Regulator Publishes Review of Broadband Market in the UK

Pending parliamentary approval, a new regulatory framework for electronic communications networks in the UK will go into effect on 25-July-2003. The new policies are based on five EU Communications directives and are designed to harmonize regulations across Europe, reduce barriers to entry, and stimulate market competition. In advance of the new framework, Oftel, the official telecoms regulator for the UK, published a 151-page review of current market conditions. The report is available online.
http://www.oftel.gov.uk/publications/eu_directives/2003/eu_dsl/dsl.pdf

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Accenture and Microsoft Build .NET Services for Carriers

Accenture is developing a new set of Web Service-enabled solutions for wireless and wireline carriers built on Microsoft's .NET framework. The applications support key operations including customer care, sales, billing, service delivery, enterprise management and business intelligence. Accenture said the .NET-connectivity would introduce a higher level of agility and real-time transactional capability through the use of Web services. By using repeatable processes, middleware and configuration, the .NET-connected version of the joint solutions significantly reduces the time it takes to deploy new services.
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2003/apr03/04-29TelecomProviderspr.asphttp://www.accenture.com

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France Telecom Sees Revenue Stabilizing, Targets 2.8M ADSL Users this Year

France Telecom reported Q1 revenues of EUR 11.376, an increase of 7.3% compared to the year-earlier period. There was an increase in operating free cash flow to EUR 3.1 billion in Q1, compared to EUR 1.9 billion in Q1 2002. On a comparable basis, France Telecom's consolidated revenues increased 3.3% annually. Some highlights for the quarter:

• The number of broadband lines for retail customers (including Wanadoo's ADSL access) was 1,777,000 at the end of the quarter, more than triple the year earlier count. FT is targeting 2.8 million ADSL customers by the end of 2003. While describing DSL as a principle growth driver, FT noted that Minitel revenues continued their downward trend.
• 
  
  Fixed line, voice and data services in France decreased 6.6% for Q1, compared to the year-earlier period, related in part to the sale of some network assets. Without the sale, the comparative decline would have been 3.4%. For Q4 2002, the annual rate of decline was at 5.7%. As a result, FT believes the impact of the opening of the local communications market to competition is slowing. France Telecom's market share in local traffic in March 2003 amounted to 79.1% compared to 86.0% in March 2002. In comparison, France Telecom's market share in local traffic in December 2002 amounted to 80.9% compared to 96.8% in December 2001.
• 
  
  France Telecom's market share in long distance traffic (domestic and international) remained stable at 63.3% in March 2003 compared to 63.7% in March 2002.
• 
  
  Contributive revenues from Equant decreased 22.6% on a historical basis and 5.1% on a comparable basis compared to the year-earlier period. For the most part, the decrease reflected the impact of the transfer of Equant's customers in France to Transpac SA in accordance with the contractual provisions put in place in June 2001 at the time of Equant's consolidation into the France Telecom group. Sales in network services, which represented more than half of Equant's revenues, increased 3.7%.
• 
  
  The FT group reduced its CAPEX in Q1 by EUR 350 million. Most of the reductions came from fixed line operations in France (47%), Orange (32%), Wanadoo (10%) and fixed line operations outside of France (11%). The company plans a 19% increase in investment expenditures in ADSL to double the number of lines in France in 2003.

http://www.francetelecom.com

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Openwave Introduces New Email/Messaging Platform for Carrier Services

Openwave Systems released a major upgrade to its email/messaging platform designed for large-scale, carrier email services. Openwave Email Mx Version 6.0 (Mx 6) features new anti-spam and anti-virus capabilities, a new web mail interface, a new "extensions" technology to allow third party applications to run on the message server, and lower cost due to architecture changes. Anti-spam features include the ability to block "Receipt to" messages that spammers harvest to steal email addresses. Performance enhancements have resulted in a decrease in CPU utilization by 40% and an increase in capacity by up to 400% in heavy usage broadband environments. Mx 6 also adds a choice in database technology, which can eliminate the need for an Oracle database if the customers chooses to use the integrated OEM database. The Openwave Mx 6 Extensions technology provides interfaces into message processing to allow value added, third party applications such as anti-virus, anti-spam (Brightmail or Postini) or lawful mail interceptions (CALEA).
http://www.openwave.com

