Verizon Business Readies for Networx Universal

Verizon Business has officially unveiled a suite of services and capabilities available to federal government agencies under the multibillion-dollar Networx Universal contract awarded by the U.S. General Services Administration on March 29. Last week Verizon Business met with representatives from federal agencies that soon will begin submitting orders under Networx Universal.



Networx Universal is the first of two Networx contracts awarded by the GSA to modernize federal government communications with seamless, secure and interoperable services to support the business of government. The second contract, Networx Enterprise, is expected to be awarded later this month. http://www.verizon.com

• Verizon Business last year opened a new Government Network Operations and Security Center (GNOSC) in Northern Virginia dedicated to supporting the unique security and operational requirements of federal government customers. The GNOSC, along with Verizon Business's vBNS+ (Very High Speed Backbone Network Service), will also play an important role in helping the federal government adopt IPv6 by the mandated transition target of June 2008.

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Alcatel-Lucent Revenues Decline 8% Year over Year

Alcatel-Lucent's Q1 2007 revenues were down 8% year over year at constant EUR/USD exchange rate at EUR 3.882 billion. The reported gross profit was Euro 1,127 million and reported operating loss was EUR (582) million, including the impact from purchase price allocation entries of EUR (338) million. For the quarter, reported net income (group share) was EUR (8) million or EUR 0.00 per diluted share (USD (0.01) per ADS).



Alcatel-Lucent cited lower sales volumes in wireless and core networks, but noted good momentum building in its order flow resulting in an improving order backlog with a book-to-bill at 1.3x.



Some highlights for the quarter:

• Revenue for the carrier business segment was EUR 2,839 million compared to EUR 3,340 million in the year-ago quarter, a 10% decline at a constant EUR/USD exchange rate, or a 15% decline at current rate. Adjusted operating income (loss) was EUR (194) million, a (6.8)% operating margin.



• Revenue for the carrier wireline business group was EUR 1,287 million compared to EUR 1,342 million in the year-ago quarter, a 1% increase at a constant EUR/USD exchange rate, or a 4% decline at current rate.



• In DSL, 7.3 million lines were delivered - with close to half of the volume from the IP-based ISAM platform.



• Revenue for the carrier wireless business group was EUR 1,204 million compared to EUR 1,495 million in the year-ago quarter, a 15% decline at a constant EUR/USD exchange rate, or a 20% decline at current rate.



• Revenue for the convergence business group was EUR 348 million compared to EUR 503 million in the year-ago quarter, a 28% decline at a constant EUR/USD exchange rate, or a 31% decline at current rate. Legacy core revenue, in both wireline and wireless, continued to decline in line with the market rate. The company said the next generation core business is still not nearly big enough to offset the declines in legacy core networking but progress is expected.



• Revenue for the enterprise business segment was EUR 371 million compared to EUR 342 million in the year-ago quarter, a 12% increase at a constant EUR/USD exchange rate, or a 9% increase at current rate. The company said revenues showed strength across all parts of the business, with a strong performance in Europe and Asia. The voice and data business contributed to the segment's growth with good momentum in IP telephony migration for small and medium businesses.



• Revenue for the services business segment was EUR 626 million compared to EUR 674 million in the year-ago quarter, a 3% decline at a constant EUR/USD exchange rate, or a 7% decline at current rate. Adjusted operating income (loss) was EUR (29) million, a (4.6)% operating margin.

Patricia Russo, CEO commented: "Having completed the largest merger in our industry, we are encouraged by the progress we are making with our overall integration plans. Since December 1, 2006, we have finalized the product and technology roadmaps for the combined company and are communicating these decisions to our customers, helping reduce any uncertainty regarding product plans. Additionally, during the first quarter we took costs out of the business in areas such as procurement, information systems and R&D, and have achieved a net headcount reduction of approximately 1,900 positions, before the impact of recently announced managed services contract wins. Based on this progress, we are on track to achieve our planned pre-tax savings of at least EUR 600 million this year, in line with our target of EUR 1.7 billion pre-tax savings within 3 years. We will strategically reinvest part of these savings in markets and technologies which we believe will enhance our position going forward."http://www.alcatel-lucent.com

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BT Kicks Off National IPTV Campaign

BT launched a multi-million pound campaign to promote its digital TV service under the theme "TV on your terms". The TV slots are supported by a nationwide BT Vision poster campaign across billboards and bus sides, including a specially created execution for the Clapham Colossus at Clapham Junction -- at 200ft, the largest backlit poster site in Europe.



