Telecommunications Americas articles from April 2001

Telecommunications Americas archives from April 2001

Kurt Dobbins.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer Ellacoya Networks Kurt Dobbins already has his retirement worked out: "Summers will be at our house on Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire; winters will be on Florida's west coast, probably near...

Symmetrical VDSL.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Telco Systems is squeezing more out of existing copper lines with its EdgeLink VDSL platform. With VDSL, providers can offer symmetrical VDSL at 10 Mbps, as opposed to other DSL flavors that are typically constrained to 5 Mbps of downstream...

Unlicensed Access.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Cirronet aims to dispel the interference myths of unlicensed wireless with its WaveBolt fixed wireless product. WaveBolt can mitigate any potential interference issues by using frequency hopping, spread spectrum RF technology, which works...

Non-Line-Of-Sight Router.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... While holy wars rage on about multicarrier OFDM as a non-line-of-sight panacea, Hybrid Networks' two-way MMDS ThruWAVE wireless router wants to prove that OFDM is not the only game in town. By using a mixture of single-carrier QPSK (quadrature...

Remote DSLAMs.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Nortel has enhanced its Universal Edge IMAS family of DSLAMs with the addition of two new products designed for remote deployment. The small footprint Universal Edge IMAS Remote is intended for installation in multitenant facilities or small...

OADM Debut.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Larscom has entered the optical add/drop multiplexer market with its Larscom 4800 that supports SONET and SDH transport on the backbone. The mux features a self-configurable software-defined backplane that lets the device automatically update...

Optical On-Ramp.(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Until that day when everything runs on IP-over-MPLS, carriers will continue to support leased line, frame relay and ATM requirements. This is where Acton, Mass., start-up Equipe Communications comes in with its E3200 switch that sits at the...

Edge Router.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... Gisco has added an edge router to its IP+Optical product portfolio. The Cisco 7600 OSR, which has a 256-Gbps switch fabric and a 30-million pps forwarding engine, features dual processors incorporating Cisco's PXF (Parallel express Forwarding)...

Multicell Base Station.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
April 1, 2001... While the supercell approach gave first-generation fixed wireless carriers a foot into the last-mile broadband service corridor, customer demand is driving the next-generation of fixed wireless to a multicell approach. ADC's Axity base...

Making Customer Billing Seamless.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... ASPs enhance quality of experience. An OSS is often seen as a necessary evil, but providers that understand its potential value can avoid many risks facing their less savvy competitors. Take the example of MCI's "Friends and Family" plan,...

Spectral Reuse: The Big Squeeze.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Providers could get up to eight times the capacity in every cell. Bandwidth is scarce. Everyone wants it, but not everyone can get it, particularly when dealing with fixed wireless broadband. However, analysts agree that the fixed wireless...

OptiMight: An All-Optical Transport Solution.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Despite the pervasiveness of DWDM systems in the core, optical technology hardly lacks for new challenges. One key hurdle is to push the optical signal over increasingly longer distances without performing expensive OEO...

Alleviating Metro Meltdown.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Hybrid Silica/MEMS push DWDM into the billion-dollar metro market. Few would argue that DWDM is the accepted technology to generate bandwidth for long-haul communications. Bits and bytes crisscross the world efficiently and cost...

Widely Tunable Lasers Give More Band for Buck.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Providers need a powerful, versatile laser technology to respond to changing capacity demands. People are logging on to the Internet by the millions, but today's numbers are tiny compared to projections for Internet traffic in just a few...

Crunching Numbers.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Traffic estimation and management are key for emerging IP networks. Carriers face an interesting dichotomy. On one hand, they must provide premium data services (e.g., gold/silver/bronze) so that enterprises can obtain lower-delay Internet...

A Pipeline to Profits.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Scalable, high-density networks bring high-speed Internet access to multitenant units. Within a few years an array of services from video on demand to electronic concierge services will be available to owners and managers of MTU...

CLECs A Call to Arms.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... Sound management and discipline, not free-flow funding, mark the companies that survive. Bad news plagues the service provider market today, with stock values down, companies bankrupt and workers cut adrift. CLECS once numbered in the...

Sewing Up the Customer.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... By providing "tailored" solutions, first-mile service providers take the pain out of being small. Rising demand for high-speed, broadband data services and applications by small and midsize businesses (SMBs) located in commercial office...

Going Soft on Switching.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Softswitches bring VoIP savings and efficiency to small and midsize businesses. Underserved SMBs (small and midsize businesses) are starting to receive long-awaited converged, bundled services from BLECs (building LEcs) that deploy VoIP...

But what Matters Is Their Impact on IP-based Services.(Technology Information)
April 1, 2001... Demand for bandwith-intensive applications such as dynamic, streaming content from residential and small business customers continues to escalate, forcing service providers to seek new ways to keep up. One solution is to deliver fiber access,...

Optical, Data Networks Pit the Smart in Buildings.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... All- optical, data-only networks make smart buildings more than islands in search of efficient cost-effective ways to communicate. Many vendors wire buildings for access to everything that telecom has to offer, but current technology and...