• Openwave noted that conventional IP blocking tools are no longer effective in stopping spammers because new tools have enabled spammers to change their IP addresses on they fly -- sometimes after every few emails sent. Openwave estimates the average lifetime of an IP address is now only 20 minutes.
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  Openwave's carrier customers currently have licensed nearly 150 million email boxes.
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  Openwave's customer list includes 150 email service providers and 85 mobile operators, such as BellSouth, RoadRunner, Verizon, AT&T Broadband, BT, Beijing Telecom and others.

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Deutsche Telekom Extends IP MPLS Service to North America

Deutsche Telekom's T-Systems division has extended its IP-VPN MPLS network services into North America. T-Systems is offering custom-build MPLS solutions that address and adapt to specific requirements at each site in terms of availability, class of service mix, service level agreement and support parameters. Four "application-aware" classes of service are available. The service runs entirely over an IP backbone.
http://www.t-systemsus.com

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UTStarcom Announces First Contracts with India's Tata Teleservices

UTStarcom has signed its first contracts to deploy 56,000 lines of its AN-2000 platform with Tata Teleservices, the largest private basic service operator in India. Financial terms were not disclosed. UTStarcom has signed five other basic service operators in India as customers and had over 600,000 lines of its AN-2000 multi-service access platform deployed as of the end of 2002. UTStarcom also cited a strong interest for its Personal Access System (PAS) in India. MTNL, the incumbent PTT operator in New Delhi, has deployed and commercialized a 5,000 line PAS trial system in three areas in south Delhi. In addition, trials of the PAS system are being conducted with two large private basic service operators.
http://www.utstar.com
http://www.tataindicom.com

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NEC America to Resell SpectraLink's Systems

NEC America agreed to resell SpectraLink's new NetLink e340 and i640 Wireless Telephones utilizing NEC's proprietary IP protocol. This WLAN solution will incorporate NEC's Dterm desktop features to provide a migration path to a wireless communications infrastructure for new and existing enterprise customers. The wireless handsets will utilize the IEEE 802.11b (Wi-Fi) WLAN standard, allowing users to share a single wireless infrastructure with mobile data devices.
http://www.cng.nec.com
http://www.spectralink.com

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McLeodUSA Links 538 Walgreens Stores

Walgreens, the largest drugstore chain in the US, selected McLeodUSA to be the primary local telecommunications services provider to 538 Walgreens stores, with nearly 5,000 business lines, in its 25-state footprint. McLeodUSA aims to install local services in all 538 stores in approximately three weeks.
http://www.mcleodusa.com

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GDC Reenters Service Business for its Products

General DataComm (GDC) will once again begin offering support services for its products beginning 01-May-2003 and has selected Telsource Corporation to deliver on-site services for its contract customers via a custom outsourcing partnership. Telsource will provide maintenance and support for all of GDC's products in the US, Canada and Puerto Rico.
http://www.gdc.com

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PMC-Sierra Introduces Multi-Rate PHY/Framers

PMC-Sierra introduced two new devices that offer a physical layer solution for simultaneously aggregating, transporting and terminating OC-3/STM-1, OC-12/STM-4, and OC-48/STM-16 Packet-over-SONET (POS) and ATM traffic on a single line card. The S/UNI MULTI devices are designed for use in physical interfaces to connect network elements that demand rapid bandwidth expansion like DSLAMs, CMTSs, and wireless base-station controllers, edge routers and multi-service switches. PMC-Sierra said a single multi-rate line card powered by one S/UNI MULTI-48 device, in conjunction with available multi-rate or pluggable optics modules, could replace up to three line card designs. Marconi is utilizing PMC-Sierra's S/UNI MULTI-48 in its BXR-48000 multiservice switch router.http;//www.pmcsierra.com