BT Vision is enabled by the V-box, an HD-ready television set-top box which connects to BT Broadband where a customer has a minimum guaranteed line speed of 2 Mbps. The STB provides access to on-demand content and the Freeview channels. It also features a personal video recorder (PVR) which can record up to 80 hours of programming. BT is making the V-box -- worth £199 - free to BT Broadband customers and, unlike its main competitors, is also not charging extra each month for the DVR function. The box is installed by a BT engineer, with an installation fee of £60 and a connection charge of £30. BT will introduce a self-install version of BT Vision later this year.



Unlike existing satellite and cable services, BT Vision does not require a mandatory subscription or minimum monthly payment. Payment terms for on-demand programming are completely flexible. Customers can either pay-per-view or subscribe to programming blocks as they wish with entertainment to suit every taste. There are current and library movies, music videos, concerts, kids' programmes, recent and classic television including drama, comedy, documentaries and other genres. The huge selection of current movies are all available on a pay per view basis with the latest blockbuster titles at lower prices than are offered by satellite, cable and high street video chains.

http://www.btplc.com

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NTT Reaches 6 Million Optical Access Subscribers

NTT continues to aggressively add B-FLETs optical access lines while ADSL and narrowband lines continue to decline. As of 31-Mar-2007, NTT East was serving 3.4 million optical access lines and NTT West was serving 2.7 million optical access lines, giving a combined total of over 6 million B-FLETs lines in service, up from 3.4 million a year earlier. NTT expects to add another 3.4 million optical lines in the next year, by which time the number of optical access subscribers should be over 9 million -- more than double the expected number of remaining ADSL subscribers in March 2008.



Financially, NTT said its corporate earnings improved against a backdrop of strong demand in Japan and overseas driven by steady improvements in the Japanese economy. In the mobile communications market, NTT said growth in the overall number of subscribers remained sluggish, but third-generation mobile communications services are expanding steadily, and with the introduction of mobile number portability, price competition remains fierce.



NTT Group's consolidated operating revenues were 10,760.6 billion yen for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2007 (an increase of 0.2% from the previous fiscal year) due to increases in IP-related revenues from B FLET'S and FOMA and system integration revenues. Consolidated operating expenses were 9,653.5 billion yen (an increase of 1.1% from the previous fiscal year) as a result of increased expenses associated with higher system integration revenues and increased mobile phone handset costs and other sales related expenses.



NTT's full annual financial report is now posted online.



http://www.ntt.co.jp

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European Commission Approves Swisscom + FastWeb

The European Commission granted unconditional approval to the acquisition of Italy-based Fastweb by Swisscom.

http://www.swisscom.com

• In March 2007, Swisscom announced a bid to acquire Fastweb, Italy's second largest fixed-network operator and leading provider of IP-based services, for EUR 47 per share for a maximum total consideration of EUR 3.7 billion.
  
  
  
  Fastweb is Italy's leading alternative broadband telecommunications provider with more than one million customers, 2006 revenues and EBITDA of respectively EUR 1.26 billion and EUR 424.6 million.

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Deutsche Telekom Sees International Growth, Revenues in Germany Drop 5%

Strong growth in international revenue boosted Deutsche Telekom's total revenue in Q1 2007 to EUR 15.5 billion, a rise of 4.1 percent over the previous year. At EUR 7.7 billion, international revenue was 15.5 percent higher than in the same quarter of 2006. This means that Deutsche Telekom generates roughly half of its revenue outside Germany.

Mobile Communications in particular generated strong growth with revenue of EUR 8.4 billion, more than half of the Group's net revenue. First quarter revenue in the Mobile Communications segment was 10.9 percent higher than in the same quarter in the previous year.

However, Deutsche Telekom's revenues in Germany dropped by 5.1 percent from the previous year to EUR 7.8 billion due to sustained competitive pressure and regulatory constraints. Contributing to this were developments in Broadband/Fixed Network, where domestic revenue was EUR 318 million lower than that of the same quarter the previous year.

