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Note: For WDM news after 10/01/06, please go to Optical Networking

WDM News (Before 10/01/06)

Top Story: China's Huawei leads in 2Q06 worldwide optical network hardware sales, up an amazing 83%
Worldwide optical network hardware revenue jumped 20% between the first and second quarter of 2006, reaching $3.1 billion in 2Q06, mainly due to big gains by China's Huawei and Alcatel, says Infonetics Research in its quarterly Optical Network Hardware report. The market is forecast to grow 14% between 2005 and 2009, when it will reach $12.3 billion.
"Huawei is the big story this quarter, with sales up an amazing 83% and a larger foothold in the EMEA region," said Michael Howard, principal analyst of Infonetics Research. "For the first time in optical network hardware market history, Alcatel is not in first place. Huawei jumped from 4th to 1st in one quarter, a rare feat."
2Q06 Optical Network Hardware Highlights
- On the leaderboard: #1 Huawei, #2 Alcatel, #3 Nortel
- WDM ROADM switch hardware sales are up 23%
- Metro equipment makes up 68% of all optical network hardware revenue, long haul 32%
"The service provider multiservice ATM switch segment continues its downward trend (down 24% since this time last year), while the IP and Carrier Ethernet switch and router segments continue to climb," commented Howard. "Carriers are outfitting their data networks to handle the coming IPTV traffic, and outfitting their mobile networks for the expected onslaught of mobile video and data traffic. Carrier Ethernet-grade equipment meets these needs."
Related Channels: WDM, Ethernet, Switching & Routing, Video, China

Top Story: Huawei leads in WDM
Ovum-RHK Tuesday announced its preliminary analysis of second quarter 2006 results for optical networking equipment vendors. In 2Q06 revenues for the segment were up 18 percent versus 1Q06 and up 11 percent versus the year-ago quarter.
2Q06 highlights for the optical networking equipment market and the top 7 vendors:
- 2Q06 revenues were $3.0 billion, up 11 percent versus 2Q05 and 18 percent versus 1Q06
- Huawei's revenues increased 81 percent sequentially and 54 percent versus 2Q05
- Siemens's revenues increased 33 percent sequentially and 46 percent versus 2Q05
- Nortel's revenues increased 30 percent sequentially and 7 percent versus 2Q05
- Alcatel's revenues were up 25 percent sequentially but down 5 percent versus 2Q05
- Fujitsu's, Lucent's, and Tellabs's revenues were down sequentially, but were at worst flat compared with 2Q05
Spending in the North American market once again outpaced the other regional markets, topping $1 billion for the second quarter in a row. The North American spending gain was once again broad-based, with metro and backbone WDM growth leading the way as network operators continued expanding their networks to accommodate growing video and packet data traffic.
"Global spending, particularly for metro and backbone WDM equipment, rose as existing users expanded their footprint and capacity for data and video services and as new builds by non-traditional customers-including mobile operators, MSOs, enterprises, research and education institutions, governments, and utilities-continued to expand," said Dana Cooperson, Vice President, Optical Networking and Practice Leader, Network Infrastructure at Ovum-RHK.
Related Channels: China

Huawei optical network products get certification from IBM
After obtaining the certification of Sun and McDATA for interoperability, the optical network solutions of Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. ("Huawei") passed the strict interoperability test of IBM in late May, 2006 and were added into the Interoperability Matrix of the IBM ESS, the DS 8000 and the DS 6000 series in August, 2006. The IBM ESS series are IBM's most widely deployed storage products, while the DS 8000 and the DS 6000 are the latest prevailing storage series launched by IBM.
As a leading supplier of network storage products and solutions, IBM is mainly engaged in providing storage solutions for high-end customers, like multinational financial firms, telecommunication operators, governments, and electric power plants. After being proved interoperable with the IBM ESS series, DS 8000 and DS 6000, Huawei's OptiX Metro 6100, 6040 & OptiX OSN 7500, 3500, 2500, 1500 were officially listed into IBM DS 8000 and DS 6000 Interoperability Matrix in August, 2006.
In recent years, Huawei's optical network solutions had been included into the operability matrix of most of the global leading providers of network storage products and solutions, such as Brocade, EMC, HP, IBM, McDATA and SUN... It shows that Huawei's optical network solutions can satisfy the most critical requirements of global leading network storage solutions for long distance data replication, helping Huawei's partners to bring more competitive solutions to enterprises of all sizes.
China's Huawei is a global leading vendor of optical network products and solutions. Its OptiX Metro 6100/6040 is mainly used in transmitting big granule service (e.g. STM-16/64, GE, 10GE etc.) and special services (e.g. ESCON, FICON, Fiber Channel, etc.). It is widely used in metropolitan backbone networks, local area networks, wideband data networks and
storage area networks, and the GE-based access layer. The Huawei OptiX OSN7500/3500/2500/1500 are new generation equipments sharing the same platform with MAN. Integrating the technologies of SDH, WDM, Ethernet, ATM, PDH, ESCON, FC/FICON, DVB-ASI, it can transmit voice, data, SAN, and video services efficiently on the same platform.
The node distance of the Metro & OSN series products can cover several thousand kilometers for SAN service, and all these products have been successfully deployed as data and SAN transport platform for finance and telecommunication enterprises worldwide.
Related Channels: China, Storage, Ethernet, WDM, SDH/SONET

Siemens showcases IPTV, Ethernet, DWDM, ROADM, GPON and IP-DSLAMs
At this year's Broadband World Forum in Paris, Siemens Communications is showcasing IPTV alongside the associated infrastructure components for Carrier Ethernet and optical networks. Europe is one of the main markets for the Siemens Group. The exhibits can be seen at Booth 2000 in the CNIT La Defense Conference Center.
Lower costs for operating fiber-optic lines: Surpass hiT 7300 Paris will be the world premiere for Surpass hiT 7300's live performance, a completely new DWDM (Dense Wave Division Multiplexing) platform for optical networks. Surpass hiT 7300 addresses the metropolitan, regional and long-haul network segments and is therefore suitable for all applications from high-density areas to regional backbone networks. The special feature of the new transport platform from Siemens is its high level of automation, which enables Surpass hiT 7300 to significantly reduce the costs for installation and ongoing operation and to make the ROADM (Reconfigurable Optical Add-Drop Multiplexer) technology, which has been very successful for long-haul applications, cost-effective for shorter transmission distances as well. In connection with a GPON (Gigabit Passive Optical Network) system from the Surpass hiX 57xx series, Siemens will demonstrate an end-to-end optical transport line in Paris that achieves data rates of up to 2.5 Gbps.
Siemens presents IP-DSLAMs (Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexers) that feature the mixed use of voice (analog connections and ISDN) and data (xDSL and Ethernet connection versions) within a single device (shelf).
Controlled by a softswitch, the voice traffic is first converted from TDM to VoIP and then forwarded via the aggregation network (Carrier Ethernet) to the IP network.
MSANs transmit the voice data via the protocols H.248 or SIP, which are used by IP softswitches to control the connection setup and to monitor the voice transmission.
Related Channels: Video, Ethernet, WDM, FTTP, xDSL

Ericsson and T-Com trial 43-Gbit/s DWDM optical transmission
Ericsson and Deutsche Telekom's fixed network unit, T-Com, have successfully completed the world's first trial for next-generation 43Gbps optical transmission technology over a 1000km link in T-Com's DWDM network in Germany.
Enabling 40Gbps connections between its IP core routers, this technology will allow T-Com to expand its network capacity in order to meet the rapid growth in broadband services usage.
Stefan Kindt, President Ericsson Germany, says: "Cooperation and trials with major customers such as Deutsche Telekom in areas of novel technologies are of vital interest for Ericsson. This trial has brought us a major step forward towards a common objective we share with our customers - achieving robust 43Gbps DWDM transmission over long distances at a competitive price."
The use of 40Gbps optical transmission facilitates a cost-efficient evolution for operators towards higher optical link capacities on existing and new infrastructure.
This technology enables 40Gbps long-distance transmission over existing 10Gbps DWDM infrastructure and provides the operator with traffic growth potential of up to 6.4Tbps per fiber pair.
The trial was conducted over T-Com's optic link between the German cities of Nuremberg and Oschatz (1047km), which is equipped with Ericsson's WDM platform.
Related Channels: WDM

Pirelli partners with Arasor
Pirelli Broadband Solutions, the broadband access and photonics company within the Pirelli Group, has entered into a strategic partnership with Arasor International Limited, a developer of integrated optoelectronic and wireless solutions, to jointly develop and provide ITLA optical solutions for global system integrators.
"The ITLA module from Pirelli and Arasor is under integration into Huawei's product to provide a state-of- the-art tunable solution for our global telecommunications network customers,"said David Huo, the Vice President of Optical Product Line of Huawei Technologies.
Under the partnership, Pirelli will go to market with a jointly developed new line of Integrable Tunable Laser Assembly (ITLA) modules for next-generation optical transport applications. The solution, a compact module with built-in control electronics and Pirelli's tunable laser, will be produced in Arasor's Guangzhou, China facility.
The ITLA is an ideal solution for DWDM optical network systems. Based on MSA standards, it can be easily integrated into an MSA 300-PIN board or a line card. With no moving parts needed to achieve tunability, the built-in tunable laser is Telcordia GR-468-CORE qualified. The initial set of customers will be networking companies operating in China, including Huawei Technologies, one of the leading systems companies providing optical solutions to telecommunications carriers worldwide.
"By teaming up with Arasor, Pirelli has chosen a proven and reliable partner to provide best-of-class optical solutions for the global marketplace," said Piergiovanni Matrona, Senior Vice President Sales Pirelli Broadband Solutions. "Furthermore, this strategic partnership allows us to build on Arasor's successful track record in China and provides an excellent platform through which we can enter this new market representing enormous potential."
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, China

Casema deploys C/DWDM platform to support Triple Play
Casema, the Dutch Cable TV operator, has successfully deployed the Transmode TS-1100 C/DWDM platform to support Triple Play services in The Netherlands.
The new network provides Casema with Gigabit Ethernet and SDH capacity to support expansion in existing triple play services, whilst also supporting high-capacity services directly to large enterprise customers. The initial phase of the deployment, which was in service by the end of August, comprised 40 nodes.
Casema is one of the largest cable TV operators in The Netherlands with a residential customer base of around 1.4 million subscribers. Casema's business division ('Casema Zakelijk') also provides a range of high-end services to enterprise customers
across the region.
Related Channels: WDM, Video

