Worldwide IT spending increases were pretty anemic as IT and telecom services spending were seriously curtailed last year. It seems that things are going better. Telecom services spending, which has been curtailed in the past few years, only grew by a tenth of a point in 2012, to $1.661tr, but Gartner projects spending on mobile data services to grow enough to more than compensate for declines in fixed and mobile voice revenues. Infonetics Research Report sees telecom sector growth outpacing GDP growth. Global capital expenditure (capex) by telecommunications service providers is expected to increase at a compounded rate of 1.5% over the next five years, from $207 billion in 2012 to $223.3 billion in 2017, says a new market report from Insight Research Corp.
Europe’s Telco Giants In Talks To Create Pan-European Network. Europe’s largest mobile network operators are considering pooling their resources to create pan-European network infrastructure, the FT is reporting. Mobile network operators are frustrated by a “disjointed European market” that’s making it harder for them to compete.
“Internet of Things” gets new push. Ten Companies (Including Logitech) Team Up To Create The Internet Of Things Consortium article tell that your Internet-connected devices may be getting more cooperative, thanks to group of startups and established players who have come together to create a new nonprofit group called the Internet of Things Consortium.
Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communications are more and more used. Machine-to-machine technology made great strides in 2012, and I expect an explosion of applications in 2013. Mobile M2M communication offers developers a basis for countless new applications for all manner of industries. Extreme conditions M2M communication article tells that M2M devices often need to function in extreme conditions. According to market analysts at Berg Insight, the number of communicating machines is set to rise to around 270 million by 2015. The booming M2M market is due to unlimited uses for M2M communications. The more and more areas of life and work will rely on M2M.
Car of the future is M2M-ready and has Ethernet. Ethernet has already been widely accepted by the automotive industry as the preferred interface for on-board-diagnostics (OBD). Many cars already feature also Internet connectivity. Many manufacturers taking an additional step to develop vehicle connectivity. One such example is the European Commission’s emergency eCall system, which is on target for installation in every new car by 2015. There is also aim of Vehicle-to-Vehicle communications and Internet connectivity within vehicles is to detect traffic jams promptly and prevent them from getting any worse.
M2M branches beyond one-to-one links article tells that M2M is no longer a one-to-one connection but has evolved to become a system of networks transmitting data to a growing number of personal devices. Today, sophisticated and wireless M2M data modules boast many features.
The Industrial Internet of Things article tells that one of the biggest stories in automation and control for 2013 could be the continuing emergence of what some have called the Internet of Things, or what GE is now marketing as the Industrial Internet. The big question is whether companies will see the payback on the needed investment. And there are many security issues that needs to be carefully weighted out.
Very high speed 60GHz wireless will be talked a lot in 2013. Standards sultan sanctifies 60GHz wireless LAN tech: IEEE blesses WiGig’s HDMI-over-the-air, publishes 802.11ad. WiFi and WiGig Alliances become one, work to promote 60GHz wireless. Wi-Fi, WiGig Alliances to wed, breed 60GHz progeny. WiGig Alliance’s 60GHz “USB/PCI/HDMI/DisplayPort” technology sits on top of the IEEE radio-based communications spec. WiGig’s everything-over-the-air system is expected to deliver up to 7Gbit of data per second, albeit only over a relatively short distance from the wireless access point. Fastest Wi-Fi ever is almost ready for real-world use as WiGig routers, docking stations, laptop, and tablet were shown at CES. It’s possible the next wireless router you buy will use the 60GHz frequency as well as the lower ones typically used in Wi-Fi, allowing for incredibly fast performance when you’re within the same room as the router and normal performance when you’re in a different room.
Communications on power line still gets some interest at least inside house. HomePlug and G.hn are tussling it out to emerge as the de-facto powerline standard, but HomePlug has enjoyed a lot of success as the incumbent.
Silicon photonics ushers in 100G networks article tells that a handful of companies are edging closer to silicon photonics, hoping to enable a future generation of 100 Gbit/s networks.
Now that 100G optical units are entering volume deployment, faster speeds are very clearly on the horizon. The push is on for a 400G Ethernet standard. Looking beyond 100G toward 400G standardization article tells that 400G is very clearly on the horizon. The push is now officially “on” for 400-Gigabit Ethernet standard. The industry is trying to avoid the mistakes made with 40G optics, which lacked any industry standards.
Market for free-space optical wireless systems expanding. Such systems are often positioned as an alternative to fiber-optic cables, particularly when laying such cables would be cost-prohibitive or where permitting presents an insurmountable obstacle. DARPA Begins Work On 100Gbps Wireless Tech With 120-mile Range.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Think M2M Is Just Another Buzzword?
http://issuu.com/alexeeweb/docs/pulse_volume_85_-_kurt_busch/13?mode=window
Two years ago, buzzwords and phrases such as ‘M2M’ (machine-to-machine) and ‘Internet of Things’ had got – ten increased attention thanks to predominate media coverage from the likes of The New York Times and Read Write Web, and vocal support from large companies, includ – ing Verizon, AT&T and Cisco
Tomi Engdahl says:
AT&T finally brings its Digital Life home automation service to 15 markets
http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/26/4266690/att-finally-brings-its-digital-life-home-automation-service-to-15
AT&T has been showing off and talking about its Digital Life home automation service for the better part of a year now
AT&T has been testing Digital Life in Dallas and Atlanta since last summer, and it plans to have it available in 50 markets by the end of this year.
Digital Life is very similar to Verizon’s Home Monitoring and Control service, with the major difference being that AT&T’s solution doesn’t require a customer to have an existing wireless or broadband service plan from the company to purchase it. The service gives customers access to things such as a security system that is monitored 24/7; the ability to see live camera feeds from anywhere in the world; controls to adjust climate and door locks remotely; and monitoring for water leaks and the ability to shut off water mains if a leak is detected. All of these services can be accessed from AT&T’s app on iOS, Android, Windows Phone devices, or the web, and the carrier has plans to bring it to BlackBerry in the future. The app also provides access to the live video feeds if cameras are installed, as well as the ability to program rules to automate lights and other things within the home.
Plans for Digital Life start at $29.99 per month, with a $149.99 initial equipment fee.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google Fiber Scares Old-School Net Providers Into Action
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2013/04/google-fiber-verizon/
Entrenched broadband providers like Verizon, Time Warner Cable and Comcast have been slow to respond to the threat posed by Google Fiber, the ultra-high-speed internet service that the search giant is rolling out in Kansas City. But the giants are finally starting to awaken since Google announced that it is expanding into other markets, including Austin, Texas and Provo, Utah.
Time Warner Cable announced on Wednesday that it’s building a citywide wireless internet service in Austin that will be available to the company’s internet subscribers for no additional charge.
Earlier this month, AT&T announced plans to built its own fiber network in Austin, complete with gigabit speeds.
It’s a change in attitude. Previously, the big internet service providers were reluctant to embrace super-high-speed services
But Google Fiber doesn’t just provide high speed internet and television. It also offers a nearly free service internet service more in line with what customers can already expect from cable or DSL. For a one time $300 setup fee, Google Fiber subscribers in Kansas City can get a 5Mbps connection for at least seven years.