Some highlights from the company's quarterly report:

DT's Broadband/Fixed Network division added 572,000 new broadband lines in Germany -- the strongest growth ever achieved in one quarter, corresponding to 42 percent of net additions in the overall market for broadband lines. This gives the company a total of 7.6 million proprietary domestic broadband lines.

A loss of 588,000 access lines in the past quarter was mainly due to unbundled loop lines (ULLs) leased to competitors; this figure increased by 484,000 to a total of 5.1 million. A further 104,000 or so lines were lost to substitution by mobile communications and competition from cable services.

In Germany, revenue from Business Customers was down by 9.6 percent year-on-year, dropping to EUR 2.3 billion. The main reasons for this were the increasingly intense competition and sustained price erosion in the traditional telecommunications business.

T-Mobile Deutschland netted 251,000 new contract customers -- compared with 89,000 in the first quarter of 2006.

43 new T-Punkt stores have been opened as part of efforts to strengthen our sales platform.

T-Mobile USA recorded a high net increase in new customers of 980,000 in the first quarter of 2007 (previous year: 1.04 million). Of these, 74 percent were contract customers, slightly higher even than in the first three months of 2006, when it was 70 percent.

In the UK, T-Mobile recorded more than 100,000 new contract customers.





http://www.telekom.de/dtag/cms/content/dt/en/82410?archivArticleID=396668

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EchoStar Adds 310,000 DBS Customers in Q1

EchoStar Communications' DISH Network added approximately 310,000 net new subscribers during the first quarter of 2007, ending the quarter with approximately 13.415 million subscribers.



Revenue was $2.64 billion for the quarter ended March 31, 2007, a 15 percent increase compared with $2.30 billion for the corresponding period in 2006. Net income totaled $157 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2007, compared with $147 million during the corresponding period in 2006. Basic earnings per share were $.35 for the quarter ended March 31, 2007, compared with basic earnings per share of $.33 during the corresponding period in 2006. http://www.dishnetwork.com

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Dune Networks and Bay Microsystems Partner on 20G & 40G System Designs

Dune Networks and Bay Microsystems announced a joint design for Carrier Ethernet applications. The design incorporates Dune Network's SAND Traffic Manager and Switch Fabric Chipset and Bay Microsystems's Chesapeake Network Processor and Traffic Manager. The companies are offering design documentation that provides detailed information regarding the integration of the critical technologies into a variety of Ethernet and multiservice line card applications.




Dune's switch fabric, and Bay's network processing functionality are highly complementary and the traffic management capabilities offered by the respective solutions together solve critical Quality of Service (QoS) problems: Dune's SAND Traffic Manager optimizes for traffic profiles across the switch fabric, while Chesapeake's integrated traffic manager optimizes for customer facing traffic on the line card.



"Those building, marketing and deploying Carrier Ethernet and multiservice platforms can now achieve a faster time to market while offering the most advanced Network Processing, Switch Fabric and Traffic Management solutions up to 40G and beyond," said Charles Gershman, Bay's President & CEO.

http://www.baymicrosystems.com

http://www.dunenetworks.com

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Verizon Business Supplies Global Net for Gruppo Campari

Gruppo Campari, a major player in the global alcoholic beverage sector, selected Verizon Business to centralize Gruppo Campari's business-critical applications and manage its global IP communications network. Gruppo Campari has implemented a fully managed Verizon Private IP network linking 17 operational sites spanning Asia, Europe, Latin America, South Africa and the United States. The deployment will be complemented by Verizon Internet Dedicated service, which provides secure high bandwidth for its users, as well as Verizon Network Colocation services, a superior managed environment that provides crucial backup for Gruppo Campari's business-critical equipment. http://www.verizonbusiness.com

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Global Crossing Reports Q1, Closes Impsat Acquisition, Recapitalization

Global Crossing reported $504 million of consolidated Q1 2007 revenue, an increase of $16 million or 3 percent from the fourth quarter, when consolidated revenue was $488 million. On a year-over-year basis, consolidated revenue expanded by 11 percent compared with the first quarter of 2006. The company said its core enterprise, carrier data and indirect channels segment, also referred to as its "invest and grow" segment, saw revenue increase by 9 percent sequentially to $381 million in the first quarter, compared with $351 million in the fourth quarter of 2006. The "invest and grow" segment improved 33 percent year over year, from $286 million in the first quarter of 2006.
Global Crossing's adjusted EBITDA less non-cash stock compensation ("adjusted cash EBITDA" was reported as a loss of $8 million. This compared to adjusted cash EBITDA of $12 million in the fourth quarter and an adjusted cash EBITDA loss of $33 million in the first quarter of last year.