Deutsche Telekom's T-Com Venture Fund invests in CoreOptics
CoreOptics Inc., a leading designer and manufacturer of 10Gb/s and 40Gb/s optical networking subsystems, announced, that T-Com Venture Fund - the corporate venture fund of the broadband/Fixed Network division of Deutsche Telekom AG - has invested in the company.
This strategic investment emphasises the current development partnership between T-Com, CoreOptics and its manufacturing partners and backs today's roll-out of products and future innovation of CoreOptics.
"We are very pleased with T-Com Venture Fund's decision to invest in our company," said Hamid Arabzadeh, CoreOptics President and CEO. "This is indeed a strong validation of our company, our product portfolio and the future roadmap of our business to deliver innovative products to our carrier customers for their faster and more cost effective service delivery."
CoreOptics has been in forefront of developing innovative products to address carriers' requirements for innovative and cost effective service delivery. CoreOptics has developed advanced 10G/40G transponder subsystems products to overcome optical layer impairments, using innovative digital signal processing techniques based on the Maximum Likelihood Sequence Estimator (MLSE) algorithm. CoreOptics currently offers complete 10G DWDM, 40/43G Single Channel Short Reach and DWDM 300 pin MSA transponder subsystems.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, Funding

MRV's CWDM and DWDM achieve NEBS compliance
MRV COMMUNICATIONS, INC., a leading provider of products and services for WDM and optical transport, metro Ethernet, fiber optic components, 10GE, out-of-band networking and other service aware networking products, announced that its LambdaDriver(R) LD1600 and LD800 wave division multiplexers ("WDM") have achieved compliance with Network Equipment Building Systems ("NEBS") Level 3, the leading product safety and reliability standard for telecommunications equipment.
"Our carrier customers demand that the WDM systems they install be held to the highest standards of safety and reliability," said Noam Lotan, MRV President and CEO. "We designed the LambdaDriver coarse WDM ("CWDM") and dense WDM ("DWDM") system from the ground up to comply with NEBS Level 3 robust standards and this certification assures them that the LambdaDriver WDM meets those criteria."
The certification means that MRV's WDM systems meet all safety standards required for use in U.S. tier one central office applications. To become certified at NEBS Level 3, the LambdaDriver WDM system passed strict physical, electrical and environmental tests and demonstrated that MRV's CWDM and DWDM solutions will operate safely and reliably in a central office environment.
Related Channels: WDM

Kylia to demo BGT-based athermal mux/demux for FTTP at ECOC
Kylia, a first class supplier of mux/demux for DWDM transmissions based on Bulk Grating Technology (BGT), features its so called mics range dedicated to FTTH.
Passive athermicity is a key parameter of Kylia mics versus standard AWG especially for low spacing (eg 50 GHz or 25 GHz). In addition, the possibility for BGT mux to operate with narrow spacing down to 12.5 GHz offers an obvious solution for FTTH to cover its needs of increasing its bit rate in a near future.
“Nowadays, the mics is the only athermal mux/demux available on the market for spacings below 50 GHz, which fits exactly low spacing DWDM access needs” said Frederic Verluise, technical manager of Kylia.
Kylia will exhibit its mics range on booth 213 and on the FTTx resource centre at ECOC.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, FTTP

AOI touts DWDM transmitter lasers
Texas-based Applied Optoelectronics, Inc. (AOI), a leading manufacturer of laser diodes, photodetectors, and optical modules for fiber optic communications systems, has announced the introduction of dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) transmitter lasers capable of 200 km transmission distances.
AOI’s proprietary laser technology is the key to ensuring the high performance and reliability of these new devices. These DWDM lasers feature:
- Greater than 200 km (3,600 ps/nm) transmission in a single-mode fiber
- Integrated high speed, low dispersion penalty distributed-feedback (DFB), multiquantum-well (MQW) laser
- Compatible with direct modulation at up to 2.5 Gbps, for OC-48/STM-16 applications
- Available in the full range of C-band ITU-T G.692 recommended wavelengths at 100 GHz spacing.
- Hermetically sealed, industry-standard 14-pin butterfly package with optical isolator
- 25 W RF input impedance
- Meets GR 468 reliability specifications
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Ignis Photonyx to demo WDM-PON at ECOC in Cannes
Oslo, Norway-based Ignis Photonyx, the global manufacturer of state-of-the-art Planar Lightwave Circuit (PLC) components for the Access and Metro markets, will feature a working WDM-PON system at their booth during the ECOC (European Conference on Optical Communications) show in Cannes, France, September 25 – 27 at booth #261.
The WDM-PON system from LG-Nortel with Ignis components inside, will demonstrate triple play capability featuring IPTV, broadband data and telephony. By the virtue of ultimately having a wavelength to each home, bi-directional 100MB/s can be provided to satisfy bandwidth hungry services such as video-on-demand (VOD) and high speed data.
With their own fabricating plant in Denmark, Ignis Photonyx has established low-cost, high volume PLC component manufacturing for WDM-PON and other access platforms. The Ignis WDM-PON Athermal AWG (Arrayed Waveguide Grating) has been designed to ensure high-performance in harsh remote-node environmental conditions.
“The Ignis Athermal AWG components in the LG-Nortel WDM-PON equipment have been specifically designed and manufactured to perform the critical wavelength splitting function”, said Ignis Photonyx’ CEO Even Zimmer. “This live demo will prove that WDM-PON is a fully commercially-available working system and that Ignis PLC components are helping WDM-PON technology to make it a high bandwidth, cost-effective alternative to other access solutions.”
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, FTTP

Furukawa Electric, Capella partner on WSS for ROADM
The Furukawa Electric Co., Ltd. (Furukawa) and California-based Capella have entered into a strategic partnership to manufacture and market Wavelength Selective Switches (WSSs) needed for ROADM technologies, based on Capella’s patented design and technologies. Capella’s best in class WSS technology combined with Furukawa’s excellent reputation and large-scale business with system providers will greatly increase the global supply of WSSs.
Under the partnership, 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 award-winning WavePath® product line at Fabrinet’s Pinehurst facility near Bangkok, Thailand.
WSSs, the core of multi-degree reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexers (ROADMs), are in strong demand by Telecommunications Carriers and Cable Operators. ROADM technology will transform the traditional telecommunications network to cost effectively deliver broadband services such as voice over IP (VOIP) and digital video (IPTV).
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Mitsubishi Electric develops 10 Gbps DWDM transceiver
Tokyo-based Mitsubishi Electric Corporation has developed a 10 Gbps transceiver module for optical communication. This module is the first compact optical transceiver in the world to comply with the DWDM (Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing) system under the 10 Gbps Form-factor Pluggable Extended Multi-Source Agreement (XFP-E MSA), the industrial standard for 10 Gbps optical transceivers. Sample shipment will begin on October 1. Mitsubishi Electric will display the module at the 32nd European Exhibition of Optical Communication (ECOC), to be held September 24-28 in Cannes, France.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Corecess touts DWDM-PON
Seoul-based Corecess Inc., a pioneer and major provider of IP broadband access solutions for the advanced service market, announced next generation Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) Passive Optical Network (PON) platform that delivers up to 16 Gigabit Ethernet and/or Gigabit Ethernet PON (GEPON) over a pair of feeder fibers.
Built on company’s market proven “S5” optical access platform, where included are advanced optical component and transmission technologies from Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), this gigabit DWDM-PON improves service provider’s bandwidth offering in a scalable and cost effective way.
This new platform provides colorless operation by employing Reflective Semiconductor Optical Amplifier (RSOA) technology from ETRI, which is implemented in SFP and GBIC form factors. These plug-n-play optical transceivers provide smooth migration from legacy optical access platform, and carry 1.25Gbps data streams, which are muxed in the off-the-shelf unit. In addition, highly modular architecture and protocol transparency of WDM favors the new platform as a gradual approach for service provider to prepare future service demands for bandwidth and service.
“This launch is Corecess’ vision for next generation optical access platform. It combines packet’s economics and DWDM’s bandwidth capability and scalability, while eliminates installation and maintenance woes by utilizing modular platform, PON architecture and colorless optical transceivers to improve service provider’s capability of bandwidth provisioning economically. Colorless operation is required to make DWDM work for access. ETRI’s knowledge and technology of advanced optics inspires Corecess to implement new type of gigabit DWDM-PON.” said Yeong-bong Son, Executive VP of sales & marketing, Corecess. He also noted that scalability and versatility in gigabit provisioning makes this platform fit for not only optical access node but back-haul aggregation node for broadband.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, FTTP, Ethernet

Novera Optics launches DWDM FTTx access transport platform
Santa Clara, CA-based Novera Optics has announced the TurboLIGHT16, a dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) fiber-to-the-x (FTTx) optical access transport platform that is the first passive optical network (PON) system to deliver 20 Gbps of symmetrical bandwidth over a single feeder fiber.
Based on Novera Optics' Lambda-PON automatic wavelength-locking technology, TurboLIGHT16 eliminates the need for expensive wavelength-specific optical network units (ONUs) and eliminates problems of bandwidth sharing, bandwidth upgrades, and mixed-service delivery over a PON.
The new platform utilizes identical colorless Gigabit Ethernet DWDM optical transceivers for low installation and operating costs. It carries 16 1.25-Gbps bidirectional data streams using 32 independent wavelengths. In addition, the system provides the flexibility of mixed-mode capabilities, allowing transport at different bit rates (125 Mbps to 1.25 Gbps) on the same platform. Existing SpeedLIGHT(TM) modules provide a bit rate of 125 Mbps.
TurboLIGHT16 enables a wide range of differentiated, dedicated point-to-point connectivity services by providing an easy upgrade path, symmetrical downstream and upstream bandwidth, and multiprotocol transparency to allow any protocol and any data rate to be carried over the same fiber infrastructure.
"TurboLIGHT16 is the only PON system capable of delivering symmetrical 20 Gbps of bandwidth over a single fiber," said Bernd Hesse, vice president of marketing and business development at Novera Optics. "It dramatically improves the ability of service providers to deliver the bandwidth their customers need now and in the future by combining simplicity, security, scalability, and the versatility to deliver any service at any time. TurboLIGHT16 is the perfect fit for backhaul applications in the access network."
Related Channels: FTTP, WDM, Photonics