Google Fiber was originally meant to stimulate the stagnant broadband industry.
Tomi Engdahl says:
CenturyLink Providing DoD’s Equivalent of Internet2
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/04/26/035247/centurylink-providing-dods-equivalent-of-internet2
“Network provider CenturyLink has won a $750 million contract from the Department of Defense to network the latter’s sites together as part of the military equivalent of Internet2. The contract calls for CenturyLink to connect as many as 150 DoD locations nationwide with a dedicated high-speed fiber-optic network, with speeds ranging from 50 Mbits/s to up to 100 Gbits/sec.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Look Out Google Fiber, $35-A-Month Gigabit Internet Comes to Vermont
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2013/04/26/look-out-google-fiber-35-a-month-gigabit-internet-comes-to-vermont/
Vermont Telephone Co. (VTel), whose footprint covers 17,500 homes in the Green Mountain State, has begun to offer gigabit Internet speeds for $35 a month, using a brand new fiber network. So far about 600 Vermont homes have subscribed.
VTel joins an increasing number of rural telephone companies who, having lost DSL share to cable Internet over the years, are reinvesting in fiber-to-the-home networks.
“Google has really given us more encouragement,” Mr. Guite said. Mr. Guite said he was denied federal money for his upgrades the first time he applied, but won it the second time around–after Google had announced plans to build out Fiber.
Tomi Engdahl says:
LTE Innovation Summit: Sprint’s multi-mode network, smart antennas and Wi-Fi
http://www.rcrwireless.com/article/20130419/networks/sprint-building-multi-mode-multi-band-network/
Sprint Nextel Corp. is working to deploy a network that will be multi-band and multi-mode, including both FDD and TDD flavors of LTE, according to Doug Alston, director of technology and strategy for the carrier.
Alston was speaking at the LTE Innovation Summit in San Diego, Calif., this week, which covered topics from base station antennas to the role of Wi-Fi and LTE-Advanced network features.
Alston said that after years of the telecom industry talking about a “killer app” for mobile, “The killer app is video. And that killer app is eating us alive. It’s putting a great strain on our networks.”
“Mobility is still important, but indoor and outdoor traffic is important, and high capacity is important,” he added.
Arnaud Meylan, a senior engineer in corporate R&D systems engineering at Qualcomm, told the audience that smart Wi-Fi offload is increasingly part of the wireless landscape.
“People would refuse to buy a phone that does not have Wi-Fi,” he said.
“There hasn’t been a lot of innovation in base stations, compared to other parts of the ecosystem,”
“LTE is driving all of us,” he said, and the three main features of LTE-Advanced are carrier aggregation, extended downlink MIMO and uplink MIMO, and intercell interference reduction.
Tomi Engdahl says:
T-Mobile could be first to offer ’5G’ LTE Advanced, thanks to late LTE rollout
http://venturebeat.com/2013/04/22/t-mobile-could-be-first-to-offer-5g-lte-advanced-thanks-to-late-lte-rollout/
It’s a year of late firsts for T-Mobile: The fourth-place carrier just launched its LTE network, and it finally received the iPhone a few weeks ago.
But even though it’s been late to the party so far, T-Mobile could be one of the first to offer the 5G wireless technology LTE Advanced.
“I think we’ll probably be able to move faster [to LTE-Advanced] because we have the latest hardware in place,” said Yasmin Karimli, head of T-Mobile’s radio network and evolution strategy, in an interview with VentureBeat last week. “Others may have hardware that’s two years old, so they may have to rip and replace.”
The latest LTE Advanced specification calls for simultaneous download and upload speeds of up to 300 megabits per second, around three times faster than LTE’s current theoretical speeds (theoretical, as in you’ll never actually see that in the real world).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Feature Report: Infrastructure evolution set to test tower space
http://www.rcrwireless.com/article/20121011/site_equipment/feature-report-infrastructure-evolution-set-test-tower-space/
We have come to expect technology advances that result in consumer electronics equipment getting smaller, more powerful and in most cases cheaper.
This evolution has also occurred in the infrastructure space, where network equipment has become more powerful while at the same time smaller in size.
This evolution of network equipment has also trickled down – or up, as the case may be – to the tower space where network equipment is slowly leaving the safety of houses on the ground and migrated up towards the top of the tower. This move has been pushed by smaller equipment that can now be safely housed closer to the antennas, or so-called “remote radio-head” deployments, or combined with the antenna into an “active antenna.”
For carriers, this move to installing more equipment closer to the actual antennas is expected to result in network efficiencies both in the spectrum being used and coverage provided, as well as financial benefits from running more efficient network equipment. Equipment providers have claimed that the move to RRH equipment could provide carriers with up to a 25% signal gain, while Nokia Siemens claims its Flexi Multiradio solution takes up just 20% of the footprint of its conventional cabinet base station and 70% less power.
ABI noted that the tower top RF electronics space could generate $4.5 billion in revenues by 2017, highlighting the strong support expected for this type of move.
For tower vendors, this miniaturization has had a profound impact on operations. Carriers have needed to renegotiate lease agreements at cell sites to take advantage of these equipment advances. This has resulted in a boost in revenues for some tower owners as these modified leased typically include either increased monthly charges or one-time fees to handle the changes at the cell site.
Another potential challenge for this equipment evolution could come from reliability. A report released last year by Tolaga Research noted that RRH solutions have an annual failure rate of between 2.5% and 5%, which is much higher than traditional infrastructure. Tolaga placed the blame for this increased failure rate at the feet of the power amplification equipment required to power RRH solutions.
Regardless of the challenges, technology progresses at a rapid clip and the move to smaller and less expensive network equipment shows no sign of relenting.
Ernesto Crudo says:
Are you tired of paying high utilitie bills ? then it is time for you to invest in solar power unit onto your home. Its a easy and affordable way of saving your dollars. Whats more it could even make you a few quid ! You can sell any excess solar energy back to the utilitie companys
Tomi Engdahl says:
NetFlow Analysis Helps Understand and Protect Distributed Networks
http://rtcmagazine.com/articles/view/102768
The ability to collect and analyze metadata on network traffic is helping administrators achieve better security as well as understand how their networks are performing so that they can maximize efficiency.
What’s going on with your network? No, what’s really going on?
An existing but not yet fully appreciated technology called NetFlow, originally developed by Cisco, can be used to collect data about network traffic and subject it to analysis for network administrators and security personnel to better monitor and understand network traffic. Primarily this applies to enterprise networks that may be both distributed and have virtual private networks (VPNs) and are connected to the larger Internet and the world in general.
NetFlow consists of metadata about network traffic that is generated by routers and switches that support it and on which it has been enabled. The routers export the NetFlow data in small messages using UDP, and it can then be collected and stored by means of a NetFlow collector and then subjected to analysis using various tools
Most of the newer routers and switches support NetFlow. NetFlow records contain, among other information, source and destination IP addresses, source and destination port IDs, start and stop times, and the number of packets and bytes. Some of the newer versions also report things like user IDs. NetFlow takes place in the background so that users are unaware of it.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Unlocking the Potential of “Big Data” in Low-Power Wireless Sensor Networks
http://rtcmagazine.com/articles/view/102975
Wireless networks are connecting millions of sensors and devices into the “Internet of Things.” Collectively these are sending huge amounts of data that must eventually be aggregated and utilized in the cloud.
