The Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA; www.tiaonline.org) and theUnited States Telecom Association (USTelecom; www.ustelecom.org) announced plans for NXTcomm, a single industry event that will replace both GLOBALCOMM and TelecomNEXT in 2007. The event will be held June 18-21, 2007, in Chicago.
Mintera Corp. (www.mintera.com) has raised $10 million in venture capital financing, co-led by investors Polaris Venture Partners and RRE Ventures. Also participating in the round were existing investors Court Square Ventures, Star Ventures, and Portview Communications Partners. This financing brings the total amount raised by Mintera to more than $54 million.
BroadLight (www.broadlight.com) and Delta Electronics (www.deltaww.com) have entered into an agreement for a strategic partnership, whereby Delta will assume the production and sale of BroadLight’s PON transceiver products.
JDSU (www.jdsu.com) has acquired the technology and patent portfolio of Metconnex Canada Inc., developer of wavelength-selective switch (WSS) modules. JDSU did not acquire any of Metconnex’s business operations. The price tag was $2.5 million. In connection with the acquisition and the liquidation of Metconnex, both parties agreed to dismiss all pending litigation, including litigation JDSU launched for alleged violation of JDSU patent and intellectual property rights.
Level 3 Communications (www.level3.com) has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Broadwing Corp. (www.broadwing.com), a publicly held provider of optical network communications services. Level 3 will pay $8.18 of cash plus 1.3411 shares of Level 3 common stock for each share of Broadwing common stock outstanding at closing. At the time of announcement Level 3 expected to pay approximately $744 million in cash and issue approximately 122 million shares.
Charter Communications Inc. (www.charter.com) is expanding availability of its converged data, voice, and video services with a network based on the Cisco Systems (www.cisco.com) IP Next-Generation Network architecture. Charter deployed the Cisco uBR10012 cable modem termination system (CMTS) to maintain the expansion of broadband speeds and to support the company’s growth of next-generation Charter Telephone services. Charter also utilizes the Cisco ONS 15454 multiservice transport platform with reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexing (ROADM).
Canadian service provider SaskTel (www.sasktel.com) claims it will be the first provider in North America to commercially deploy high-definition (HD) television services as part of an IPTV offering using new technologies such as MPEG4. SaskTel will leverage Alcatel’s (www.alcatel.com) Triple Play Service Delivery Architecture for the carrier’s Next Generation Access Infrastructure (NGAI) program. The Alcatel architecture offering includes the Alcatel 7750 Service Router, 7450 Ethernet Service Switch, and 7330 ISAM fiber-to-the-node (FTTN) platforms. The Alcatel 5620 Service Aware Manager and 5526 Access Management System provide management for the equipment.
The City of Amsterdam has begun construction of its city-wide fiber-optic network, CityNet. The network is expected to create an open and future-secure communication infrastructure through private and public collaboration. The target is to connect 450,000 citizens, institutes, and companies by 2010. CityNet is based on an MPLS core network with an E-FTTH design using a per-service virtual local area network (VLAN) architecture based onCisco Systems (www.cisco.com) equipment. The activation and use of the network will be managed by Cisco partner BBNed.
TXP Corp. (www.iphotonics.com), provider of premanufacturing services for the electronics industry, has signed a letter of intent with Siemens AG(www.siemens.com) to acquire the assets and intellectual property for its optical network terminal (ONT) technology, supporting both BPON and GPON standards. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2006.
Intexys Photonics (www.intexysphotonics.com), which specializes in high-speed, high-density optical interconnection, announced that it has closed €5 million in a Series A funding round. IRDI-ICSO, UFG Private Equity, BNP Paribas Private Equity, LC Capital, and EMERTEC joined existing investors in this financing round.
T-Com Venture Fund, the corporate venture fund of the Broadband/Fixed Network division of Deutsche Telekom AG, has invested in CoreOptics Inc. (www.coreoptics.com). The amount of the investment was not disclosed. The investment is in addition to the $28 million funding from new and existing investors CoreOptics announced this past July. T-Com Venture Fund will gain a seat on the CoreOptics board.
Ericsson (www.ericsson.com) will provide its DWDM optical technology to T-Com for the upgrade of its metro and regional networks in Germany.
