In the end of 2015 there were 3.2 billion people online. 67% of Americans now have broadband at home, compared to 70% in 2013, and 13% connect via smartphone only vs 8% in 2013; smartphone penetration in US at 68%. The share of Americans with broadband at home has plateaued, and more rely only on their smartphones for online access. We can see downtick in home high-speed adoption has taken place at the same time there has been an increase in “smartphone-only” adults – those who own a smartphone that they can use to access the internet, but do not have traditional broadband service at home. The American broadband market is notoriously oligopolistic with the majority of citizens offered limited choice, especially at the high-speed end, complete with high monthly fees.
Fixed Internet speeds increase – even without fiber to every house. We will start to see more 1Gbps Internet connections – and not all of them need fiber (2014 was the year of “fiber everywhere”). For example Comcast ‘rolls out’ ‘world’s first’ DOCSIS 3.1 modem, pumping 1Gbps over existing cable. It should, in theory, be quick and easy to get 1Gbps broadband to your home using DOCSIS 3.1, but I expect we will see only very few experimental roll-outs of the service in 2016. The beauty of DOCSIS 3.1 is that it is backwards compatible.
Mobile networks continue to lead the way when it comes to connecting people for the next generation of communications: Mobile subscriptions are now at 7.1 billion globally, and more than 95% of the world’s population are now within reach of a mobile network signal. Mobile cellular subscriptions have overtaken fixed phone subs, mobile broadband subscriptions and households with Internet access. This development most probably causes expectations that Network jobs are hot so salaries are expected to rise in 2016 as especially wireless network engineers, network admins, and network security pros are needed.
There are still some 350 million people globally who have no way of Internet access, mobile or otherwise, and there will be some race to get connections to at least some of those people. High stakes in broadband satellites race as building a satellite network and associated ground-based facilities and user terminals to provide Internet access to even the remotest and poorest parts of the world will be a huge technical, regulatory, and business challenge. Data versions of low Earth orbiting (LEO) satellite networks started appearing in the late 1990’s, followed with mobile telephony via LEO satellites, but never managed to deliver on the hype—partly because of technology constraints or poor business models. Over years there have been huge technology advances in satellites: they can now be made much smaller and lighter, so launch costs are significantly lower. Also component costs associated with the different terminals and handsets have plummeted. These factors have clearly helped the business proposition, but there are still challenges.
There will be new radio frequencies available for wireless communications thanks to WRC-15 Spectrum Decisions: In addition to confirming the use of the 700 MHz band (technically 694 to 790 MHz) for mobile broadband services in ITU Region 1, which includes Europe, Africa, the Middle east and Central Asia, delegates also agreed to harmonize 200 MHz of the C-band (3.4 to 3.6 GHz) to improve capacity in urban areas and used in small cells, and the L-band (1427-1518 MHz) to improve overall coverage and better capacity. So the mobile broadband sector now has, at least in the short to medium term, three globally harmonized bands. There was also decision for spectrum to be used for wireless avionics intra-communications (WAIC).
5G gets started. Just five years after the first 4G smartphone hit the market, the wireless industry is already preparing for 5G: cell phone carriers, smartphone chip makers and the major network equipment companies are working on developing 5G network technology for their customers. There are still many challenges as 5G infrastructure must be able to serve the billions of internet-connected objects of small appliances in addition to large consumers of information.700MHz harmonization is a key feature in operators’ plans to begin rolling out 5G services and C-band is also likely to be used for 5G. After 2016 to get the fastest promised 5G speeds very high frequency bands that will need to be deployed for 5G services, mainly above 24 GHz.
5G will not only be about a new air interface with faster speeds, but it will also address network congestion, energy efficiency, cost, reliability, and connection to billions of people and devices. Many believe that a critical success factor for 5G will be a fully revamped TCP/IP stack and a group of major vendors has put forward an open source TCP/IP stack OpenFastPath they say is designed to reinvigorate the ancient and rather crusty protocol. Cyber security research will be important important in 2016 as 5G networks will be critical infrastructure, on top of which for example. transport, industry, health and the new operators set up their business around 2020. Growing network virtualization functionality and programmability are both an opportunity and a threat to security. Keep in mind that everything connected to the Internet can, and will be hacked.
Heightened interest in the Internet of Things (IoT) and of Everything (IoE) will continue in 2016. IoT networks heat up in 2016 as low-power wide area networks for the Internet of Things have been attracting new entrants and investors at a heady pace with unannounced offerings still in the pipeline for 2016 trying to enable new IoT apps by undercutting costs and battery life for cellular and WiFi. There are many competing technologies in this field, and some will turn out to be winners and some losers. Remember that IoT is forecasted to be 50 billion connections by 2020, so there is lots of business opportunities for many IoT technologies.