By 2020, there could be 50 billion devices that communicate wirelessly. According to the GSM Alliance, just a quarter of these devices will be mobile handsets and personal computers. The rest will be autonomous connected devices that communicate with other machines without user interaction. The Internet we know today is rapidly evolving into a web of connected wireless devices—the Internet of Things (IoT).
Options for connecting devices wirelessly are numerous, but some of the more popular include Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, ZigBee and proprietary solutions based on sub-GHz technologies. Each solution has its own set of strengths and weaknesses, but in this emerging world of unprecedented connectivity, these wireless technologies will co-exist
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft Puts Free Portable WiFi In Forbes Magazine Print Issues
http://designtaxi.com/news/357287/Microsoft-Puts-Free-Portable-WiFi-In-Forbes-Magazine-Print-Issues/
To promote its Office 365 software, tech giant Microsoft equipped a number of Forbes magazine print issues with free WiFi.
The print mag was sent out to various subscribers, and when activated the T-Mobile WiFi router provided users with 15 days of free internet.
The WiFi hotspot could connect up to five devices at once, and the router lasts three hours before it had to be recharged.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Magazine slips in a free T-Mobile WiFi hotspot, courtesy of Microsoft (video)
http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/23/magazine-slips-in-a-free-t-mobile-wifi-hotspot/
A magazine with a hotspot, however, is fresh — and might just get us to notice the ads we normally skip. Americans who’ve received a special issue of Forbes have flipped past the articles to discover a fully functional (if stripped down) T-Mobile router tucked into a cardboard insert.
Microsoft gives away free mobile broadband and a free super-compact Wi-Fi router to people.
That’s probably really bad for the environment, but it’s pretty awesome!
Tomi Engdahl says:
Panel seeks to fine tech companies for noncompliance with wiretap orders
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/proposal-seeks-to-fine-tech-companies-for-noncompliance-with-wiretap-orders/2013/04/28/29e7d9d8-a83c-11e2-b029-8fb7e977ef71_story.html
A government task force is preparing legislation that would pressure companies such as Facebook and Google to enable law enforcement officials to intercept online communications as they occur, according to current and former U.S. officials familiar with the effort.
Driven by FBI concerns that it is unable to tap the Internet communications of terrorists and other criminals, the task force’s proposal would penalize companies that failed to heed wiretap orders — court authorizations for the government to intercept suspects’ communications.
Rather than antagonizing companies whose cooperation they need, federal officials typically back off when a company is resistant, industry and former officials said.
There is currently no way to wiretap some of these communications methods easily, and companies effectively have been able to avoid complying with court orders.
Instead of setting rules that dictate how the wiretap capability must be built, the proposal would let companies develop the solutions as long as those solutions yielded the needed data.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cabling infrastructure developers avow 400G union
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/04/cabling-400g-union.html
DatacenterDynamicsFOCUS has a good wrap-up noting the committment of several major cabling companies to work with a unified approach toward hammering out the new 400Gbps specifications. Brocade, Avago Technologies, JDS Uniphase, Molex and TE Connectivity have formally joined to advance the new 400G copper cable and fiber-optic transceiver specs to drive data transmission rates.
The companies are working together under terms of a multi-source agreement to define the 400G transceiver, module, and plug’s mechanical form factor as well as a host-board electrical edge connector and cage. The prototype 400G module will integrate 16 transmit and 16 receive channels supporting passive and active copper cables, and active optical modules.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Internet of Things will lead towards smart cities
IT decision-makers see smart cities as an attractive vision for the future.
It is an important foundation of the Internet of Things, ie the communication between machines (machine to machine, m2m).
Participants in the study believed that M2M technology to play an important role in the competitiveness of companies in the future. The benefits from it was seen as a better option to react to and affect real-world events, to get more information about the business, as well as to increase productivity, efficiency, and opportunities for cooperation.
Beyond business use, useful and interesting M2M technology was seen as a result of smart cities. Collecting and analyzing in real-time intelligent, networked devices produced large amounts of data, as well as residents of activity on social network capable of improving and facilitating the life in the city.
“The Internet of Things will take M2M technology to the next level”
Source: http://www.tietokone.fi/uutiset/esineiden_internet_vie_kohti_alykaupunkeja
Tomi Engdahl says:
Skype video calling launches for Outlook.com, available in UK today and US in ‘coming weeks’
http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/30/4283888/skype-video-calling-outlook-com-integration
When Microsoft first unveiled its Outlook.com webmail service in July, the software maker promised Skype video calling from the web.
Microsoft is announcing that Outlook.com will now support Skype video calling.
The roll out will start in the UK today, followed by US and Germany availability in the “coming weeks,” and worldwide support by the summer. The integration works by first installing a browser plugin that interfaces with Skype and Outlook.com. The plugin supports the most recent versions of Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Firefox, and Skype users will be prompted to download it once an Outlook.com account is paired with Skype on the web. Voice and video calling are both supported, along with instant messaging.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Opinions vary widely on IoT security concern
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/systems-interface/4413081/Opinions-vary-widely-on-IoT-security-concern
Will the IoT (Internet of Things) become a hacker’s paradise? Or is concern over security for the embedded systems that define the IoT overblown?
Opinions about IoT security are as varied as the systems that will make the IoT, according to a study released last week at DESIGN West by UBM Tech (EDN’s parent company) and VDC Research
27% of survey participants indicated the industry is not very vulnerable or not vulnerable at all to attacks on IoT/M2M devices.
I have to assume that those who aren’t worried either figure IoT devices a) aren’t penetrable or b) lie below the threshold of interest of bad actors. It’s safe to say that any system can be penetrated
I’m having a hard time with the “somewhat worried” category: If there’s a basic acknowledgement of a security problem, we all should be very worried. Even under the assumption that the IoT will comprise billions of smart sensors with hardwired operation that can’t be modified remotely, there are too many opportunities for corrupting the data stream – make that deluge – of information flowing through the IoT
It’s difficult to identify right and wrong answers when it comes to security of devices for a system of systems that isn’t built yet and may take markedly different turns than traditional systems. It stands to reason, however, that if the foundation is vulnerable, the system of systems is vulnerable.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Securing stable 3G Communications on mobile computer platforms
http://datarespons.com/Newsroom/News/2013/Securing-stable-3G-Communications-on-mobile-computer-platforms/
3G communication has become an inseparable part of any modern mobile computer application. It enables data transfer for purposes such as remote system monitoring, real time remote data acquisition, remote system update and many more. It is therefore imperative that the communication between the mobile device and home base is stable.
Due to the nature of its operation, the 3G modem may lose connection to the network from time to time. In most cases, the modem can recover from the error and reconnect to the base station by itself and the system will continue to operate satisfactory. However, in some occasions the 3G modem is unable to recover from the connection error and cannot re-establish communication to the base station.