Global Crossing completed its acquisition of IMPSAT Fiber Networks, Inc. (Impsat), a leading provider of integrated broadband data, Internet, voice telecommunications and advanced hosting in Latin America, for a total estimated transaction value of $347 million, comprised of approximately $95 million in equity, $26 million of assumed indebtedness and repayment of $226 million of indebtedness. Global Crossing said Impsat's extensive IP-based intercity network, 15 metropolitan networks and 15 advanced hosting centers will provide a greater breadth of services and coverage to its Latin American operations.



Global Crossing also announced that it had completed a five-year, $250 million secured term loan facility with Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse as joint book runners, yielding net cash proceeds of $241 million. To facilitate the loan, a subsidiary of the company's majority shareowner, Singapore Technologies Telemedia (ST Telemedia), agreed to subordinate its mandatorily convertible notes due December, 2008 to the term loan and then to convert the notes into common stock and warrants.

http://www.globalcrossing.com

http://www.impsat.com

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NTELOS to Deploy Tellabs' GPON

NTELOS, a communications provider serving portions of seven states, will deploy the new Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) features on the Tellabs 1150 multiservice access platform. The upgraded access network will enable NTELOS to deliver High Definition (HD) video services and faster data services.



Tellabs' GPON products deliver up to 2.4 Gbps downstream and up to 1.2 Gbps upstream./ http://www.tellabs.com

http://www.ntelos.com

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Global Crossing Implements Ditech Networks' Voice Assurance

Global Crossing is using Ditech Networks Voice Quality Assurance (VQA) technology to enhance the voice quality of calls received from international destinations on the Global Crossing Ready-Access on-demand audio collaboration services network. Global Crossing provides local access to its Ready-Access customers throughout the world and recently added new VoIP access options to 31 cities in Europe, as well as six countries in Asia.



Ditech Networks' VQA substantially reduces noise and echo that can be introduced by the local carrier and transferred to the Global Crossing network. The company said acoustic echo occurs when extraneous noise from the user's phone is reflected back into the network through the microphone. Wire line and wireless handsets commonly introduce acoustic echo into the carrier's network. Hybrid echo occurs at the four-wire to two-wire conversion point on PSTN local exchange networks. This type of echo is especially problematic on conference calls when an annoying echo can affect the experience of all participants until the offending line is identified and disconnected, or muted. Ditech Networks' VQA technology addresses acoustic and hybrid echo, and increases call intelligibility, regardless of the method used to join the meeting or technology used to provide the conferencing service.
http://www.ditechnetworks.comwww.globalcrossing.com

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JAJAH Raises $20 Million for VoIP via Mobiles

JAJAH, a start-up based in Mountain View, California, announced $20 million in Series C funding for its mobile calling service.



JAJAH offers a Mobile Suite application that enables consumers to make free long-distance and global calls directly from their mobile phones. To use the service, you first need a JAJAH account, which is free and without obligation.



Intel Capital was the lead investor (amount undisclosed) in the round.
Additionally, a business agreement was made with Intel Corporation that includes business and marketing components. Intel will provide JAJAH access to their extensive community of product dealers, OEM customers and developers, to further their reach into global development communities.



JAJAH was founded in 2005, and has offices in Mountain View, Calif., Tel Aviv and Luxembourg.

http://www.jajah.com

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Space Systems/Loral Awarded Build Satellite for SES New Skies

Space Systems/Loral (SS/L) has been awarded a contract to manufacture a new spacecraft for SES NEW SKIES. NSS-12, which will be the first satellite contract that SES NEW SKIES has awarded to SS/L, will be a state-of-the-art, hybrid C- and Ku-band satellite that will be located at 57º East Longitude over the Indian Ocean.



It will be based on SS/L's 1300 spacecraft and will be equipped with 40 C-band and 48 Ku-band active high-power transponders (36 MHz equivalents). Completion date is planned for 2009.

http://www.ses-newskies.com/http://www.ses-global.com

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JDSU Acquires Innocor for Broadband Test Solutions

JDSU agreed to acquire Innocor, a provider of broadband test solutions for network equipment manufacturers, for an undisclosed sum. JDSU expects to complete the acquisition in the current fiscal fourth quarter ending June 30, 2007.