A DSLAM-Dunk?(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... DSL is a compelling choice for providers looking to crack the MTU market. As customer demand continues to escalate, the ability to deliver broadband Internet access Is no longer a key differentiator among service providers. To set...

Ethernet and ATM Are Both Sound Choices for PONs.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... Over the last year, PON (passive optical networking) has come back into vogue as service providers recognize the enormous market potential for optical access services. Specifically, PON enables providers to roll out a wide range of flexible...

Bridging the T1/T3 Gap.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Multilink frame relay the solution for Intermedia Communications. Because of the recent capital crunch, service providers are struggling to offer differentiated, value-added services that balance revenue potential with capital expense to...

Verizon Goes Global.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Verizon Communications is going global by building a network linking the United States with major cities in Europe, Asia and Latin America. The network integrates active network links between New York and Toronto and between Hawaii, Hong Kong,...

Takeoff Stage.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... The next-gen voice market may be gearing for takeoff, with worldwide revenues rising from $386 million in 2000 to $6 billion in 2004, according to Infonetics. That's good news for hardware vendors such as those providing voice and media...

Needed Boost.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Evangelists for the developing 802.17 RPR (Resilient Packet Ring) specification have formed an alliance to make this technology popular in metro networks--particularly those built with Ethernet switches. Alliance members include Cisco, Nortel...

Rapid Deployment.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... COX Communications has deployed Emperative Inc.'s software for rapid activation of cable modem subscribers in its systems in more than 35 cities in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri and Idaho. The deployment is worth potentially more than $1...

IP Service Switches to the Rescue.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... The lack of satisfactory business-grade SOHO IP service is a nagging issue. SOHOs require the same level of security and performance guarantees as large enterprises, but the technical capabilities and economics do not exist to deliver them. ...

Back talk.(Company Business and Marketing)(Interview)
April 1, 2001... A Conversation with Steve Blumenthal of Genuity As Genuity's senior vice president of engineering and technology. Steve Blumenthal is responsible for network architecture, network engineering and planning and product and service...

Helping Hands.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Passive optical network solution vendor Quantum Bridge Communications and Corning Cable Systems have agreed to work together. Corning will become Quantum Bridge's preferred provider of PON intrastructure solutions, while Quantum Bridge will be...

Intelligent Hardware.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Infonetics Research kicked of a new quarterly report on what it calls intelligent optical network hardware. Global revenues for this product category, which hit $5.37 billion last year, will jump to $8.52 billion this year. This generation of...

Support Mounts for G.SHDSL.(Technology Information)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Copper is getting a new lease on life with the ITU's ratification of G.991.2 (G.SHDSL), a standard that supports data rates from 192 kbps to 2.312 Mbps in 8 kbps increments over a single, twisted-pair. Verilink has developed a G.SHDSL access...

Untapped Unlicensed Band: A Blessing and a Curse.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... BOSTON--Just like the discovery of oil, service providers are now unearthing the hidden business potential of fixed unlicensed wireless. While fixed wireless via MMDS (multichannel multipoint distribution service) is fast becoming a viable...

Cash Flow.(Company Financial Information)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Stock prices might be giving the industry a scare, but money continues to flow to at least some start-ups. A big winner was Calient Networks, which pulled in $225 million on top of the $56 million it had already received. The company's...

Ethernet Equity.(Company Financial Information)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Yipes Communications received a C funding round of $200 million, raising the total equity in the company to $291 million. IntelliSpace's B financing round gave the ESP $60 million. With total financing of more than $100 million, IntelliSpace...

Wireless Partnerships Outsmart FCC.(Government Activity)
April 1, 2001... WASHINGTON, D.C.--The FCC was completely outmaneuvered in the latest spectrum license auction that was designed to give smaller wireless providers with gross revenues of less than $125 million a fighting chance. By forming partnerships with...

Free Space Optics Hits Mainstream.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Look Out, LMDS. Free space optical technologies are about to make the jump from niche application to billion-dollar industry, according to market research firm Allied Business Intelligence. The close to $119 million in revenue generated by...

Off and Running.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... Metro-Optix announced the general availability of its CityStream metro optical networking platform and completion of a 92,000-sq. ft R&D/manufacturing facility. Last December the vendor disclosed that OutReach Communications, an equipment and...

Broadband Bonanza.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2001... Owners of multitenant/multidwelling units are desperate to get broadband Internet access for their facilities, according to Cahners In-Stat Group, which predicted sales of equipment and services for this market will skyrocket from $370 million...

Local Service Competition Fizzles.(Company Business and Marketing)
April 1, 2001... WASHINGTON, D.C.--Competition for local-calling business has all but dried up, despite optimistic predictions when the Telecom Act was passed five years ago. AT&T, WorldCom and Sprint have barely gained a toehold in local markets and are...

Thinking Differently.(Industry Trend or Event)
April 1, 2001... This month's cover story is on the challenges facing CLECs, and I'm sure every CLEC that went bust or faces difficult times has a pretty good idea where things went wrong. While the endgame is all about acquiring customers--astonishingly some...