This situation may be a challenging for many mobile computer applications as they often function autonomously, where human action to resolve the fault is either not possible or not aloud, and the system must recover from the error by itself.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ethernet Motion Networking to Triple by 2016
http://www.designnews.com/author.asp?section_id=1386&doc_id=262779&
Two recent studies by IMS Research (now part of IHS Inc.) highlight the high growth rate of Ethernet motion network, and also the long-term sustainability of fieldbus infrastructures.
The use of Ethernet with motor drives and motion controllers is forecast to more than triple in 2016 — from 1.8 million new connected nodes in 2011.
Ethernet drive and motion control applications are growing at an impressive rate. At the show, the EtherCAT Technology Group highlighted the 10-year anniversary of publishing the specification as a global IEC standard and reported that more than 2,300 members support the technology.
Ethernet nodes are forecast to account for more than 20 percent of the total new networked motor control products in 2016. This is an increase from the estimated 12 percent in 2011, when fieldbus protocols dominated new node connections. Ethernet is quickly gaining ground in the industrial market, which is known to be slow to adopt new technology.
A second study by IHS estimates that fieldbus protocols accounted for 75 percent of new industrial automation component network connections in 2011, even though it is projected to fall to 69 percent in 2016. New network connections using fieldbus protocols are still some way ahead that of Ethernet, yet growth of Ethernet connections is expected to be considerably higher to 2016.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile Technology’s Influence on Data Acquisition
http://www.designnews.com/author.asp?section_id=1386&doc_id=262720&
Industrial users are starting to expect mobile access to measurement data, according to an article on mobile technology that is part of the recently released “Data Acquisition Technology Outlook 2013″ report from National Instruments
The report states:
The worldwide proliferation of mobile devices has given people unlimited and instant access to information. Questions no longer go unanswered, as information is made available from anywhere, anytime. Mobile technology has created a natural expectation to have continuous access to information and it is now influencing the data acquisition market.
The report also quotes Jessy Cavazos, industry director for test and measurement at the consulting firm Frost & Sullivan:
Mobile computing devices are evolving and providing opportunities for wireless data acquisition systems. This is going to change the data acquisition market.
Though we may not be surprised by this trend or even by that bold prediction, they do raise questions about the impact of mobile technology on data acquisition methods and tools.
The other articles that are part of the report are:
Big Analog Data and Data Acquisition: “Differentiation is no longer about who can collect the most data; it’s about who can quickly make sense of the data they collect.”
Moore’s Law at Work in Data Logging: “With the digital world we live in becoming more complex, we are demanding more from the systems recording the physical and electrical phenomena of today and tomorrow.”
Emerging Bus Technologies: “New bus technologies are poised to evolve data acquisition systems and address the challenges of future measurement applications.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Belgian ISPs sued for providing Internet access without paying copyright levies
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2036961/belgian-isps-sued-for-providing-internet-access-without-paying-copyright-levies.html
Sabam, the Belgian association of authors, composers and publishers, has sued the country’s three biggest ISPs, saying that they should be paying copyright levies for offering access to copyright protected materials online.
Sabam wants the court to rule that Internet access providers Belgacom, Telenet and Voo should pay 3.4 percent of their turnover in copyright fees, because they profit from offering high speed Internet connections that give users easy access to copyright protected materials
Since 2000, revenue generated from copyright levies imposed on physical media have declined by 54 percent, Sabam said. This “huge loss” has not been compensated by collections from online services like iTunes, YouTube and Spotify, it added.
ISPs over the years have profited from the switch to online media consumption and they have offered unlimited Internet access with very high download speeds in advertising campaigns, Sabam said. “The Internet access providers have never paid copyright levies for this activity. They hide behind their status as intermediary, without taking responsibility for the information transmitted over their networks,” the organization said.
Tomi says:
The rise and $23 billion fall of text messaging
http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/bulletin/the-rise-and-23-billion-fall-of-text-messaging/18525
Text messaging, the 20-year-old thumb-happy talk replacement that radically changed people’s communications habits and enriched cellphone carriers, is on a decline.
Mobile operators like Verizon and Vodafone lost a combined $23 billion of potential revenue in 2012 as users opted for other ways to send short notes to each other, market research firm Ovum notes, as reported by the BBC.
Many phone owners switched to “chat apps.”
Chat apps carried 19 billion missives a day in 2012 compared to 17.6 billion for texts, Informa notes.
Next year the gap will widen, to 50 billion versus 21 billion, the research firm predicts.
Don’t toll the bell just yet. Texting is still rising, and revenue will hit $127 billion in 2016, up from $115 billion last year, Informa forecasts. While chat apps are popular among smartphone users, consumers in emerging economies with simpler phones will keep text messaging alive for now.
Tomi Engdahl says:
UK gears up for white space broadband rollout in 2014
http://www.fiercewireless.com/europe/story/uk-gears-white-space-broadband-rollout-2014/2013-04-26?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss
UK regulator Ofcom has invited industry players to take part in a pilot of “white space” technology in the UK this autumn and said the technology could be fully rolled out during 2014 if the pilot is successful.
The technology uses the gaps reserved between airwaves for digital terrestrial TV broadcasting called “white spaces”
Ofcom added that it is separately planning to free up more spectrum in the future for the next generation of high-speed mobile data services, already dubbed “5G”
The UK has been taking a leading role in Europe on the deployment of white space spectrum for wireless broadband services. GigaOM noted that there are also initiatives underway in Finland, Ireland and France, while there has been a strong focus on white space technology in the US.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Chat apps have overtaken SMS by message volume, but how big a disaster is that for carriers?
http://gigaom.com/2013/04/29/chat-apps-have-overtaken-sms-by-message-volume/
According to analysts at Informa, IP-based platforms such as WhatsApp now carry more messages than SMS infrastructure does. However, we should be cautious about how we interpret the figures.
There’s a reason why mobile carriers are scared of third-party messaging apps such as WhatsApp, and here it is: people are now sending more messages over these services than they are text messages.
Informa says 2012 saw nearly 19 billion messages sent over these apps each day around the world, versus 17.6 billion SMS messages. The analyst house reckons the contrast will be even starker in 2014, with 21 billion text messages projected, against almost 50 billion app-based messages.
As you will note, this suggests that SMS volumes will continue to increase, at least in the short term.
First off, while the volumes of non-SMS messages has overtaken that of traditional texts, the user numbers remain significantly lower – although how much lower is a bit unclear.
According to Informa analyst Pamela Clark-Dickson, there were 3.5 billion SMS users in 2012.
Regarding the chat apps, Clark-Dickson only took 6 into account, namely WhatsApp, BlackBerry Messenger, Viber, Nimbuzz, Apple’s iMessage and KakaoTalk. At the end of 2012, she said, there were 586.3 million users of these platforms, but that’s not taking into account other giants such as Facebook Messenger for Android (somewhere between 100-500 million installations) and China’s TenCent (around 300 million users).
And then we have a big unanswered question: even when SMS tails off, how big a chunk of the IP-based messaging market will the carriers themselves own?
“Mobile operators do have the opportunity to provide their own IP-based messaging applications,” Clark-Dickson noted.