Time Warner Telecom completes redundant DWDM SONET protected fiber ring in Silicon Valley
Time Warner Telecom Inc., a provider of managed voice and data networking solutions for businesses, announced the completion of its 480-mile fiber ring in the Bay Area. The fully redundant DWDM SONET protected fiber ring extends service from San Francisco, the East Bay and Walnut Creek to the Silicon Valley cities of Palo Alto, San Jose, Santa Clara and Sunnyvale.
Time Warner Telecom operates and maintains a national fiber network infrastructure and a 10 Gbps IP backbone delivering state-of-the-art Ethernet-based communications services and converged voice and data solutions to enterprise and carrier customers across the U.S.
"This recent addition to our ring in the Bay Area creates the region's most robust and flexible conduit for delivering data and voice communications services," said Sonja Williams, sales director for Time Warner Telecom in San Francisco. "Our products and services, along with this 480-mile fiber ring, offer converged communications solutions to the most technically advanced and entrepreneurial businesses in the country."
Related Channels: Ethernet, WDM, SDH/SONET

Titan Photonics intros athermal AWG 100GHz 40-channel DWDM module
California-based Titan Photonics, a market leader in optical components and network subsystem by providing excellent engineering and product services, introduces Ultra Flat-Top Athermal Array Waveguide Grating (AAWG) 100GHz 40-Channel DWDM Module. This product provides the widest and flattest passband compared to any other AWG in the industry; and it is fully passive.
Titan’s ultra flat-top AAWG modules have bandwidth over 0.47 nm at -1.0 dB from the peak, comparing to 0.40 nm or less from other competitions. The insertion loss is less than 4.8dB while the adjacent isolation exceeds 26 dB over operating temperature from -5 to 65 oC.
Titan’s unique AAWG solution brings major performance and cost benefits to future optical network design. It eliminates the temperature control devices used in conventional AWG modules. The flat wide passband relaxes the need to control the transmitter wavelength to a precise value. The wide passband also allows system integrators to cascade multiple devices in the network span.
Titan’s AAWG has many advantages over traditional thin film filter (TFF) DWDM design. The size is only one-quarter of traditional cascaded TFF DWDM. Unlike thin film filter (TFF) DWDM, there is no splicing required inside the module, which it could potentially cause reliability problems. Another important advantage of AAWG is the cost, and the average cost of AAWG is only half of traditional TFF DWDM.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Siemens Communications intros new DWDM transport platform the U.S.
Siemens Communications, Inc. announced the U.S. introduction of its SURPASS(R) hiT 7300 optical transport platform, a highly automated yet low-cost transport solution for regional and long-haul applications.
Thanks to an intelligent automation strategy, the new Siemens SURPASS hiT 7300 platform combines the simplicity of metro systems with the performance of long-haul systems. This intelligent automation strategy minimizes complexity and therefore reduces procedural errors and simplifies network turn-up, operation and maintenance -- with savings of more than 60 percent, based on actual monitoring of build service costs to date.
With the SURPASS hiT 7300 DWDM transport platform, Siemens has realized a clear objective: to reduce the necessity for onsite work to an absolute minimum and to automate system setup to a major extent. Anything else that is required in terms of configuration, monitoring, or software updating is carried out from a central location.
Related Channels: WDM

Brazil's Padtec and Meriton partner on ROADM
Meriton Networks, specialists in Agile Optical Networking, and Padtec, a leading Brazilian specialist in DWDM systems, have entered into a strategic technology partnership. This agreement allows Padtec to extend its market leadership position by adding advanced Reconfigurable Optical Add-Drop Multiplexing (ROADM) capabilities based upon Meriton’s state-of-the-art technology. A spin-off from CPqD, the national R&D Center for Telecommunications, Padtec has leveraged its success selling CWDM and DWDM solutions to become a leading supplier of optical systems and components in Brazil. Padtec customers include leading network operators such as Embratel and Brasil Telecom.
Meriton’s ROADM products have been carrying live traffic in service provider networks for more than three years. Meriton offers the only optical transport platform on the market today that combines true wavelength selective switch (WSS) technology with a GMPLS control plane, 10-port multiservice GFP card, and a GUI-based network management system for truly “reconfigurable” optical add-drop multiplexing capabilities for the delivery of SONET/SDH and Ethernet-based services.
“Being selected by Padtec, who is widely recognized as the leading authority for optical solutions throughout Brazil, is further validation of our solution’s value proposition,” says Mike Pascoe, president and chief executive officer of Meriton Networks. “We look forward to helping Padtec achieve first mover advantage in the growing ROADM market in Brazil.”
“We believe that Meriton and Padtec, by combining their technological competencies, can deliver very competitive solutions,” said Jorge Salomão Pereira, chief executive officer of Padtec. “We are very excited to be able to offer an integrated solution to our customer base not only for the Brazilian market, but on a worldwide basis.”
Related Channels: WDM

Hungary's Magyar deploys Harmonic CWDM
Hungary's leading telecommunications service provider and a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom, has deployed Harmonic's FLXLink commercial services solution to bring high-speed IP-based services to apartment buildings and other multiple dwelling units (MDU). Deployed in conjunction with Synergon Information Systems Plc., a leading system integrator in the region, this scalable solution enabled Magyar Telekom to leverage its existing network infrastructure to deliver 100 megabits per second (Mbps) fiber links to buildings throughout its broad service area.
Magyar Telekom operates optical networks that serve approximately three-quarters of Hungary's population, and a wireless network with complete nationwide coverage. With Harmonic's versatile FLXLink solution, which uses coarse wavelength division multiplexing (CWDM) technology, Magyar Telekom was able to simply add wavelengths to its existing fiber network to securely transmit ultra high-speed IP-based services to a building or an individual customer.
Related Channels: WDM

Telecom Engineering USA completes DWDM engineering job in Minnesota
Minnesota-based Telecom Engineering USA, Inc. have completes the engineering and supply of a multi node 16 wavelength DWDM network for Park Region Mutual Telephone Company in Minnesota.
This leading edge network uses MRV Communications Fiber Driver Product Line transponders and TIP 16 wavelength universal DWDM multiplexers capable of transmission rates up to 10 Gbps / OC-192 on each wavelength. Using only one bidirectional fiber strand connection between sites, the network capacity is capable of 80 Gbps. Existing Cisco 15454 SONET and GigE traffic are currently transported over this DWDM backbone with ample room for growth.
Additional features of this new network include; fully protocol and data rate transparent, optical client side interfaces from 100 Mbps to 10 Gbps, accepts alien wavelengths, expandable fiber backbone to 80 Gbps, GigE multiplexing, user friendly network management and remote access GUI , easy expansion using pluggables such as SFP, XFP, GBIC, and Xenpak.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics

Photonics vendor TeraXion appoints Jim Frappier as Sales VP
Canada-based TeraXion, a technology leader in the development of advanced optical components for high-speed communications networks, is pleased to announce the appointment of Jim Frappier as Vice President, Sales of the company.
Mr. Frappier will be responsible for global sales, marcom, and strategic OEM relationships to better capitalize on worldwide market opportunities. Mr. Frappier will focus on driving forward sales of Teraxion telecom products while broadening the company’s customer base including OEM relationships worldwide.
Strategic marketing activities for Teraxion will be managed by Dr. Martin Guy - VP of Product Line Management and Technology.
“With his extensive experience in major account management, Jim will bring our sales organization to a new level. Our products are rapidly gaining traction and the multiplying number of active opportunities is calling for enhanced ways of strengthening key customer relationships and our channels to the customer,” explains Alain Chandonnet, President of TeraXion.
Prior to TeraXion Mr. Frappier was responsible for business development and marketing of the NRC’s - Canadian Photonics Fabrication Centre (CPFC), and was a business development manager. Mr. Frappier has worked as a Director of Sales for both emerging technology companies such as, Scion Photonics (San Jose) and established industry leaders such as Tyco Electronics and JDS Uniphase. Mr. Frappier is an executive member of the Ottawa Photonics Cluster (OPC) and a founding member of the International Photonics Commercialization Alliance (IPCA).
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, FTTP, Appointments

BSNL, MTNL to deploy undersea cable systems for more bandwidth capacities
Due to increasing competition, Indian telecom companies are rapidly deploying undersea cable systems that will enable corporate and consumer customers to get more bandwidth capacities for communications/data connectivity at affordable prices.
Inaugurating Reliance's $400-million Falcon cable system that would connect India with 10 nations in the Middle East and Africa, communications minister Dayanidhi Maran said state-owned phone companies BSNL and MTNL had decided to jointly lay submarine cable system to connect Southeast Asia and Middle East.
That cable would eventually connect the US and Europe, adding that BSNL was about to launch India-Sri Lanka cable.
"The present submarine cable scenario is not very encouraging from the Indian point of view, as there are only four Indian bandwidth providers - VSNL, Bharti, Reliance and BSNL - while there are 33 in London, 32 in the USA, 32 in Germany, 24 in France and 14 in South Korea," he said.
Built at the cost of $400 million, Falcon, which was already operational, would connect India with Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, UAE, Yemen, Sri Lanka and Maldives.
Officials said the idea behind connecting the Middle East was to tap into the rapid growth of trade, tourism and communications in the region.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics

Jiangsu Telecom protects DWDM backbone
Nanjing Putian, a major vendor to the Chinese telecommunications industry, and Lynx Photonic Networks, the leading provider of network-availability and business-continuity solutions, announced the deployment of their co-branded LightLEADERT protection systems at Jiangsu Telecom. The Lynx protection systems will provide Jiangsu Telecom with guaranteed protection of its critical DWDM (dense wavelength division multiplexing) backbone within less then 10 milliseconds of a link failure.
"Our backbone carries critical communication traffic and cannot tolerate any failures," said Cao Shun Xiang, deputy director of Jiangsu Telecom. "We have been looking for protection systems that will provide the high level of network availability that our customers deserve. Lynx-Putian's LightLEADER systems, we believe, will meet these stringent requirements, and we anticipate great improvement in our service quality."
Related Channels: China, WDM, Photonics

