Government of Malaysia, which will put a global early warning system at the disposal of all Member States.

The Child Online Protection (COP) initiative is a vitally important project that will protect one of the most vulnerable groups online by providing valuable guidance on safe online behaviour, in conjunction with other UN agencies and partners. Companies including Intel, Microsoft and Telecom Italia have also pledged their support. Organizations, such as the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA), the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and the GSM Association are also backing the initiative.


The ITU is mainstreaming the issue of how ICTs can help prevent and avert climate change. Touré said there is a strong role for ITU in standards for energy efficiency of the ICT equipment on which our digital economy depends. The Resolution passed recently at the World Telecommunication Standardization Assembly (WTSA) in Johannesburg encourages ITU Member States to work towards reductions in Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions arising from the use of ICTs, in line with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. ITU aims to achieve climate neutrality for its operations within three years.

The ITU said its efforts to combat climate change will also include an effort to identify the necessary radio-frequency spectrum for climate monitoring and disaster prediction, detection and relief, including a promising cooperation with the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in the field of remote-sensing applications.http://www.itu.inthttp://www.itu.int/osg/csd/cybersecurity/gca/

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NCTA Protests FCC Inquiry into

The President of the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA), Kyle McSlarrow, sent a letter of protest to the FCC concerning an newly-opened inquiry into about the industry's digital migration and its impact on consumers. Earlier this month, the FCC Enforcement Bureau sent letters to 13 cable operators asking about the industry's digital migration and its impact on consumers. McSlarrow said that cable operators welcome the opportunity to describe the benefits of this evolution but that that this collection of data constitutes an abuse of the Commission's processes and violates the Paperwork Reduction Act. Furthermore, McSlarrow said the FCC inquiry appeared to be a "broad fishing expedition" rather than a means of addressing any specific complaints that the agency is investigating. The NCTA letter is posted online.http://www.ncta.com

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CableLabs Issues Modular Headend Architecture Specifications

CableLabs released a set of Modular Headend Architecture (MHA) specifications that define interfaces for narrowcast MPEG digital video services such as video-on-demand (VOD) and switched-digital-video (SDV). These build on the existing DOCSIS Modular CMTS specifications.


The MHA suite includes multiple specifications and an architecture overview technical report. The new specifications define MPEG video processing functionality for VOD and SDV Edge Quadrature Amplitude Modulators (EQAMs), as well as an interoperable resource management and video session setup protocol and an interoperable EQAM provisioning and configuration mechanism. With the addition of these new specifications, the MHA suite provides a common industry-wide approach for Universal EQAMs, as well as for Video EQAMs and M-CMTS EQAMs.


CableLabs said these new digital video specifications result from an effort involving headend equipment manufacturers and cable operators. The specifications provide a point of harmonization between the Time Warner Cable-led Interactive Services Architecture (ISA) and the Comcast-led Next Generation on Demand (NGOD) architecture, which are used throughout the industry.


"This is important because for the first time we have an interoperable set of specifications that will lead to integrated equipment from multiple suppliers for delivery of advanced video and data services," said Tony Werner, Comcast CTO. Added Mike LaJoie, Time Warner Cable CTO: "Once again our industry's suppliers have worked with us through CableLabs to achieve a common approach which benefits the whole industry and our suppliers."http://www.cablelabs.com

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