Either way, though, what’s clear is the speed at which all this is happening. The SMS is 20 years old and chat apps have only been around for around 5 years. Although we should take care when predicting the results, the trend of IP-based messaging replacing SMS certainly appears unstoppable.
Tomi Engdahl says:
M2M is DEAD–Long Live IoT
http://www.eetimes.com/design/communications-design/4413286/M2M-is-DEAD-Long-Live-IoT?Ecosystem=communications-design
M2M was the closest thing yet to the vision of devices communicating with other devices without human interaction. But the greater opportunity was still elusive, tethered to the cord of a cellular module. A SIM card is the foundation of M2M but it is at the same time a limitation. Its economics and technical character limited it reaching the full potential of the market. And so as part of the natural order of things, it died. But by doing so, it gave birth to its ultimate incarnation – Internet of Things. Billions of connections, access and device agnostic, the true potential of market finally reachable.
M2M is dead – long live the Internet of Things!
Thank you for your indulgence during my eulogy for M2M. It may appear strange to proclaim the death of an industry that is just starting to realize its potential. My point is that when you fully define the opportunity before us, the real and complete opportunity is the Internet of Things.
M2M, as defined by a SIM-based world, is certainly a large opportunity. But it dwarfs in comparison to what is the Internet of Things. Some call it the Internet of everything, but by any name it is the next massive industry opportunity in the years to come. It represents the opportunity of connected everything, everywhere , in every way, and not just limited to cellular connectivity. And, of course, those billions of connections open the door to new opportunities, new business models, new applications, new reasons to want connectivity, just like the current generation of smartphones and the apps they run gave meaning to the connectivity we used to have simply to connect us via voice calls.
2016 M2M revenues are estimated to be approximately $23 Billion and will continue to grow at around 30% per year. $23 Billion is certainly a big number, but it is but a rounding error when looking at the Internet of Things.
Think 50 Billion devices by 2020.
A recent paper by the World Bank and General Electric estimate what they call the Industrial Internet is a $32 Trillion opportunity. That’s right, trillion with a “T.” That’s a lot of money, even to politicians. To quote the report, this opportunity is created by the convergence of the global industrial system with the power of advanced computing, analytics, low cost sensors and connectivity. It is the deeper meshing of the digital world with the world of machines.
A fascinating concept in this paper is the concept of 1%. Through sensors or IoT being integrated into aviation, power, healthcare and transportation, industry can experience savings of $200Billion with just a 1% improvement.
So we can feel good about the IoT opportunity is real, but how do we achieve this vision without waiting 1600 years?
It comes down to three things – standards, platforms & intellectual property. Let’s take them one at time.
In a brand new survey from IHS, released here today at this conference, almost 90% of respondents listed standards, architecture and interoperability as the number one challenge to mass adoption.
In 2012 global mobile phone sales were 1.6 billion units. Imagine 30 times that number of IoT devices without standards.
The reality is that no stand-alone effort can possibly succeed against a standards-based approach, partly due to the very nature of how standards are developed. The standardization process in effect creates a worldwide, massive R&D project – a crowdsourcing – that incents engineers and inventors around the globe to discover the best answers to the hardest problems. It is phenomenally difficult, if not impossible, for any individual company to compete against that type of research structure.
Standards naturally lead us to platforms because you implement the standard through technology.
Which brings us to the next piece of the puzzle – intellectual property.
require investment on the part of the companies that will work to solve the technical challenges that will unlock the Internet of Things.
The companies and engineers that will commit to that effort will have to be comforted in the knowledge that their investment is protected and yielding value. Real, economic, fungible value that can be traded, transacted and monetized in some way, shape or form.
So back to my prediction. If history holds true, and standards and platforms do have the same effect in M2M as they’ve had throughout technology history, I’m going to predict that the vast majority of companies that have been involved in M2M to date – doing custom integrations, building proprietary solutions, deploying systems soup to nuts – will disappear within the next decade or so, unless they make a substantial change to their business. A change so substantial that it involves basically revisiting everything they’ve done to earn a living to date and accept to step into the new world of the Internet of Things with their only advantage – although it is a considerable one – being the vertical industry understanding and experience they’ve gained.
Other than those companies, what we will see in a decade or even much less is a new list of players, doing things a new way. For many it will be a considerable challenge. But for all of us it’s a huge opportunity.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Government Lab Reveals It Has Operated Quantum Internet for Over Two Years
http://www.technologyreview.com/view/514581/government-lab-reveals-quantum-internet-operated-continuously-for-over-two-years/
A quantum internet capable of sending perfectly secure messages has been running at Los Alamos National Labs for the last two and a half years, say researchers
One of the dreams for security experts is the creation of a quantum internet that allows perfectly secure communication based on the powerful laws of quantum mechanics.
The basic idea here is that the act of measuring a quantum object, such as a photon, always changes it. So any attempt to eavesdrop on a quantum message cannot fail to leave telltale signs of snooping that the receiver can detect. That allows anybody to send a “one-time pad” over a quantum network which can then be used for secure communication using conventional classical communication.
These systems have an important limitation, however. The current generation of quantum cryptography systems are point-to-point connections over a single length of fibre, So they can send secure messages from A to B but cannot route this information onwards to C, D, E or F.
Today, Richard Hughes and pals at Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico reveal an alternative quantum internet, which they say they’ve been running for two and half years. Their approach is to create a quantum network based around a hub and spoke-type network. All messages get routed from any point in the network to another via this central hub.
This is not the first time this kind of approach has been tried. The idea is that messages to the hub rely on the usual level of quantum security. However, once at the hub, they are converted to conventional classical bits and then reconverted into quantum bits to be sent on the second leg of their journey.
So as long as the hub is secure, then the network should also be secure.
The problem with this approach is scalability.
Only the hub is capable of receiving a quantum message (although all nodes can send and receiving conventional messages in the normal way).
That may sound limiting but it still allows each node to send a one-time pad to the hub which it then uses to communicate securely over a classical link.
google adsense ,tricks ,networks says:
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Tomi Engdahl says:
AOL vs. Netflix: The Entire Internet In One Simple Chart
Dialup out, broadband in. It doesn’t get more clear than this.
http://www.splatf.com/2013/05/aol-netflix-chart/
At the end of March, almost 2.7 million people still subscribed to AOL service, the company reported this morning. That’s about where Netflix stood at the end of 2004.
Since then, Netflix’s subscriber base has grown — 29 million at the end of March — and AOL’s has declined at a remarkably parallel rate.
Worth noting: Netflix now has more subscribers than AOL ever had.
Worth pondering: What will eventually cause Netflix’s decline?
Tomi Engdahl says:
Open source cellular targets rural comms
Linux and Asterisk for cellular networks
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/13/range_networks_linux_asterisk/
Start-up RangeNetworks is hoping that the combination of low cost and transparent software will allow it to break into the notoriously locked-down cellular network market.
Mobile network infrastructure is traditionally the preserve either of either established vendors (think Ericsson or Alcatel-Lucent), or well-backed new entrants like Huawei. Rather than try to pitch itself into the large, complex world of urban mobile networks, Range is looking for smaller-scale targets like rural and remote networks.