Innocor's TestPoint product family is designed for development, verification and production of next-generation fibre channel, 10G Ethernet and SONET/SDH/OTN networks. TestPoint complements JDSU's ONT-506, the industry's first all-in-one portable tester for 40/43G networks, including jitter and wander.



Innocor, which is based in Ottawa, will be integrated with JDSU's Communications Test and Measurement (CommTest) business.



In a related development, JDSU also announced the appointment of Bill Mortimer as vice president and general manager of JDSU CommTest's Lab and Production division, overseeing the company's fiber optic, optical transport and Innocor business units.
http://www.jdsu.com

http://www.innocor.com/

• In January 2007, JDSU agreed to acquire Casabyte Inc., a provider of service quality monitoring solutions for mobile network operators, for an undisclosed sum. The acquisition is targeted at the need for quality of service (QoS) test solutions as network operators deliver bandwidth-intensive multimedia content over converged fixed- mobile networks.

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Joost Raises $45 Million from VCs and Media Companies

Joost has raised $45 million in funding to support the rollout of its Internet TV service. The funding came from five selected parties, each of whom invested in a minority percentage of the company. The investors include Index Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Li Ka Shing Foundation, CBS Corporation and Viacom.



As previously announced, CBS and Viacom are also content partners, providing channels and programming on Joost. In addition to its investment, CBS has contributed more than 2,000 hours of CBS entertainment, sports and news programming.

http://www.joost.com

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Utah's UBTA-UBET Deploys Occam Broadband Loop Carrier

UBTA-UBET Communications, which serves Utah's Uintah Basin, selected Occam Networks to assist with building out services to new homes under construction in its service area. UBTA-UBET serves more than 20,000 residential and business subscribers with POTS, broadband, and related services. UBTA-UBET Communications has purchased Occam's 6312 Optical Line Termination blades, 6252-02 ADSL2Plus and POTS with Gigabit Ethernet blades, 6440-01 Gigabit Optical Ethernet Transport blades and 6640-01 Subscriber Trunk Gateway blades.

http://www.occamnetworks.com

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Teridian Ships 100 Million Chips for STBs

Teridian Semiconductor announced a major company milestone -- the shipment of 100 million ICs into cable and satellite digital set-top boxes worldwide. Teridian's chips provide the connectivity in systems from DirectTV, EchoStar's Dish Network, Thomson, and Motorola. Teridian's broad STB product portfolio currently includes modem ICs for satellite STBs, smart card reader chips enabling conditional access (CA) features, A/V Pro video switch, and 10/100 Ethernet semiconductors enabling IP connectivity.

http://www.teridian.com

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NewStep and Kyocera Wireless Collaborate on CDMA/Wi-Fi FMC

NewStep Networks and Kyocera Wireless are conducting trials for CDMA-compliant Voice Call Continuity (VCC) solutions for fixed-mobile convergence. The companies have tested a Wi-Fi enabled prototype handset with the NewStep CSN fixed-mobile convergence platform. This enables seamless CDMA-to-VoIP handoffs.

The tests used Kyocera's next-generation, VCC-enabled CDMA/Wi-Fi handsets handsets.

NewStep offers two versions of its carrier-class CSN server-based software platform: the CSN30 for enterprises and small carriers, and the CSN1000 for large carriers.

http://www.newstep.com

http://www.kyocera-wireless.com

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Qwest Ready for Federal Networx Universal Contract

Qwest Communications announced the launch of products and services available under the Government Services Administration's (GSA's) Networx Universal contract. Qwest is a offering a full suite of 39 services required by the GSA. Qwest is one of just three nationwide providers for Networx Universal.



Qwest said it recently received an "Order to Proceed" from GSA and plans to take the first orders from federal agencies on the Networx Universal contract later this year.

http://www.qwest.com

http://www.gsanetworx.com

• In March 2007, The General Services Administration (GSA), which is the central procurement agency for the U.S. government, awarded a set of contracts under its "Networx" program valued at an estimated $20 billion over 10 years -- believed to be the largest networking contracts ever issued.
  
  
  
  Contract award recipients include AT&T, Verizon Business Services (MCI), and Qwest Government Services.
  
  

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