BaySpec to speak at Alcatel/Intel Capital Technology Day in Paris
Intel Capital and Alcatel have invited BaySpec, Inc. to attend the Alcatel/ Intel Capital Technology Day on Tuesday, October 3rd, 2006 at Alcatel headquarters in Paris.
An Intel Capital Technology Day event brings a group of emerging technology companies from Intel Capital's portfolio on-site to a corporate customer (Alcatel in this case), to meet with key decision makers and influencers for potential adoption by the company for internal use, or for use in solutions for the customer's client projects. Alcatel selected BaySpec and fewer than 10 other companies from Intel Capital's Innovation Catalog of over 300 portfolio companies, based on matching technology interests.
BaySpec family of market leading monitoring products enable Agile Optical Networking, including: 100 or 50 GHz DWDM Optical Channel Performance Monitors, 10/40 G/s mixing Optical Channel Performance Monitors, Ultra-wideband Optical Spectrum Analyzers, CWDM Optical Channel Performance Monitors, Athermal Mux/Demuxes and Intelligent EDFAs. Applications include: reconfigurable optical add/drop monitoring, physical layer monitoring for provisioning and commissioning optical networks, real-time fault detection and isolation in DWDM systems, EDFA gain balancing, channel power/ wavelength/ and OSNR measurements, and handheld battery-operated CWDM & DWDM field test equipment for low-cost testing in triple-play fiber deployments. Agile Optical Networks offer dynamic reconfigurability, advanced wavelength services, and reduced OpEx and CapEx.
BaySpec, Inc. is based in Fremont, California and founded in 2000 with venture funding from Kaiyuan Group, Intel Capital, Cisco Systems, H&Q Asia Fund, CDIB, Finisar, JDSU as well as private investors.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Bookham secures $23.5 million through private placement of its common stock
Optical components and subsystems vendor Bookham, Inc. has entered into a definitive agreement for the private placement of 8,696,000 newly issued shares of common stock at $2.70 per share, and warrants to purchase 2,174,000 shares of common stock, with selected institutional investors, for gross proceeds of approximately $23.5 million. The warrants, which have a term of five years and will become exercisable after March 1, 2007, have an exercise price of $4.00 per share. This represents a premium of approximately 26 percent over the closing price of the Company's common stock on August 31, 2006. Cowen & Company, LLC, acted as the sole placement agent for this offering. Certain additional institutional investors will have the right to purchase, on or before September 19, 2006, up to 2,898,667 shares of common stock and warrants to purchase up to 724,667 shares of common stock at the same purchase price as the initial investors.
The Company intends to use the proceeds for general working capital purposes.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Huawei opens new facility in India
China's Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. ("Huawei"), a leader in providing next generation telecommunications network solutions for operators around the world, today announced that Huawei Technologies India, its largest overseas software R&D center has opened a new facility in Bangalore, to develop optical network products and wireless LAN solutions.
In particular, the new center will work on Huawei's new generation Optix series of intelligent optical network products based on cutting edge optical technologies. Huawei's optical solutions are widely deployed by major service providers for providing IPTV services, Triple Play (high speed Internet, television and voice) services, mobile services and leased line services to their customers.
"Huawei Technologies India has been involved in key technology development, and this expansion will broaden our portfolio with the addition of new domains such as optical solutions and wireless LAN," said Mr. Virendra Gupta, Vice President and Head of Embedded Solutions at Huawei Technologies India.
The new facility to accommodate 180 software engineers will also house team working on Wireless LAN domain related software development catering to the Wireless Switch and Wireless Access Points products.
"Huawei India provides its staff opportunity to work on development of cutting edge technologies, and the new facility will be engaged in the development of cutting edge products/components in wireless LAN domain and Optical domain," said Mr. George Huang, Chief Operating Officer of Huawei Technologies India.
Huawei's optical network ranked No.2 in the global optical network market, and ranked No.1 in the global LH+MR DWDM market in 2005, according to statistics provided by Ovum-RHK. Huawei has been ranked No.1 in the Asia-Pacific optical network market for the past five years.
Related Channels: Wireless, Video, WDM, OSS/BSS, Switching & Routing, China

Bhaskar Thyagarajan joins FLAG Telecom as Marketing VP
Bhaskar Thyagarajan has joined FLAG Telecom as Vice President, Marketing and lead the Product Management & Development, Partners & Alliance Program and Customer Solutions functions of the company. Bhaskar comes to FLAG after an 18 years stint with Sprint, and was recently the Executive Director, Global Data Product Sales for Asia, India, Europe and Middle East & Africa. Bhaskar brings with him over 17 years experience in sales, partnership management, business development, global network planning and design in the global telecom market. Primarily responsible for the wholesale and enterprise market segments, he was a key player in building and marketing Sprint's Tier 1 global IP network and product suite. Bhaskar holds degrees in MBA degree (University of Missouri, USA) and Bachelor of Electrical Engineering (Kolkata University) and a Master’s diploma in Industrial Management (IIT-Kharagpur).
Related Channels: WDM

Infinera touts 10Gbit/s long-haul DWDM shipments
California-based Infinera extended its lead in 10 Gigabits/second (Gb/s) long-haul DWDM shipments in the second quarter of 2006 with a 29% global market share, according to data from independent analyst firm the Dell’Oro Group.
Infinera co-founder and CEO Jagdeep Singh noted that in the second quarter Infinera announced several new customers including two nationwide carriers, Global Crossing and Broadwing. “We were very pleased to see increasing uptake of the Digital Optical Networks architecture by our customers in the second quarter, as service providers are increasingly recognizing the technical and economic benefits that photonic integration can bring,” he said.
As a new, private company, Infinera’s shipments are not broken out as a separate line item in Dell’Oro’s published tables, but are included in Dell’Oro’s totals. According to Dell’Oro data, the top three vendors in 10 Gb/s long-haul shipments in the second quarter were Infinera with a 29.4% market share, Nortel with 16.4% share and Siemens with 11.5% share. According to Dell’Oro Group data, Infinera has now led in 10 Gb/s long-haul DWDM shipments for the last four quarters.
Related Channels: WDM

Harmonic announces DWDM transmitters and receivers for extending HFC bandwidth
California-based Harmonic Inc. announced new high performance transmitters and receivers designed to extend hybrid fiber coax (HFC) network bandwidth. The new PWRLink™ 1 GHz broadcast transmitters, METROLink™ 1 GHz DWDM forward path transmitters for narrowcast applications and MAXLink™ 1 GHz receivers support substantially more capacity to the home. This capability is critical as cable operators add more personalized and on-demand video services, greater amounts of high-speed Internet, VoIP and commercial services. The transition to 1 GHz capacity in the cable network is underway, and already more than two million homes are served by Harmonic's range of scalable PWRBlazer™ 1 GHz nodes.
In addition, as part of its suite of higher bandwidth capable products, Harmonic has introduced a DWDM digital return path transmitter that supports 65 MHz—a key requirement for node segmentation solutions—and complements Harmonic's 65 MHz CWDM return path transmitter.
Viewers today are consuming ever increasing amounts of video content, whether delivered via traditional broadcast television, emerging video-on-demand (VOD) services or streamed over IP. This includes high definition television, as well as narrowcast services such as VOD, personal video recorders (PVR), network PVR, time-shifted TV and Internet gaming. This trend results in the need for operators to place greater amounts of digital content on the network, and necessitates more bandwidth to the home.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics, Video, Cable MSO

China's Huawei to undertake Greater Mekong Subregion Information Superhighway (GMS-IS) project for Cambodia
China's Huawei Technologies signed a commercial contract with Telecommunication Cambodia (TC) to materialize an internet construction project which aims to provide the country with a digital information exchange platform to be shared with its neighbors.
Under the project, an optical telecommunication network will be laid all over the country to allow high-quality internet communication among Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and China.
This is a part of the Greater Mekong Subregion Information Superhighway (GMS-IS) Plan, for which the Chinese government will extend policy and financial support as well as 17.5 million U.S. dollars worth of preferential loans, said Duan Jinzhu, counselor at the Chinese Embassy.
"Basic facility construction such as the GMS-IS project is among the important cooperation between China and Cambodia. China is willing to give all possible aids to Cambodia to beef up its economic development," Duan added.
Meanwhile, Secretary of State of Cambodian Ministry of Post and Telecommunications Chin Bun Sean emphasized that the project is very important for the region to step up its overall economic and social development.
"We hope the information superhighway to be completed soon to contribute to the GMS countries and their people," he added.
Related Channels: China, WDM

Asia Netcom supports Tricom Asia's submarine Vietnam Hong Kong Cable (VNHKC) system
Asia Netcom has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Tricom Asia. Under the MoU, Asia Netcom will provide Tricom Asia with cable landing station, PoP, backhaul and operations and maintenance services to support the landing of the Vietnam Hong Kong Cable (VNHKC) system in China's Hong Kong.
"With this agreement, Tricom not only becomes a strategic customer for Asia Netcom, but the company's new subsea cable makes them an important partner in bringing seamless connectivity to one of the region's fastest growing markets -- Vietnam," said Bill Barney, Asia Netcom's president and chief executive officer. "At the same time, Tricom's selection of our infrastructure is further validation of the quality of our facilities, which also support our own subsea network."
After a tendering process that began in mid-2005, and following a thorough evaluation of several suppliers, Tricom Asia selected Asia Netcom for its state-of-the-art cable landing station.
"Asia Netcom boasts one of the most well-connected, carrier neutral datacenters in Hong Kong, and Tricom Asia was impressed with Asia Netcom's long term commitment to service the VNHKC," said Peter Landgren, CEO and president of Tricom Asia. "The infrastructure Asia Netcom provides in Hong Kong and the extensive onward connectivity, not only in the region but also globally, is something that will secure a high service level to us, our partners and our customers."
Related Channels: China, WDM, Photonics