RangeNetworks founder and CEO David Burgess told The Register that capex and complexity are the enemies of small-scale cellular operators, particularly where subscriber density is low. The company claims its Snap system, which can serve 400 subscribers, is one-tenth the capex of a traditional vendor’s base station.
It’s also low power – at 35 watts, it’s suitable for remote solar or small-scale wind power – and uses IP backhaul.
“the systems are manageable by people who know Linux and IP networking. They don’t need the kind of specialised training the older SS7 systems do.”
“An important strategic initiative will be to get a handful of normal-looking public cellular networks up and running, to provide services in a way that looks familiar to incumbent carriers,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ethernet over coax/PoE adapters carry IP video, data, power to legacy infrastructure
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/04/altronix-legacy-poe.html
Altronix has introduced its eBridgePlus Ethernet over coax/PoE adapters, which transmit IP video, data and power over coaxial cable, allowing legacy infrastructure to support IP devices up to 1500 feet (5x the maximum Ethernet distance, claims the company) without the need for repeaters.
The new product series supports PoE and PoE+ cameras, accessories, and access control devices.
“The new eBridgePlus Ethernet over Coax/PoE Adapters from Altronix allow existing analog infrastructure to be efficiently upgraded with today’s advanced IP devices without sacrificing performance,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Hands-on video documents home fiber installation services
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/04/handson-fiber-install.html
The Columbia, Missouri-based voice, data and Internet-systems installer firm Socket has released a video documenting the process its installers take to deliver a Fiber to the Home (FTTH) connection.
Tomi Engdahl says:
10G, 40G, 100G port shipments seen skyrocketing
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/04/port-shipments-skyrocketing.html
A new report from Infonetics Research reveals that the number of 1G, 10G, 40G, and 100G network ports shipped on service provider and enterprise equipment in 2012 grew 22% over the previous year, to top 360 million.
“Overall, shipments of all port speeds have been on a steady upward path as a result of growing network traffic and the need to constantly upgrade networks, but the revenue growth opportunity is in higher-speed ports — 10G, 40G, 100G — shipments for which shot up 62% in 2012,” says Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst for enterprise networks and video at Infonetics Research.
1G ports still make up a significant portion of overall shipments and will continue growing as 1G becomes the standard in service provider and enterprise access networks, notes the research. However, 10G currently accounts for about 3/4 of all high-speed (10G+) ports shipped.
Machowinski continues, “While 1G port revenue is actually declining due to commoditization and becoming a standard feature on network equipment, we expect high-speed (10G+) port revenue to double by 2017, to over $42 billion.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Analyst: Ethernet switch market undergoing dramatic changes
May 1, 2013
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/05/ethernet-switch-market-changes.html
New research by Dell’Oro Group contends that “the Ethernet switch market is undergoing dramatic changes, as end users favor unique products purpose-built and optimized according to deployment location” — i.e. whether in the data center, the enterprise (including campuses and branch offices), small and medium businesses (SMBs), or for Carrier Ethernet services.
Dell’Oro’s latest analysis suggests that, as the data center migration towards 10 Gigabit Ethernet for server access ramps, existing and new vendors face opportunities, challenges and market share turbulence in these segments.
“Data center consolidation projects and an increase in cloud services are causing the data center segment to significantly outperform the overall Ethernet switch market,”
“At the same time, the increase in mobile devices is causing many enterprises and SMBs to invest more heavily in WLAN. While we haven’t seen a negative impact yet, we believe over the next several years the Enterprise and SMB segments will plateau and then gradually decline in favor of wireless technologies, such as 802.11ac. The divergence in market segment performance will have more impact on vendor share and vendor product offerings over the next several years than we have experienced in the past decade,” he adds.
market that now exceeds $20 billion.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How Cat 8 cable will economically solve data centers’ need for high bandwidth
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/05/how-cat8-will-solve.html
While “Category 8,” the classification for the next-generation twisted-pair cabling specifications, is still in the development stage, the outlook looks quite positive that it will be specified to 2 GHz, four times today’s bandwidth of 500 MHz, promising a new copper speedway for data centers in the not-too-distant future.
“What Category 8 copper cabling will do for the data center is let them transport data four times faster on essentially the same type of cable they now use,”
“That makes great sense application-wise and economically, because the intended data rate being developed by IEEE is 40-Gb, 4 times faster than 10GBase-T, using the same or less power per port, which has an unofficial target of less than 2 Watts.”
Most likely composed of four (4) shielded copper twisted pairs, with the similar overall diameter as Category 6A and Category 7A cables, the Category 8 cabling system under development also will use the popular modular RJ-45 style of connectors. The intention of the Category 8 standard is to be fully backwards compatible with the previous Category 6A and lower standards.
According to Vaden, Category 8 cables will physically be very similar to shielded Category 6A or Category 7A cables. The conductor size will not change, nor should the overall diameter.
All things considered, Vaden says he believes the intention of TIA-568-C.2-1 Balanced Twisted-Pair Telecommunications Cabling and Components Standard, Addendum 1: Specifications for 100Ω Category 8 Cabling, is to provide a familiar and economical solution that is easy to implement. One of the key factors is the ability of 40GBASE-T equipment to do auto-negotiation, or switch over to multiple data rates, based upon the equipment connected at the other end.
“Auto-negotiation is a big feature of all the BASE-T applications,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Rugged fiber-optic connectors carry power, reduce maintenance for cell tower installations
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/05/conec-lc-celltower.html
Conec has expanded its rugged IP67-rated connector offering to meet the needs of cellular tower and base station-located fiber distribution cabinets that combine data and power connectivity in one platform.
The company says its ODVA-compliant, IP67-rated LC Series duplex and circular power connector product offering provides significant design flexibility for cellular tower box manufacturers. The connectors intended especially for harsh environment applications, including radio heads using fiber to the antenna (FTTA) connectivity, requiring rugged connector and cable assemblies suitable for outdoor use.
The new IP67-rated LC Series connectors feature a 1/6th turn bayonet coupling for a fast and secure mating/unmating, even with gloved hands.
The water-resistant LC duplex fiber-optic connectors provide increased protection from contamination and moisture in addition to mechanical stability, temperature resistance and vibration immunity.
The LC Series duplex connectors are available from Conec at $20.00 apiece in OEM quantities
Tomi Engdahl says:
Technical document provides step-by-step conduit-fill calculation
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/05/conduit-fill-calculation.html
“The number of cables being placed in the conduit, the cross-sectional area of the cable or cables being placed in the conduit, and the number of conduit bends.”
Superior Essex then explains each of those three factors as a step in the calculation process.
http://www.superioressex.com/uploadedFiles/Communications_Cable/Docs/PDF/Tech-Guidelines/TG16-Conduit-Fill-Requirements.pdf
Finally, determine the number of bends to be placed in the conduit. For each 90° conduit bend, subtract 15% from the total cross-sectional area (see examples below). It is recommended that no more than two 90° bends be placed in a single section of conduit.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ethernet Alliance adds subcommittees for 400G, access networking, technology roadmap
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/05/new-ea-subcommittees.html
The Ethernet Alliance announced the addition of three new subcommittees, with the formation of titular focus groups for 400GbE, Access Networking, and [Ethernet technology] Roadmap advancements. The consortium says the the approval and formation of the new groups parallels the rapidly accelerating changes taking place within the global Ethernet ecosystem.