Meanwhile, Ericsson (www.ericsson.com) and Telstra (www.telstra.com) have signed a 3-year deal valued at more than $230 million to help evolve the operator’s inter-capital, regional, and rural transport networks. The Ericsson transport equipment and software will upgrade capacity up to 10 Gbits/sec through the use of optical (SDH and DWDM) and radio technology. Telstra says the additional capacity will improve consumer access to high-speed Internet, video conferencing, music on demand, and video streaming.
Global Crossing (www.globalcrossing.com) has deployed Xtera’s (www.xtera.com) Nu-Wave XLS DWDM system on two unrepeatered submarine links between Ireland and the UK. The unrepeatered links are part of Global Crossing’s international network.
Ocean Broadband Networks Ltd. (OBN; www.obroadband.com.cn), a supplier of EPON equipment, has closed its Series B financing. Motorola Ventures and Atlas Venture have joined as new investors. OBN will use the funding to expand its China operations and commercialize and deploy its EPON offerings. The amount of the funding was not disclosed.
Alcatel (www.alcatel.com) has signed a contract with Chunghwa Telecom (CHT), Taiwan’s recently privatized incumbent operator, to deploy an aggregation and transport network for the delivery of such services as digital video. Alcatel will supply its data-aware Optical Multi-Service Node systems.
The Furukawa Electric Co., Ltd. (www.furukawa.co.jp) and Capella (www.capellainc.com) have entered into a strategic partnership to manufacture and market wavelength-selective switches (WSSs) based on Capella’s patented design and technologies. Furukawa and Capella will each independently source and manufacture WSSs. Furukawa will manufacture WSSs at its own factory in Japan and market them under the “FITEL” brand. Capella will continue to manufacture its WavePath product line at Fabrinet’s Pinehurst facility near Bangkok, Thailand.
Lucent Technologies (www.lucent.com) has been awarded a contract to supply SK Telecom(www.sktelecom.com), South Korea’s largest wireless service provider, with optical networking systems for building out SK’s intelligent backbone networks. Lucent will deliver its LambdaUnite MultiService Switch to major central offices of SK Telecom, completing the deployment by the end of December. Lucent’s Optical Management System will provide network management and provisioning capabilities for the deployment, and Lucent Worldwide Services will provide professional technical support.
Asia Netcom (www.asianetcom.com) and NEC (www.nec.co.jp) have signed an agreement to double the capacity on the southern segment of Asia Netcom’s pan-Asian submarine cable system, EAC. The upgrade on the EAC2 ring, which spans Hong Kong, Singapore, the Philippines, and Taiwan, will raise the bandwidth capacity on those routes to 160 Gbits/sec. This will be the third capacity expansion this year for Asia Netcom.
NEC Corp. (www.nec.co.jp) has completed the second phase of a telecommunications and broadcasting project to improve and expand the countrywide network in Uzbekistan. The ¥10 billion project comprises the construction of a 3,487-km fiber-optic network with transmission systems and 41 stations/89 bases for TV broadcasting, covering the entire nation.
The Ethernet Alliance (www.ethernetalliance.com), an industry group dedicated to the expansion of Ethernet technology, announced that members Excelight/Sumitomo, Fiberxon, Finisar, Fujitsu, Intel, Opnext, and Picolight successfully conducted multivendor interoperability testing of 10GBase-LRM optical interfaces in support of the IEEE standard 802.3aq-2006. Conducted at the Cisco Photonics Labs in Monza, Italy, from September 18-22, the tests evaluated various optical transceiver form factors (including X2, XFP, and SFP+) over 220 m of OM1 (62.5-µm) and 260 m of OM2 (50-µm) multimode fiber.
TriAccess Technologies Inc.(www.triaccesstech.com) is shipping its TAT6254 Radio Frequency Integrated Circuit (RFIC) video receiver and amplifier in volume, beginning with what it calls “a major order from a leading triplexer subassembly module developer.” The company says it is on track to fulfill the volume needs for all 10 of its customers, with general availability planned by the end of last month. The Santa Rosa, CA-based company also announced that it acquired multimillion-dollar funding from private sources to finance production and continuing operations. The sources and amount of this funding were not disclosed.