Omron to acquire NHK Spring's FTTH optical coupler business
Tokyo-based OMRON Corporation,a global leader in automation, sensing and control technologies, has reached a preliminary agreement with NHK Spring Co., Ltd. to acquire NHK Spring's FTTH optical coupler business.
NHK Spring's optical coupler business includes the component micro-fabrication technologies and film deposition technologies required to produce high-performance quartz optical waveguides, as well as the development, manufacture, and sale of optical coupler modules that incorporate these optical waveguides. NHK Spring is a top supplier of optical couplers in North America, with total sales of 1.3 billion yen in fiscal 2005. OMRON, as the first company in the world to commercialize an optical coupler module incorporating proprietary stacked polymer optical waveguide technology, expects to enjoy substantial synergies through this acquisition.
The FTTH market is expanding rapidly in Japan and the United States, and in future this growth is expected to extend into Europe and Asia. OMRON intends to combine NHK Spring's quartz optical waveguide technology with its own stacked polymer optical waveguide technology to create new high-performance, cost-competitive products that will reinforce its product lineup and expand its business in the FTTH optical coupler market. This agreement is also expected to help stimulate sales of OMRON's optical switches and CWDM Mux/Demux Modules.
As a result of this acquisition and the synergies it is expected to generate, OMRON forecasts that its optical communications component business will achieve total sales in fiscal 2006 of approximately 2 billion yen. NHK Spring and OMRON are now working to finalize the details of this agreement, which is scheduled to take effect on November 1, 2006.
Related Channels: Photonics, FTTP, WDM

WDM vendors should pay attention to video applications for growth: Online video and IPTV services drive WDM growth
A newly published report by Dell'Oro Group, the trusted source for market information about the networking and telecommunications industries, reveals that worldwide sales of Optical Transport equipment reached $2.3 billion in the second quarter of 2006--the highest quarterly results since the fourth quarter of 2001-- primarily on strong WDM sales. Worldwide sales for WDM equipment grew 35% in the second quarter year-over-year with the majority of the growth coming from North America and the EMEA regions.
"The explosion of video content on the Internet and the emergence of IPTV services are pushing the limits of traditional optical networking technology," said Shin Umeda, Principal Analyst for Optical Transport research at Dell'Oro Group. "WDM systems offer the capacity and scalability that telecom service providers and cable operators require to address the burgeoning traffic growth on their networks," he added.
Related Channels: Video, WDM, Photonics

VSNL International to build high-capacity submarine cable system linking Singapore, Hong Kong, and Japan
VSNL Singapore, the international arm of Indian carrier VSNL, plans to build a new high-capacity submarine cable system linking Singapore, Hong Kong, and Japan.
The new intra-Asia cable will enable VSNL International to better serve its global customers doing business in and with the burgeoning Asia-Pacific markets.
This investment follows the recent announcement by VSNL to build a new system from India to Europe that will provide connectivity to the Gulf region and the African continent.
The intra-Asia cable, when combined with the Tata Indicom Cable System and the TGN-Pacific cable system, will complete VSNL International's multi-Terabit capability from India to Asia and onward to the US, the carrier said.
"With Asian bandwidth demand forecasted to grow at an average of 27% CAGR, VSNL International is taking steps to expand its capacity to serve customers in the booming intra-Asia market," said Vinod Kumar, president of VSNL International.
VSNL International will commence construction of the new intra-Asia cable by December.
The company is already in the process of finalizing design details, selecting suppliers and identifying additional partners for the project. Future potential landing stations for the cable include locations in China, Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Guam.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics

Telecom Egypt selects Huawei DWDM technology
China's Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. ("Huawei"), a leader in providing next generation telecommunications network solutions for operators around the world, has been selected by Egypts largest telecommunications company, Telecom Egypt, to provide Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) technology.
This technology enables multiple video, audio, and data channels to be transmitted over one fiber and increases the efficiency and bandwidth of networks by supporting different formats. The three year contract will increase the capacity of Telecom Egypts Cairo network and reduce operating costs while increasing quality of service.
"Emerging demand for advanced, higher-quality communications poses a paradigm-shifting challenge to telephone operators. Originally designed to carry circuit-switched voice traffic, existing networks now need to carry heavy data loads, deliver streaming video, and provide Internet access to a rapidly growing user base. The decision to evolve our network is significant and is the result of in-depth research and analysis. Huawei offers industry leading transmission network architecture with its DWDM technology and enable us to give our customers access to new, advanced services while enhancing the security and quality of existing services," said Dawlat El Badawi, planning vice chairman, Telecom Egypt.
The Huawei DWDM equipment has been applied to over 250 national and inter-city transmission networks. In the Middle East, Huawei DWDM Technologies have been widely adopted in many countries like the UAE, Saudi Arabia Oman, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco.
As a leading supplier in the global optical market providing full set of NMS, DWDM, MSTP, intelligent optical and network solutions, Huawei was named Optical vendor of the Year for the second year running at the 2006 Frost & Sullivan Asia Pacific ICT Awards. Huawei is devoted to bringing value-added solutions in network programming, technology innovation, and customized solutions to telecom operators globally.
"We are very proud to work with Telecom Egypt to plan and implement the first DWDM national backbone network in the country," said Thomas Zhu, managing director, Huawei Technologies, Egypt. "Introducing new technology is vital for telecom operators to beat competition and changes in technology will influence the mobile communications value chain, creating a new trend of multimedia convergence. We deployed the Cairo transmission network of Telecom Egypt to connect the various areas in Cairo and this validates the excellent partnership between Telecom Egypt and Huawei."
Related Channels: WDM

Harmonic to showcase CWDM at IBC 2006
At IBC 2006 booth #1.361, Harmonic will introduce a range of new video stream processing, encoding and broadband networking products that dramatically improve picture quality and bandwidth utilization.
New and featured solutions at IBC 2006 will include VOD, nPVR, HD and SD MPEG-4 AVC (H.264) encoding systems, re-encoding, encryption, bulk descrambling, seamless splicing, wireless backhaul and CWDM-based commercial services platform.
Related Channels: Video, WDM

Thales and Alcatel secure DWDM wavelengths
Thales Security and Alcatel announced a major breakthrough in the security of DWDM wavelengths for financial and government applications. The Thales SONET Datacryptor® has successfully demonstrated encryption of an aggregate SONET signal generated by an Alcatel 1677 SL provisioned with optional Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) modules and Erbium Doped Fiber Amplifiers (EDFA). In addition to providing DWDM-based encryption, this testing validates that the Thales SONET Datacryptor does not introduce significant delays or impairments when used with ITU optics for SONET protection schemes, including Linear, Unidirectional Path-Switched Ring, and Bidirectional Line-Switched Ring.
DWDM technology allows network operators to increase the capacity of their existing fiber networks while avoiding costly installation of additional fiber infrastructure. EDFAs allow operators to extend the reach of their DWDM signals without the need for numerous, costly regeneration sites. As demand within the financial and government sector for high capacity transmission increases, this testing validates that the Thales SONET Datacryptor and the Alcatel 1677 SL, with the inclusion of DWDM optics, provides the increased capacity of DWDM while still offering secure transmission of mission-critical information.
New federal regulations mandate that large financial institutions and the U.S. Government encrypt their Wide Area Network links to improve overall security. While traditional DWDM-based encryption services have been limited to the entire fiber, Thales and Alcatel have demonstrated per-wavelength encryption. This solution allows these operators to cost effectively expand their effective bandwidth while securing their data in a more flexible and efficient manner.
"Information security, via encryption, is rapidly becoming an essential component of doing business," said Steven Pickett, senior vice president and general manager of Alcatel's optical networking activities in North America. "As the world leader in optical networking, Alcatel is committed to meeting the needs of our customers. By working with Thales to prove the effectiveness of the SONET Datacryptor, Alcatel continues to provide and support the latest technologies and applications required by the market."
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics, Security, SDH/SONET

Novera intros symmetrical 20 Gbps WDM-PON
California-based Novera Optics announced the TurboLIGHT™16, a dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) fiber-to-the-x (FTTx) optical access transport platform that is the first passive optical network (PON) system to deliver 20 Gbps of symmetrical bandwidth over a single feeder fiber.
Based on Novera Optics' ë-PON™ (Lambda-PON) automatic wavelength-locking technology, TurboLIGHT16 eliminates the need for expensive wavelength-specific optical network units (ONUs) and eliminates problems of bandwidth sharing, bandwidth upgrades, and mixed-service delivery over a PON.
The new platform utilizes identical colorless Gigabit Ethernet DWDM optical transceivers for low installation and operating costs. It carries 16 1.25-Gbps bidirectional data streams using 32 independent wavelengths. In addition, the system provides the flexibility of mixed-mode capabilities, allowing transport at different bit rates (125 Mbps to 1.25 Gbps) on the same platform. Existing SpeedLIGHT™ modules provide a bit rate of 125 Mbps.
TurboLIGHT16 enables a wide range of differentiated, dedicated point-to-point connectivity services by providing an easy upgrade path, symmetrical downstream and upstream bandwidth, and multiprotocol transparency to allow any protocol and any data rate to be carried over the same fiber infrastructure.
"TurboLIGHT16 is the only PON system capable of delivering symmetrical 20 Gbps of bandwidth over a single fiber," said Bernd Hesse, vice president of marketing and business development at Novera Optics. "It dramatically improves the ability of service providers to deliver the bandwidth their customers need now and in the future by combining simplicity, security, scalability, and the versatility to deliver any service at any time. TurboLIGHT16 is the perfect fit for backhaul applications in the access network."
Related Channels: FTTP, WDM, Photonics

Covega raises $10M
Washington-based Covega Corporation, a leading provider of state-of-the-art, opto-electronic components and subsystems, has raised ten million dollars in expansion financing. Core Capital Partners, Intersouth Partners, and Optical Capital Group/HRLD were the lead investors in this round, which also included Siemens Venture Capital and Square One Bank. Covega has raised $30 million since its inception in February 2003 and will use this latest round to fund working capital growth, expansion of manufacturing capacities and acceleration of the product roadmap for new tunable optical components.
"Demand for our industry leading gain chips and small form factor modulators for tunable lasers and transponders has dramatically increased to record volumes over the last year. This has helped our business to grow over 25% quarter over quarter at more than twice the industry average. This recent infusion of capital will enable us to scale our operations to match the growth in the marketplace," said Joe Dixon, CEO of Covega Corporation.
One of Covega's major drivers has been "wavelength tunability," which both reduces network capital and operating costs, and enables the deployment of agile networks. Products such as Covega's gain chips allow tunable laser and transponder providers to launch light further and tune over a significantly greater bandwidth than competing solutions. This lowers their overall costs by minimizing the need for expensive optical signal regeneration or amplification. It also enables carrier customers to tune these products to any specific wavelength, directly "in the field," by using a single component.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, Funding