“We’ve reached an inflection point in Ethernet’s timeline; there’s a cascade of exciting developments — the race to 400GbE, for example — that are advancing this seminal technology farther and faster than at any other time in its 40-year history,” contends Dell’s John D’Ambrosia, chairman of the Ethernet Alliance.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Intel unveils new reference architectures for data centers, telecom networks
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/04/intel-unveils.html
Three strategic reference architectures that will enable the IT and telecom industries to accelerate hardware and software development for software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) were recently announced by Intel at the Open Networking Summit conference.
Aimed at the telecommunications, cloud data center and enterprise data center infrastructure market segments, the new reference architectures combine open standards for SDN and NFV with Intel’s hardware and software to enable networks to be more agile and intelligent so they can adapt to changing market dynamics, says the company.
SDN and NFV are complementary networking technologies poised to transform how networks are designed, deployed and managed across data center and telecom infrastructure environments, claims Intel.
By separating control and data planes, SDN allows the network to be programmed and managed externally at much larger and more dynamic scale for better traffic control across the entire data center. NFV allows service providers to virtualize and manage networking functions such as firewall, VPN or intrusion detection service as virtual applications running on a high-volume Intel x86-based server.
“SDN and NFV are critical elements of Intel’s vision to transform the expensive, complex networks of today to a virtualized, programmable, standards-based architecture running commercial off-the-shelf hardware,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Smart building management market seen escalating to $4 billion
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2013/05/abi-smart-buildings.html
The smart building management market is set for big growth, with revenues to top $4 billion per year by 2018, says ABI Research.
A new report from the firm observes that a drive for cost savings and energy efficiency has brought a wave of new players and capabilities into the commercial building automation market
“We are seeing a rush of investment, creativity, and revenues in developing what can be achieved with BAS data,” comments Jonathan Collins, principal analyst with ABI. “These software as a service (SaaS) or cloud services have the ability to pull together management of multiple buildings and applications within them, simplifying the process of improving energy efficiency for building owners.”
The largest IT and systems integrator companies have also seen potential in the market, adds the report, with IBM, HP, and Cisco “all bringing their own approaches.”
The scope of offerings and the ability of the players will be key to bringing their new services to the traditionally staid and entrenched BAS market, contends ABI.
Tomi says:
Who is Samsung trying to kid? There will NEVER be a 5G network
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/14/samsung_5g/
There will almost certainly never be a “5G” mobile broadband network, but that hasn’t stopped Samsung using the trendy moniker to describe its 1Gbit-per-second wireless experiments.
The South Korean giant managed to achieve that data transfer rate through two kilometres of air in the 28GHz radio band, thanks to some advanced antenna boffinry. The Android smartphone maker declared it a “5G” breakthrough.
Too bad such an ultra-high-speed mobile internet service will never exist under that name in all likelihood.
Slapping “5G” on the outdoor experiment is just a headline-grabbing technique that means nothing – and that’s a shame
The technology in question allows the use of the relatively unpopulated 28GHz band, mitigating atmospheric signal loss with 64 dynamically adjusting antenna elements. Impressive stuff
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cisco cites data-center, wireless for quarterly revenue increase
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2038846/cisco-cites-datacenter-wireless-for-quarterly-revenue-increase.html
Data-center and wireless sales led growth at Cisco Systems in its fiscal third quarter, as it saw customers spending more in the U.S. and developing countries but reported continuing weakness in Southern Europe.
Cisco is aiming to become the leading overall IT player, breaking out of its role as primarily a network vendor. Sales of its UCS (Unified Computing System) servers and key data-center switches, which grew 77 percent, are being driven by Cisco’s overall architecture pitch, according to Chairman and CEO John Chambers. UCS and the Nexus data-center switch line now represent an annual US$5.5 billion business, he said.
Overall, Cisco’s revenue grew just 5 percent from last year’s third quarter, to $12.2 billion.
Switching revenue as a whole fell 2 percent, and the company also brought in less money for its security products and Telepresence high-end videoconferencing platforms.
While declaring itself a more strategic vendor than mere networking rivals, Cisco also restated its case on SDN (software-defined networking), which could threaten the company’s switch and router sales by separating network intelligence from underlying hardware. Cisco is promoting a variant of SDN centered on its Cisco ONE (Open Networking Environment), which it says is broader and more compatible with existing equipment. The company has more than 50 beta-test customers for Cisco ONE, Chambers said.
“I don’t think it’s going to be a software game. It’s going to be an architecture game,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Welcome to the programmable world
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/05/internet-of-things/all/
In our houses, cars, and factories, we’re surrounded by tiny, intelligent devices that capture data about how we live and what we do. Now they are beginning to talk to one another. Soon we’ll be able to choreograph them to respond to our needs, solve our problems, even save our lives.
Open a telnet session in the house’s digital hub and you can actually spy on his chattering stuff, hear what it says when no one’s listening:
LIBRARY MOTION SENSOR: Device 0x9E07 zone status 0×0031
CAR DOOR: Temperature: +13.0C; Battery: 2.4V
CAR GLOVE COMPARTMENT: [87AC] checkin
FAMILY ROOM LIGHT: 2001-
KITCHEN COUNTER LIGHT: 2001-
THERMOSTAT: 4301-
FOYER LIGHT: 2001-
COFFEEPOT: 2001-
LIVING ROOM MOTION SENSOR: Device 0xB247 zone status 0×0031
This is the language of the future: tiny, intelligent things all around us, coordinating their activities. Coffeepots that talk to alarm clocks. Thermostats that talk to motion sensors. Factory machines that talk to the power grid and to boxes of raw material. A decade after Wi-Fi put all our computers on a wireless network—and half a decade after the smartphone revolution put a series of pocket-size devices on that network—we are seeing the dawn of an era when the most mundane items in our lives can talk wirelessly among themselves, performing tasks on command, giving us data we’ve never had before.
Imagine a factory where every machine, every room, feeds back information to solve problems on the production line. Imagine a hotel room (like the ones at the Aria in Las Vegas) where the lights, the stereo, and the window shade are not just controlled from a central station but adjust to your preferences before you even walk in. Think of a gym where the machines know your workout as soon as you arrive, or a medical device that can point toward the closest defibrillator when you have a heart attack. Consider a hybrid car—like the new Ford Fusion—that can maximize energy efficiency by drawing down the battery as it nears a charging station.
There are few more appropriate guides to this impending future than Hawkinson, whose DC-based startup, SmartThings, has built what’s arguably the most advanced hub to tie connected objects together.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Routing and OpenFlowing
Hölzle did not make a big fuss about the networking that underpins the Compute Engine service, but he noted an Advanced Routing feature that creates a virtual private network to link from your on-premise infrastructure over a secure tunnel.