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Zhone Announces Smaller Multi-Access Line Concentrators

Zhone Technologies announced the newest addition to its Multi-Access Line Concentrator line, which supports both traditional voice and broadband data services over a common loop infrastructure. The new MALC 300 measures 3U in height and uses the same line cards and components as the company's existing MALC 700 models. The MALC supports software selectable service ports, integrated cross-connect, integrated loop qualification with internal splitters, and flow-through provisioning capabilities to clearly differentiate the platform from traditional DLC platforms. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service has granted "RUS Acceptance" status to the MALC family of products, enabling rural telephone and utilities companies to purchase and deploy MALC with funds obtained through low-interest RUS loans.
http://www.zhone.com

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Yahoo! Platinum Expands its Broadband Content Line-up

Yahoo! is expanding its recently launched premium broadband content service to include video and audio content from Showtime, the National Hockey League, National Geographic, Major League Soccer, and Warren Miller Entertainment. In coming weeks, Yahoo! Platinum plans to add financial news from CNBC, in addition to a mix of entertainment and news programming from the BBC . Content already available on the service includes CBS' Survivor Insider, FOX's American Idol, ABC News, CBS MarketWatch, and NASCAR.com. Pricing remains at $9.95 per month. Access to some sports content is extra.
http://www.platinum.com

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Spirent Unveils Avalanche AfterBurner for Gigabit L4-7 Testing

Spirent Communications introduced a new "Avalanche AfterBurner" that boosts the performance of its Avalanche SmartBits product line for testing Layer 4-7 systems. Spirent's Avalanche AfterBurner enables in excess of 400,000 TCP connections per second on a single Gigabit link. Foundry Networks is using the solution for testing its high-performance ServerIron systems.
http://www.spirentcom.com/avalanche

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Alcatel to Resell General Bandwidth for VoATM in FTTU

Alcatel signed an OEM agreement to resell General Bandwidth's G6 Packet Telephony Migration Platform for providing Voice over ATM in fiber to the user (FTTU) networks. Alcatel will integrate, resell, and support General Bandwidth's carrier-class platform to selected customers and engage in joint marketing activities as appropriate. The G6 features a scalable 60 Gbps backplane, supports IP, ATM and TDM in the same platform, and offers an element management system that is Telcordia OSMINE certified.
http://www.genband.com
http://www.alcatel.com

• In July, 2002, Alcatel announced a multi-million dollar agreement under which SBC had agreed to deploy the Alcatel 7340 Fiber-to-the-User (FTTU) solution for residential customers in SBC Pacific Bell's Mission Bay project in San Francisco. General Bandwidth was selected to provide the voice component of the project.

Alcatel has recently announced a series of OEM and technology partnership agreements, including:

• fSONA, for its Free Space Optics (FSO) as a subsystem of the Alcatel high capacity wireless solution. Alcatel's high-capacity urban wireless systems are being integrated with FSO technology. Free space optics delivers point-to-point, fiber-like services over the air using lasers.
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  RADVISION, for its new viaIP gw-P20/M Gateway, which supports real time video telephony sessions between 3G-324M enabled cell phones/PDAs and multiple IP and ISDN-based videoconferencing systems. The system is based on the 3G-324M standard for real-time multimedia communications over WCDMA and CDMA2000 3G/UMTS networks. The RADVISION product will be matched with the Alcatel 5020 Softswitch acting as an H.323 gatekeeper, which manages the fixed IP videophones or PCs with an embedded Webcam and a broadband connection to the Internet (xDSL, cable modem or corporate).
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  Adjungo Networks, for its wireless LAN security & management systems, which offers several secure authentication mechanisms for WLAN users, such as SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) based and Virtual SIM authentication, which leverages the mobile network capabilities supporting 802.1x hot spots and Web-based hot spots. The offer also includes an SMS (Short Message System) based authentication feature.
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  Native Networks, for its technology for metro Ethernet over SDH in its Optical Multi-Service Node (OMSN) equipment. Alcatel's Optical Multi-Service Nodes aggregate multiprotocol traffic onto SDH. Although configurable as ADMs (Add-Drop-Multiplexers), OMSNs have cross-connect capability and already support point-to-point Ethernet connections. Under the new partnership, Alcatel is leveraging Native Networks' Metro Ethernet technology to introduce enhanced transport and aggregation of Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, and Gigabit Ethernet services, along with Packet Ring functionality.
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  IP Wireless, for its TD-CDMA (TDD) mobile broadband technology. The TDD solution, which will support Alcatel's portfolio of UMTS/3G and WLAN networks and services, is aimed at mobile operators wishing to complement their GSM/GPRS and WCDMA services with enhanced TDD coverage in dense business areas.