Taiwan's APTG selects Alcatel's optical solution
Alcatel has signed a contract with Asia Pacific Telecom Group (APTG) - a leading incumbent operator offering fixed and 3G mobile services, and cable TV services - to upgrade and expand its existing network in Taiwan with Alcatel's optical transport solution. The project will allow APTG to support new Ethernet-based applications for addressing the increased traffic requirements of research institutions, as well as to enhance mobile traffic backhaul capabilities.
Alcatel will deploy its optical multi-service and dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) technologies, enabling APTG to significantly increase its network capacity, flexibility and performance. The Alcatel solution will be based on its 1626 Light Manager (LM) multi-reach DWDM system that maximizes the capacity of core optical networks, while lowering the overall transmission cost per bit.
Additionally, Alcatel will supply its data-aware Optical Multi-Service Node (OMSN) providing APTG with a single platform optimized to aggregate multiple traffic types and backhaul the mobile traffic, carried over the APTG CDMA network, from base stations to the core. Under the terms of the contract, Alcatel will also upgrade its Alcatel 1350 management suite - which allows the management of packet, TDM and wavelength connectivity services – further enabling operational cost-savings.
Related Channels: WDM

Fujikura Europe unveils 10G XFP transceivers for 80km
Fujikura Europe strengthens its metro portfolio with its new 10G XFP transceivers for 80km, released under its Sigma Links brand.
There are two versions in full production; a single wavelength module (SLB138H) compliant with ITU G659 standards and a 100GHz DWDM module (SLB1D8H-C) for higher capacity applications.
Both modules are fully compliant with the MSA 4.0 standards, allowing multi-rate operation from 9.95 to 11.1Gbps. Both utilise cooled 1550nm EML modulators to produce excellent chirp characteristics and dispersion penalties better than 1dB.
“Even though Sigma Links is a relatively new name for the European Market” says Simon Richardson, product manager, at Fujikura Europe Ltd. “It is a leading brand in the Asian market fully backed by our parent company Fujikura Ltd., with established large scale production for both XFP and the 300PIN modules. Our objective is to replicate that success within the European market using the LR XFP modules as an excellent platform to launch this drive”.
Sigma Links, previously a joint venture brand with OKI semiconductors, is now 100% owned by Fujikura Ltd.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM

Asia Netcom, Clara Online to partner on fast backbone connection
Asia Netcom and Japanese server hosting service company Clara Online will partner to provide a high-speed international backbone connection across its global internet infrastructure for enterprise customers. The new connection is designed to greatly enhance the reliability of Clara Online's network connection, enabling the company to offer better service performance and customer satisfaction to its customer base. Asia Netcom's regional IP backbone consists of over 30 Gbps of intra-Asia and trans-Pacific capacity.
Related Channels: WDM, xDSL, VoIP, Video

Huawei ranks No.3 among the top 100 Chinese non-state-owned enterprises listed by the Chinese version of Forbes
The Chinese version of Forbes, a magazine that tracks the world's wealthy, has officially released a list of top Chinese enterprises, the first survey conducted by it on Chinese non-state-owned enterprises with annual sales revenues of more than CNY 5 million.
Among a total of 100 firms on the list, Legend Holdings Limited and Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. rank among the top 3.
Legend Holdings heads the list with total assets of CNY 62.3 billion, sales revenues surging 107% to CNY 108.2 billion, and an above average profit of up to CNY 2.05 billion. The third one is Huawei, which has owned total assets of CNY 49 billion, sales revenues of CNY 40.5 billion with a growth of 39%, and a profit of CNY 4.07 billion coming to the fore.
Related Channels: China, Switching & Routing, WDM, VoIP, VPN, xDSL, Video, FTTP, Ethernet, Wireless, OSS/BSS, Security, Cable MSO, SDH/SONET, Storage

China Netcom's new 350-kilometer East Asia Cable starts operation
China Netcom's new 350-kilometer East Asia Cable (EAC) has formally been put into operation.
EAC, which is intended to ensure the smooth communications during the 2008 Olympic Games, is one of the key communications projects of China. It is also an addition to the Sino-Korean Cable that surrounds the Asia Pacific region.
After the completion of the project, China Netcom will provide a direct route from mainland China to all countries along the cable. Qingdao will become the only landing station for the international seabed cable in northern China.
Related Channels: China, WDM, Photonics

Ciena and Nortel settle two patent lawsuits
Ciena Corporation and Nortel have reached an agreement to settle two patent lawsuits between the companies that have been pending in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas.
Pursuant to the settlement, the parties entered into a long-term patent cross-license agreement. Both the original lawsuit brought by Ciena against Nortel in January 2005 and a second patent infringement case filed by Nortel against Ciena in April 2006 are to be dismissed.
The first suit, filed in March 2000 against ONI Systems for its use of the ONI Online metro DWDM transport product, was inherited by Ciena when it acquired ONI in June 2002.
The second suit, filed in November 2002, claimed that Ciena’s metro optical transport products--the Core Stream, Core Director and Metro Director K2--infringed on various Nortel patents.
Related Channels: WDM

ECI lands DWDM deal with Romania cable MSO
Israel-based ECI Telecom has signed a new multi-million dollar contract with the largest cable operator in Romania, RCS & RDS, for the upgrade and expansion of its optical network. The network upgrade will enable RCS & RDS to provide triple play and other broadband services across Eastern Europe and will enable access to the European Internet exchange located in Frankfurt. RCS & RDS' upgraded network will serve approximately 1.7 million subscribers.
Under the contract, ECI is upgrading the national network between all the major cities in Romania, creating a new regional network in Moldova and connecting Hungary to Romania. The network is based on 10G DWDM technology. Underscoring the efficiency of the deployment, ECI was able to deploy the main ring in less than two weeks. ECI and RCS & RDS have been working together since 2001. ECI had previously enabled the customer to deploy an SDH network using its flagship XDM® optical platform. In the current project, RCS & RDS' backbone is being upgraded to add more capacity and to support 10G DWDM by adding a 10G LAN interface. This will make the network more cost-effective and easier to maintain, resulting in significant savings to its operating expenses. RCS & RDS has deployed ECI platforms worth over $10 million in recent years.
"We place great value on our partnership with RCS & RDS and are delighted that the company has again chosen us for their network expansion," said Ido Gur, ECI Telecom's Executive Vice President of Global Sales and Marketing. "The ability to customize a triple-play network for the largest cable operator in Romania demonstrates the quality of our technology and our continued strength in tailoring cost effective solutions for our customers."
Related Channels: WDM, Cable MSO

Deutsche Telekom's T-Com to buy bandwidth from FLAG Telecom
FLAG Telecom, a subsidiary of India's largest private telecom service provider Reliance Communications, Monday announced signing of a contract with T-Com, the Broadband / Fixedline strategic business area of Deutsche Telekom AG. Under this contract, FLAG Telecom would provide 180 gigabits (GB) of high quality connectivity to T-Com between Europe and the United States of America to meet their growing business requirements.
"FLAG Telecom is delighted to complete this milestone agreement with T-Com," says Gary Adey, VP Sales Europe, FLAG Telecom. "We have worked closely with Deutsche Telekom to understand their needs while designing this flexible, scalable and high quality solution. The solution exacting to Deutsche Telekom's customer service standards offers them excellent value for money".
This additional 180 GB capacity will enable Deutsche Telekom to implement route diversity between the key business centres of Europe and the US and, consequently, offer enhanced scalability and reliability of service to its customers. Demand for voice, data, and Internet between these two extremely important parts of the world has been growing rapidly. The total used capacity on the Europe-USA route has grown at around 48% year on year between 2002 and 2006 and is expected to clock a similar or higher growth rate in the coming years.
"In our evaluation FLAG Telecom has proved to be among the best transatlantic providers scoring very well in system reliability and flexibility," said Wolfram Pueschner, Executive VP Global Networks, T-Com. "FA-1's historical performance on system availability and MTTR is excellent".
Related Channels: WDM

XO Communications touts its new long-haul high-capacity fiber optic network
US-based XO Communications is now carrying customer traffic on major segments of its new, wholly-owned next generation nationwide long haul inter-city fiber optic network. As announced earlier this year, XO is upgrading its long-haul network by deploying DTN optical system, industry’s most advanced digital fiber optic technology, across its wholly-owned nationwide fiber assets. The upgrade will allow XO to more than double network capacity and enable XO to offer a broader range of higher-speed data transport services to meet the increased bandwidth demands of content providers, enterprises and service providers.
XO’s upgrade will initially deliver 100 Gbps (10 x OC-192) of capacity and sets the stage for a ten-fold capacity increase up to 400 Gbps (40 x OC-192) between any two cities on the XO inter-city network. The increased capacity will enable XO to deliver 10 Gbps high speed transport services. In addition, with the deployment of digital optics technology, XO will be able to provision or upgrade customer circuits in a matter of hours versus days.
“The deployment of this upgraded network marks the first step in creating one of the industry’s most advanced digital optical networks,” said Ernie Ortega, president of Carrier Sales at XO Communications. “In addition to making our network more efficient, the technology we are deploying will vastly increase our ability to meet rising demand for high-capacity transport services from content providers and service providers, and the cost advantages of our new network will help improve our competitive position in the marketplace.”
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics

APA Cables & Networks intros fiber frame solution for FTTx
Plymouth, Minn.-based APA Cables & Networks (APACN), a leading provider of fiber connectivity systems for Fiber-to-the-x (FTTx) networks and wholly owned subsidiary of APA Enterprises, Inc., announced an integrated Central Office (CO) Fiber Frame System designed for FTTx deployments choosing to deploy using a Homerun Passive Optical Network (PON) methodology. APACN's integrated fiber frame system, the Fiber Distribution System (FDS), is an ideal fiber management solution for environments where thousands of individual fibers require the best in modularity, flexibility and accessibility. In addition, the architecture allows for an easy migration from passive to active gear, thereby future-enabling the network.
APACN's high-density FTTx fiber frame solution allows for a FTTx network to be managed in one convenient centralized location. Distribution panels, splitters and wave-length division multiplexers (WDM) are incorporated into the system and allow for easy patching from active to passive gear, RF video overlay, and distribution out to customers.
"Density along with access and protection in the central office is a chief concern of every telecommunications engineer," commented Johnny Hill, APACN vice president of product development. "The APACN solution offers all three without requiring the service provider to completely outfit their central office at the on-set of the project. The modularity of the platform ensures a 'grow-as-you-go' deployment methodology."
Related Channels: Photonics, FTTP, WDM