He also bragged that with everyone yammering about OpenFlow and software-defined networks, Google has operated an OpenFlow backbone with several terabits per second of aggregate bandwidth that connects its data centers in North America, Europe, and Asia for the past two years.
Of course, Google is also rich enough to lay its own undersea fiber optic cables to link its data centers, too. Few companies on the planet can afford to do that.
Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/15/google_compute_engine_enhancements/
Tomi Engdahl says:
A Peek At Google’s Software-Defined Network
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/05/16/0121208/a-peek-at-googles-software-defined-network
“At the recent 2013 Open Networking Summit, Google Distinguished Engineer Amin Vahdat presented ‘SDN@Google: Why and How’, in which he described Google’s ‘B4′ SDN network, one of the few actual implementations of software-defined networking. Google has deployed sets of Network Controller Servers (NCSs) alongside the switches, which run an OpenFlow agent”
Inside Google’s Software-Defined Network
http://www.networkcomputing.com/data-networking-management/inside-googles-software-defined-network/240154879
Tomi Engdahl says:
Bell Labs group aims at 90% energy-saving in networks
http://www.eetimes.com/design/communications-design/4414238/Bell-Labs-group-aims-at-energy-saving-in-networks?Ecosystem=communications-design
GreenTouch, a global industry consortium formed by Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs, has said its research shows the net energy consumption in the world’s information and communication technology (ICT) networks could be reduced up to 90 percent by 2020, if a number of leading-edge technologies are adopted.
GreenTouch was formed in 2010 with the backing of service providers AT&T, China Mobile, Portugal Telecom, Swisscom, Telefonica and many universities and research institutes. Other companies that have joined the consortium subsequently include Chunghwa Telecom, Fujitsu, Huawei, NTT, Vodafone and ZTE.
“Networks used to be dimensioned and scaled for capacity, performance and cost, never for energy consumption. There is going to be an exponential increase in traffic over the next 10 years so the consortium was formed to look out how to handle data in a sustainable way,” Thierry Klein, chairman of the GreenTouch technical committee told EE Times.
The 90 percent energy-saving claim comes from a theoretical exercise although one that is based on a detailed evaluation of what was possible in 2010 and what will be possible in 2020, Klein said.
Klein stressed that the 90 percent energy saving in networks over 2010 is possible even while coping with the deluge of data that is expected and takes into account the Internet of Things. “The traffic numbers are based on extrapolations from Cisco and others. It may be a lot of devices but the internet of things is not expected to create a lot of data necessarily. Data volume will still be dominated by video for humans,” said Klein.
Mobile networks stand to benefit the most from energy efficiency efforts, as they are the most inefficient and yet the fastest growing networks in terms of data volumes. Mobile networks could realize potential energy efficiency improvements of up to 1043 times.
Energy efficiencies in fixed-line and core networks are also expected, but will be less dramatic.
Among the technologies that should be brought in to achieve improved energy efficiency are small-cell basestations for dense urban environments, shared infrastructure across operators, use of sleep-modes in the network for periods without traffic, dynamic allocation of resources, beam-forming of signal propagation in cells using antenna technology.
“We want to create a road-map for equipment makers and let people know this is achievable. There are more technologies and more projects to come that have not been taken into account,” said Klein.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Deep packet inspection–Use cases, requirements and architectures—Part I
http://www.eetimes.com/design/industrial-control/4414474/Deep-packet-inspection-Use-cases–requirements-and-architectures-Part-I?Ecosystem=communications-design
Deep packet inspection, or DPI, is a form of computer network packet filtering that examines the data part (and possibly also the header) of a packet as it passes an inspection point, searching for defined criteria to decide what, if any, action should be taken by the network on that packet.
A classified packet may be redirected, marked/tagged, blocked, rate limited, or reported to a reporting agent in the network. Many DPI devices can identify packet flows (rather than packet-by-packet analysis), allowing control actions based on accumulated flow information.
Typical identification parameters include source and destination IP and ports. Some devices support far deeper inspection of packets to examine the metadata of protocols used and may use these for reporting and classification.
DPI enables a range of network services including network optimization, flow inspection, data flow management, security and application monitoring. These services may be called many things
Tomi Engdahl says:
Is M2M Dead?
http://www.edn.com/electronics-blogs/from-the-edge-/4413409/Is-M2M-Dead-
At a recent Telecom Council Mobile Forum M2M Workshop, Allen Proithis, Executive Vice President, InterDigital Solutions, presented a keynote address. The Topic: M2M is DEAD—Long Live IoT! As this is an important topic, here is a reprint of the majority of the speech, which begins with a eulogy to M2M, and continues here:
Thank you for your indulgence during my eulogy for M2M. It may appear strange to proclaim the death of an industry that is just starting to realize its potential. My point is that when you fully define the opportunity before us, the real and complete opportunity is the Internet of Things.
M2M, as defined by a SIM-based world, is certainly a large opportunity. But it dwarfs in comparison to what is the Internet of Things. Some call it the Internet of everything, but by any name it is the next massive industry opportunity in the years to come. It represents the opportunity of connected everything, everywhere , in every way, and not just limited to cellular connectivity.
2016 M2M revenues are estimated to be approximately $23 Billion and will continue to grow at around 30% per year.
Internet of Things. So just how big of an opportunity are we looking at? Let me share a few numbers. Think 50 Billion devices by 2020.
A recent paper by the World Bank and General Electric estimate what they call the Industrial Internet is a $32 Trillion opportunity.
A fascinating concept in this paper is the concept of 1%. Through sensors or IoT being integrated into aviation, power, healthcare and transportation, industry can experience savings of $200Billion with just a 1% improvement.
So we can feel good about the IoT opportunity is real, but how do we achieve this vision without waiting 1600 years?
It comes down to three things – standards, platforms & intellectual property.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Inside AT&T’s 83GB/hour mobile cell tower …or why your iPhone no longer drops out at huge events
http://9to5mac.com/2013/05/19/inside-atts-83gbhour-mobile-cell-tower-or-why-your-iphone-no-longer-drops-out-at-huge-events/
AT&T shared a little bit of what goes into a portable network cells they put up at special events where bandwidth needs will be extraordinary. Remember, AT&T’s network is about 80% iPhones so this is important stuff. The setup above was what they used to cover a recent Los Angeles festival (read: Coachella).
This isn’t a test network; AT&T’s been honing their skills since they got caught with their pants down at SXSW in 2010
Since then, with their mobile response team, they’ve been able to keep their network up and running at huge events with the addition of these ‘kits’ above.
The network performance stats for this setup – some of which are staggering:
Carried approximately 83 GB of data traffic during the peak hour on our in-event network
Carried a combined 6,054 GB (or more than 6 terabytes) of data on our in-event network during the two weekends of the music festival (24-hour traffic totals, Friday-Sunday for two weekends).
About 50 engineers were involved in planning, construction or onsite 24/7 monitoring.
Both the super multi-beam antenna and five-beam antenna are AT&T innovations
The super multi-beam antenna has two rows with nine beams each – 18-beams total – and can handle as much as 18 times the network traffic capacity of a traditional single-beam antenna.