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Extreme Announces 4th Generation Networking Silicon for 10-GigE Core

Extreme Networks unveiled its for fourth generation silicon, designed for scalable core networks with dense, wire-speed 10-Gigabit Ethernet performance. Extreme's 4GNSS silicon architecture promises wire-speed IPv4, IPv6, MPLS, HVPLS and NAT services for metro and regional networks. The new silicon also includes a new feature, called T-Flex, that uses ASIC-based programmable packet parsers and editors to allow new protocols and services to be deployed without hardware upgrades. Extreme's first incarnation of the new 4GNSS architecture, code named "Mariner," delivers six 10 Gigabit ports or 60 Gigabit Ethernet ports per blade for a total of 48 10 Gigabit Ethernet and 480 Gigabit Ethernet ports in a single chassis. Additionally, the "Mariner" switch provides hitless failover, hitless upgrades and self-healing capabilities. Extreme Networks is demonstrating the "Mariner" switch at NetWorld+Interop this week in Las Vegas. Product availability is slated for Q3. Pricing is listed at under $50,000 for an entry-level system, with 10 Gigabit Ethernet pricing at less than $8,000 per port.
http://www.extremenetworks.com

• Earlier this month, Extreme Networks launched its third-generation “Triumph�? switching chipset, which increases the port density of Extreme BlackDiamond chassis-based switches by up to 275% while maintaining the performance and line-rate throughput with Layer 3 services. The new chipset is being delivered in two new BlackDiamond modules that can be used to scale a single BlackDiamond 6816 chassis switch to up to 360 Gigabit Ethernet connections. The module options are for either 24-port auto-sensing 10/100/1000 copper ports ($12,995 list) or 16 port fiber 10/100/1000 ports ($13,995). In addition to increased density, the new silicon provides ingress and egress rate shaping for traffic management, along with port-based management and flow control for traffic protection. With the new switching modules, the BlackDiamond switch can support eight ingress, eight egress queues and one egress super-queue per port so that each port can be individually configured to rate shape traffic. Extreme said the new modules maintain line-rate forwarding performance, even while supporting QoS, full Layer 3 routing services, and security services such as ACLs, Intrusion Detection and Network Login. Extreme's chipset also provides advanced Denial of Service (DoS) attack protection through hardware classification, processing and acceleration of common IP control traffic functions.

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Cisco Announces Intelligent Processor Engine for the WAN Edge

Cisco Systems introduced a new Network Processing Engine for handling IP/MPLS services on its Cisco 7300 routers, which can be deployed by enterprise customers as an Internet gateway application, or used by service providers as a high-end customer-premise-equipment (CPE) router for managed service offerings. The Cisco 7304 NPE-G100 processor supports advanced IP features, including multicast; Any Transport over MPLS (AToM); and Virtual Routing and Forwarding (VRF)-Select, which enables network operators to provide the appearance of multiple network topologies on a single interface. It also supports IPv6 and network-based application recognition (NBAR) services that allow customers to support a variety of connection types tightly coupled with advanced packet inspection for intelligent networking. Additionally, the NPE-G100 offers three built-in 10/100/1000-Mbps Ethernet ports (copper or optical). The Cisco 7304 router with the NPE-G100 Network Processing Engine will be available in May and list priced at $22,000.
http://www.cisco.com