ZTE becomes a major supplier for Indian telecom market
China's ZTE Corporation recently signed a USD 30-40 million contract to exclusively supply Tata-Indicom with the CDMA system, squeezing into the mainstream suppliers for the Indian telecommunications market.
ZTE has been advancing triumphantly in the Indian market since its entrance in 1999. Its average sales kept increasing by 200% year-on-year from 2002 to 2004. The contractual sales approached USD 100 million in 2004, soared to USD 220 million in 2005, and is expected to surpass USD 400 million in 2006.
Its CDMA and DWDM products respectively took a share of over 80% and 60% in the Indian BSNL market presently. ZTE has entered into strategic partnership with Indian telecom operators, SPICE and SHYAM, and SPICE agreed to purchase all GSM and relevant products from ZTE, while SHYAM promised to procure all CDMA systems and terminals from ZTE in the future seven years. The overseas market has become a major source driving ZTE's revenues growth, currently contributing 35.1% to its total revenues.
Related Channels: Wireless, WDM, China

BaySpec unveils 40 Gbps Optical Channel Performance Monitor
California-based BaySpec, Inc., a leading volume supplier of optical modules and sub-systems, announced commercial availability of its market leading 40 Gbps Optical Channel Performance Monitor (OCPM). Already qualified by a number of telecom equipment vendors, the OCPM offers proven performance in the field with built-in flexibility for the future. The bandwidth required by services such as video-on-demand and 100 Mbps Internet are driving 40G demand in the transport network. BaySpec's unique 2.5/10/40G discernable OCPMs enable significant operating cost reduction in the price sensitive Metro Core market where current demand is strongest. Devices are Telcordia GR-1221-CORE qualified and shipping in volume.
BaySpec family of market leading monitoring products enable Agile Optical Networking, including: 100 or 50 GHz DWDM Optical Channel Performance Monitors, 2.5G/10/40 G/s mixing Optical Channel Performance Monitors, Ultra-wideband Optical Spectrum Analyzers, CWDM Optical Channel Performance Monitors, Athermal Mux/Demuxes and Intelligent EDFAs. Applications include: reconfigurable optical add/drop monitoring, physical layer monitoring for provisioning and commissioning optical networks, real-time fault detection and isolation in DWDM systems, EDFA gain balancing, channel power/ wavelength/ and OSNR measurements, and handheld battery-operated CWDM & DWDM field test equipment for low-cost testing in triple-play fiber deployments.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, Test

Korea Telecom deploys Novera Optics' DWDM access transport
Korea Telecom, the largest communications carrier in Korea, has ordered additional dense wavelength division multiplexed (DWDM) access transport technologies from Novera Optics to support about 20,000 broadband subscribers. The deployment brings the company's total number of Novera-supported lines to approximately 100,000.
Previously Novera Optics has delivered more than 75,000 lines of DWDM transport technologies to Korea Telecom for Internet and data services through its DWDM access transport platform. Due to successful commercial demands, Korea Telecom is adding another 20,000 lines of the proven technology.
"The deployment of additional lines to Korea Telecom shows their confidence and commitment to our DWDM technology," said Bernd Hesse, vice president of marketing and business development at Novera Optics. "So far, KT has deployed 75,000 lines over our system. By adding an additional 20,000 lines, KT will connect approximately 100,000 subscribers over the DWDM technology, which shows how this future-proof investment provides carriers with the simplicity, security, scalability, and the versatility to deliver any service at any time. We are very pleased to have our system commercially deployed by one of the leading innovative broadband access service providers worldwide."
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics, xDSL

Broadwing names Stephen Courter CEO
Broadwing Corporation Tuesday announced that the Company's Board of Directors has appointed Stephen E. Courter as the Chief Executive Officer for Broadwing Corporation, a leading supplier of innovative data, voice and media solutions for both enterprises and service providers. He will also join the Corporation's Board of Directors.
Mr. Courter brings over 20 years of telecommunications, financial and international experience to his new position. He led fiber-optic service provider Neon Communications, Inc., as CEO and Chairman until its merger with Globix Corporation in 2005. At Neon, he expanded the customer base, strengthened the balance sheet and guided the company through four consecutive years of steady revenue growth. Prior to Neon, Mr. Courter served as CEO of Enertel in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and was also a Vice President for Sprint and Sprint International. Earlier in his career, he held positions with IBM and KPMG after serving as a Captain in the United Sates Army, a tour that included service during Operation Desert Storm. He is a graduate of Pennsylvania State University and holds an MBA from George Washington University.
"We believe Mr. Courter's knowledge and leadership approach will enable Broadwing to build on its reputation for providing effective communications solutions. He has a proven record of success and significant experience in the telecommunications industry. He has demonstrated that he is a customer-focused team player able to grow revenue and improve operations," said Donald R. Walker, chair of the Board's Nominating and Governance Committee.
"I look forward to working with the entire Broadwing team to help our company to capitalize on the opportunities I see ahead of us," said Mr. Courter.
Mr. Courter will assume his duties as CEO immediately. He succeeds Dr. David Huber, Chairman of the Board, who transitioned out of the CEO role earlier this year. Mr. Courter will be supported by the senior management team that has operated Broadwing in the interim, a team comprised of Scott Widham, President of Sales & Marketing; Lynn D. Anderson, Chief Financial Officer; and Kim Larsen, Senior Vice President, M&A/Corporate Development and General Counsel.
Related Channels: WDM, VoIP, VPN, xDSL, Appointments

Broighter picks Transmode's metro WDM
Broighter, the specialist High-Bandwidth Broadband Provider for Dublin, has selected Transmode, the optical networking pioneer, to supply metro WDM technology for its Dublin metro network upgrade.
The upgraded Dublin metro network uses the Transmode TS-1100 to provide a CWDM overlay network on the existing infrastructure thereby providing considerable service flexibility and future-proofing for the network.
Broighter Networks offers resilient, cost-effective, high-speed broadband services to enterprise customers and service providers in the greater Dublin area. The services operate at speeds of between 10 Mbit/s and 1 Gbit/s and are based on Metro Ethernet technology. Applications for these services include enterprise site interconnects, Internet access, wireless base station aggregation and mobile phone backhaul.
“As a rapidly growing Metro Ethernet based service provider we were in need of a cost effective and highly functional optical network to support our planned network expansion,” said Joerg Steegmueller, Chief Marketing Officer at Broighter. “Transmode provided us with a network design that met our day-one requirements whilst also providing a platform that is capable of expansion to DWDM and 10G when required.”
The Transmode TS-1100 provides Broighter with a flexible and scalable platform supporting the 7700 multi-protocol 2.5G Transponder, 7900 multi-protocol 10G Transponder, 5500 4 port low speed muxponder and the 5400 2x GbE/FC muxponder.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics

Luminent-HG Genuine Opto deal aborted
California-based Luminent Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of MRV Communications, announced that they have mutually agreed with Huagong Tech Company Limited ("HG Tech") to terminate the agreement under which Luminent was to acquire HG Genuine Opto, a subsidiary of HG Tech, based on current market valuations of comparable companies and further due diligence. The parties have expressed the hope to find mutually agreeable terms in the future in which the synergies between HG Genuine and Luminent can be realized.
Luminent is a leading provider of Fiber to the Premise (FTTP), Metro Transceivers, and CWDM and DWDM Solutions, and has Research and Design centers and TL9000 certified production facilities in Chatsworth, CA and Hsin-Chu, Taiwan. Luminent has pioneered the field of triplexer transceivers for triple play voice, video, and data services and is currently the dominant supplier of triplexer transceivers worldwide. Luminent has shipped well over a half million triplexers for deployment in homes across North America. Luminent supplies a diverse customer base and includes top tier system OEMs such as Alcatel, Ciena, Motorola, Redback, and Tellabs in its top 5 customers.
Related Channels: Photonics, FTTP, WDM, Mergers & Acquisitions

Broadwing picks Infinera
Broadwing Corporation has selected Infinera's DTN optical system to enhance its leading-edge optical network. The Infinera DTN optical platform is the first telecommunications system based on photonic integrated circuits (PICs). It combines the scalability of Dense Wave Division Multiplexing (DWDM) with the flexibility of digital switching and power of GMPLS service intelligence.
The Infinera DTN will enable Broadwing to deploy a robust platform to meet customers' current and future service needs without requiring costly or operationally disruptive upgrades. Infinera's Digital Optical Networking will enable Broadwing to offer managed wavelength services to more cities in their nationwide network while benefiting from the economics of an architecture that combines transport and flexible switching in a single platform. It also will facilitate many new service capabilities, including:
-- Path to future 40Gb/s OC-768/STM-256 services
-- Gigabit Ethernet Private line Service without a separate SONET layer
-- Future protected wavelength services up to 50ms plus full bit-transparency
-- 10 Gigabit Ethernet LAN PHY
In addition, Infinera is licensing key Corvis intellectual property including Raman amplification.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics, Switching & Routing, Ethernet

Huawei has broad product portfolio to meet needs for convergence
Recently, global telecom companies have been increasingly merging their businesses to meet the needs for convergence, such as the recent Nokia-Siemens deal, the Alcatel-Lucent deal, the Cisco-Scientific Atlantic deal and the earlier Ericsson-Marconi deal.
However, Huawei is not worried because it had anticipated the convergence trend early and already prepared with a very broad product portfolio. Huawei, established 18 years ago, is offering a broad product portfolio including wireless, fixed-line, IP, optical and data networks, applications and software for value-added services and handsets and wireless terminals.
Huawei's telecoms equipment have already been sold in more than a 100 countries and serve 28 of the world's top 50 operators.
Related Channels: China, Wireless, VoIP, Video, FTTP, Ethernet, OSS/BSS, Security, VPN,  Switching & Routing, WDM, xDSL, Cable MSO, SDH/SONET

Flag Telecom lands $35M deal with China Netcom
Flag Telecom, the global telecom arm of the Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications, has reportedly won a $35 million international deal for providing international bandwidth to China Netcom.
Under this contract, Flag Telecom would provide close to 50GB of high-quality international bandwidth for the retail broadband operations of China Netcom.
Flag would be providing the link between China and West Coast of the US to China Netcom.
Earlier this week, Anil Ambani, chairman of Reliance-Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (R-ADAG), made a visit to 4 countries in the Middle East where he signed deals that would earn revenues of over $ 150 million on the Reliance Communications' soon-to-be-launched Falcon Cable.
This mega deal across the Pacific comes shortly after the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group company made waves by bagging the largest enterprise deal across the trans-Atlantic under which it would provide 150-200 GB of international bandwidth for the retail broadband operations of Deutsche Telekom AG.
Anil Ambani had met up with senior level delegations of OmanTel, ITC - Saudi, Bahrain's Batelco and Ministry of Telecommunications, Kuwait where plans of enabling the broadband revolution in the oil-rich states were discussed.
Related Channels: WDM

10G/40G photonics subsystems maker CoreOptics raises $28M
Gemany-based CoreOptics Inc., a leading designer and manufacturer of 10Gb/s and 40Gb/s optical networking subsystems, announced the closure of $28 million round of financing from new and existing investors, bringing the company’s total funding to date to over $68 million.
CoreOptics mission is to deliver innovative 10G/40G transponder subsystems products to overcome optical layer impairments using advanced digital signal processing techniques based on Maximum Likelihood Sequence Estimator (MLSE) algorithm. CoreOptics currently offers complete 10G DWDM, 40/43G Single Channel Short Reach and DWDM 300 pin MSA transponder subsystems; including key building blocks such as 43 Gb/s Ultra-FEC, 40G Mux/DeMux for 4x10G client signals and Interface Converter supporting SFI-5s, SFI-4, XFI.
”CoreOptics has been in the forefront of developing distortion tolerant 10G/40G solutions which have enabled the next generation of open tolerant optical networks around the world. Our solutions deliver the highest level of Chromatic Dispersion and PMD Tolerance in the market today,” said Hamid Arabzadeh, CoreOptics President and CEO. “CoreOptics has successfully completed product introduction phase with a number of topTier-1 system providers and is now focusing on ramping up volume manufacturing to address the significant growth in demand for our products.”
CoreOptics’ 10G transponder product is enabled by the company’s MLSE electronic equalization engine that acts adaptively as part of the receiver to compensate for both optical and electrical distortions accumulated along the transmission link. CoreOptics 10G DWDM transponder product is in deployment with 15 service providers globally.
Related Channels: Photonics, WDM, Funding

Kylia provides tunable multiplexer rental module for DWDM network testing
Paris-based Kylia, the Bulk Grating Technology leading company, announced its rental offer of its tunable multiplexer for DWDM Network test. Tunable multiplexer reproduces standard multiplexers behaviours in DWDM Network whatever the spacing used and the first frequency.
The rental module is a 20 channel multiplexer with a tunable spacing of 37.5 GHz to 75 GHz. The frequency is tunable along all the C+L band. Kylia also proposes to manufacture a designed module with a specific 50 GHz tunable spacing range with the channel number needed. Manual and a computer versions are available. OSNR penalties, BandWidth, Insertion Loss, Crosstalk can be measured in a testing loop.
Frederic Verluise, CEO and technical manager of Kylia said "Tunable mics has been designed in order to save time and money for network designers when considering either a new network or updating an existing one. Network designers know that optical performances are a matter of compromise between devices features and optical requirements. Tunable multiplexer gives the opportunity to designer to confront theoric data with physical constraints. This way, Optical designer can better define their technical requirements.
Related Channels: Test, WDM, Photonics

China Telecom, Russia's Rostelecom sign cooperation memorandum in view of explosive traffic growth between Asia and Europe
Rostelecom, Russia's largest long-distance telecom services provider, said Monday it had signed a memorandum on cooperation with China Telecom, the country's largest fixed-line telecoms operator.
In April 2004, China Telecom (China Telecommunications Corporation) and Rostelecom concluded a cooperation agreement on the Transit Europe-Asia (TEA) telecoms project . In May 2006, Rostelecom launched a new fiber-optic data transmission line linking Russia's Far Eastern cities of Belogorsk and Blagoveshchensk with the Chinese city of Heihe on the Russian border.
Rostelecom said in a statement that the two sides planned to expand the range of services using the TEA line's broadband capability and highlighted the project's importance given that traffic between Europe and Asia is expected to triple by 2010.
Russia and China are planning to boost trade turnover from about $30 billion at present to $60-80 billion in the near future.
During President Vladimir Putin's visit to China in March 2006, a number of Russian companies and agencies signed agreements with Chinese companies.
Russia's utility giant Unified Energy Systems has signed an electricity export contact with China's State Grid Corporation, while state-owned oil major Rosneft and natural gas monopoly Gazprom signed agreements on supplies and joint ventures with the Chinese National Petroleum Corporation.
Telecoms company Kosmicheskaya Svyaz and China Netcom Group Ltd. have agreed to cooperate in providing international satellite TV broadcasts of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.
The St. Petersburg city government has also signed agreements with China's Eximbank and with the Shanghai Industrial Investment Corporation, which is financing a massive development project in St. Petersburg.
Related Channels: China, WDM, VoIP, IPTV

Alcatel to deploy Maroc Telecom's DWDM submarine connection between Morocco and France
Alcatel has signed a contract with Maroc Telecom, the leading telecommunication operator in Morocco, for a submarine cable network linking Morocco and France. Based on Alcatel's market-leading optical solutions, the project, named Atlas Offshore and valued at Euro 26 million , will help Maroc Telecom to enhance its network capacity in support of new broadband service delivery and particularly call centers and off shoring activities.
The submarine network will span more than 1,600 km between Marseille in France and Asilah in Morocco. Once completed in early 2007, it will enable Maroc Telecom to handle the increasing number of DSL subscribers by leveraging enhanced connectivity and broadband access capabilities. Furthermore, it will create a new traffic route offering an alternative path to the existing 3,200 km Eurafrica submarine system linking France, Morocco and Portugal. The 320 Gbit/s capacity offered by the Marseille-Asilah connection will be 570 times higher than the one delivered by the Eurafrica submarine network. In addition, the new submarine link will benefit from advanced restoration capabilities and will serve as backhaul infrastructure for Eurafrica.
"New applications and services are increasingly raising the bar of the capacity, performance and efficiency that submarine networks must guarantee," stated Jean Godeluck, President of Alcatel's submarine networking activities. "Alcatel's optical networking solutions deliver the benefits of maximum network effectiveness to support our customer in best serving their end-users."
The Alcatel turnkey solution will be based on its DWDM submarine equipment, including the 1620 Light Manager (LM) submarine line terminal, and repeatered cables, as well as the 1678 Metro Core Connect (MCC) for terrestrial applications. All the equipment will be managed by Alcatel's 1350 management suite. Furthermore, Alcatel will be in charge of the installation, commissioning, integration and testing of the entire system, along with post-commissioning support.
Related Channels: WDM, Photonics

ZTE to build 9,000km optical fiber network for Cadafe in Venezuela
China's ZTE will start building a 9,000km, nationwide optical fiber network for Venezuela's state electricity firm Cadafe in September.
Initially, Cadafe will be the sole user of the new US$312M network, which will support business processes. Later the company could opt to offer services such as broadband internet, cable television and telephone to the general public.
ZTE will have 12-18 months to complete the network.
Related Channels: Video, VoIP, VPN, xDSL, WDM, China

Military defense subcontractor picks BaySpec's ultra-wide band OSA modules
California-based BaySpec, Inc., a leading volume supplier of optical modules and sub-systems, has received a follow on volume order from a military defense subcontractor for its ultra-wide band OSA modules which provide real-time imbedded monitoring in defense and test & measurement environments. The OSA modules cover coarse wavelength range from 1230 nm to 1670 nm and simultaneously monitor S, C and L-band wavelengths at 50 GHz spacing, providing fully integrated spectral monitoring devices for the combination of CWDM and DWDM application.
The ultra-wide band OSA modules feature high detection sensitivity, allowing to detect weak signal, and wide dynamic range, providing flexibility for monitoring both strong and weak signals. The newly launched OSA modules can work in very low temperature environment, for which electronic parts with industrial grade are utilized. Compared with commercial application where the typical low limit of operating temperature is -5 to 0°C, the operating temperature of BaySpec OSA modules is extended down to -20°C with high reliability. Further notable features include compact size and lower weight. Because no active temperature control is required, the power consumption is low. These characteristics are collectively critical to particular applications under extreme conditions, such as defense industry. Moreover, the OSA modules have no moving parts, utilizing a highly efficient volume phase grating as the spectral dispersion element in combination with a solid-state InGaAs detector array. They are highly reliable and Telcordia GR1209/1221/63 compliant, exceeding Mil-spec requirements.
For proprietary reasons, this customer has requested that BaySpec not release its name.
BaySpec family of market leading monitoring products enable Agile Optical Networking, including: CWDM Optical Channel Performance Monitors, 100 or 50 GHz DWDM Optical Channel Performance Monitors, 10/40 G/s mixing Optical Channel Performance Monitors, Ultra-wideband Optical Spectrum Analyzers, Athermal Mux/Demuxes and Intelligent EDFAs. Applications include: reconfigurable optical add/drop monitoring, physical layer monitoring for provisioning and commissioning optical networks, real-time fault detection and isolation in DWDM systems, EDFA gain balancing, channel power/ wavelength/ and OSNR measurements, and handheld battery-operated CWDM & DWDM field test equipment for low-cost testing in triple-play fiber deployments. Agile Optical Networks offer dynamic reconfigurability, advanced wavelength services, and reduced OpEx and CapEx.
Related Channels: Photonics, Test, WDM

City of Klamath Falls, OR, approves Lightspeed Networks' (LSN) franchise ordinance
The City of Klamath Falls, OR, has approved Lightspeed Networks' (LSN) franchise ordinance, allowing the carrier to expand its fiber network reach in another southern Oregon city.