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Portal Software and SAP Team on Telecom Solutions

Portal Software and SAP AG signed a global strategic alliance and software development agreement to deliver an integrated management solution for the telecom industry. The solution from Portal and SAP seamlessly integrates key billing system processes with financial business processes, enabling telecommunications providers to more effectively deal with revenue assurance issues by providing complete, real-time visibility into customer transactions.
http://www.portal.com
http://www.sap.com

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Alcatel Reports Q1 Sales of EUR 2.96 Billion, Soft Markets

Alcatel reported Q1 sales of EUR 2.961 billion, down 31.1% year over year and down sequentially by 34.3%. Loss from operations was registered at EUR 161 million and net loss at EUR 461 million, or a diluted loss of EUR 0.39 per share ($0.43 per ADS). Alcatel cited seasonality and currency exchange issues for the weaker performance. It also noted that carrier markets continue to be soft, and the economic and geopolitical environmental may add a few points to the 15% degradation it had previously predicted for 2003. The non-carrier market is better but for the same reasons may be a few points off from the expected stagnation. Overall Alcatel still expects the market in the second half of 2003 to be comparable to last year, at a constant exchange rate. Nevertheless, Alcatel anticipates that its restructuring programs will enable it to reach an operating breakeven target for the full year. Some highlights for the quarter:

• Revenue for fixed communications equipment decreased sequentially by 34.5% to EUR 1.317 billion. DSL sales were strong worldwide, but were offset by the weakness in the carrier data market. Optical networks decreased substantially, particularly terrestrial transmission where the good performance in traditional cross connects was offset by the continuing depressed WDM long-haul market, especially in the US.
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  Revenue for mobile communications decreased sequentially by 37.8% to EUR 798 million. Sales were hit by the temporary unavailability of color screens coupled with pricing pressures on mature monochrome models.
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  Revenues for private communications decreased sequentially by 28.4% to EUR 952 million, primarily due to declining space revenues in light of delivery schedules and soft underlying market conditions.
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  Gross margin improved to 29.7%, compared to 27.3% for Q4 2002.
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  Alcatel ended the quarter with 76,000 employees, down from 119,000 in Q4 2000. The company estimates it will have 60,000 employees at the end of this year.
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  Alcatel is targeting a breakeven point at quarterly sales of around EUR 3 billion per quarter at year end.

http://www.alcatel.com

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SpectraLink Offers 802.11b Wireless Phones

SpectraLink announced an 802.11b NetLink Wireless Deskset priced at $499 and incorporating a speakerphone, large display, and special feature keys. A docking station version will be priced at $299. In the docking station configuration, the user has the option of using the NetLink Wireless Deskset's traditional wired handset or the NetLink Wireless Telephone handset to roam throughout the enterprise.
http://www.spectralink.com

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Transparent Networks Ceases Operations

Transparent Networks, a start-up that was developing a 3D MOEMS (micro-opto-electronic-mechanical-system) mirror array switch, is ceasing operations and will liquidate its assets. The company's intellectual property includes optical signal processing and MEMS-based technology. A buyer is being sought. Transparent Networks was based in Milpitas, California.
http://www.transparentnetworks.com

• In March 2002, Transparent Networks previewed its 3D MOEMS mirror array integrated with high-voltage high-density VLSI electronics. The single chip array includes 1200 mirrors and could be scaled for use in optical switches with up to 18,000 ports. Transparent Networks' first product implementation allows field scalability of the optical switch from 8 to 1,024 bi-directional protected ports. The design would allow carriers to deploy the switch with a small number of active ports and then add more ports based on demand.
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  In February 2002, Transparent Networks secured $20 million in second round venture funding for its work in intelligent photonic switching systems. The company raised $30.2 million since its inception in June 2000. Transparent Networks is headed by Dr. Janusz Bryzek, who is considered one of the pioneers of the MEMS industry.

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