2016 will be another booming year for Ethernet. Wi-Fi is obviously more convenient than wired Ethernet cables for average mobile user. But Ethernet still offers advantages — faster speeds, lower latency, and no wireless interference problems. Ethernet matters a lot with desktop PCs, laptops at desks, game consoles, TV-streaming boxes, and other devices – like when building backbone networks and data centers. Assuming it’s easy enough to plug the devices in with an Ethernet cable, you’ll get a more consistently solid connection. Yes, Ethernet is better.
The augmented global demand for data centers is the key driver for the growth in Global Ethernet Switch and Router Market 2016-2020.25G, 50G and 100G Ethernet is finding it’s place in in the Data Center. Experts predict that the largest cloud operators will shift to 100G Ethernet fabrics while cost-efficient 25G and 50G will remain the workhorses for most of the other well-known data-center companies.The increasing usage of advanced technologies, such as 10GbE ports, by enterprises and universities for educational and official purposes, is a significant factor in the enterprise and campus segment. The key players in this segment will be Arista Network, Brocade Communications, Cisco, Dell, HP, Huawei and Juniper Network. The 2015 Ethernet Roadmap shows a roadmap for physical links through 2020 and looks into the future terabit speeds as well.
I expect 2016 will be a year of widespread product adoption around 2.5 and 5 Gigabit Ethernet (GE) bandwidth over twisted-pair copper cabling (2.5GBASE-T and 5GBASE-T) as transition to next generation 802.11ac Wave 2 access points will drive significant demand for 2.5G ports. Enterprise operators are looking to fill the gap between 1G and 10G over this legacy unshielded twisted-pair copper cabling (Category 5e/Category 6) that is installed all over. IEEE 802.11ac is 3x faster and 6x more power efficient than its predecessor, 802.11n, while remaining interoperable with 802.11n. Rapid adoption of 802.11ac is run by fact that tablets and smartphones are becoming ubiquitous in the workplace.
Driven by IEEE standards, Ethernet hits the road in 2016: A new trend emerging in the automotive market in 2016 is the migration of Ethernet, a tried-and-true computer network technology, into connected cars. The proliferation of advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) features in many vehicles is also expected to expand Ethernet use. The completion of IEEE 100BASE-T1 and 1000BASE-T1 standards are both expected. The emergence of the 1000BASE-T1 standard in mid-2016 provides a roadmap for automotive Ethernet evolution. Ethernet, starting in 2016, will be seen as the dominant in-vehicle network backbone.
Prepare for the PAM4 phase shift. PAM4 (four-level pulse-amplitude modulation) will be coming to wider use in 2016 because we all the time need faster communications links between ICs inside devices. NRZ won’t work at 56 Gbps and it seems that PAM-4 is the way to go as PAM4 doubles the bit rate for a given baud rate over NRZ. At 56 Gbps, 400 Gbps Ethernet can be realized with four lanes of PAM4 but might require eight 28 Gbps lanes with NRZ. PAM-4 is also gaining traction in 28 Gbps links. The bad news is that PAM4 trades off bandwidth for SNR (signal-to-noise ratio) meaning it is more sensitive to noise and timing skew than NRZ. PAM4 does bring SNR (signal-to-noise ratio) to the forefront of design issues. With four voltage level and three eyes, PAM4 requires new design techniques for recovering embedded clocks and for identifying bits in symbols. PAM4 will be used mainly on copper links, but it can be also used with fiber optic links, which has it’s own set of challenges. These and other issues are forging new techniques for how to measure and simulate PAM4 signals.
Cloud Scale Networking term will be seen. The virtualization of networks, storage, and servers is reshaping the way organizations use IT. Cloud computing plays an essential role in this process as cloud delivers the additional capacity required to satisfy growing demand to an enterprise or small business from a third party. The amount of data volume carried by networks has exploded. Cisco estimated last year that by 2017, data centers will handle some 7.7 zetabytes of IP traffic, two thirds of which would be on account of cloud computing. Total global data centre traffic is projected to triple by the end of 2019 (from 3.4 to 10.4 Zettabytes). Legacy, tiered, network designs can be replaced with scalable flat network topologies. They can be future-proofed using open, scalable SDN and NFV platforms. The network is cloud computing’s final frontier, at technology, people and process levels. Service providers seek to reduce costs, create new business opportunities, and introduce new services more quickly.
The “software-ization” of Telco and increasing use of pen-Source Networking will continue in 2016. In 2015, the adoption of OpenStack, OpenDaylight, OpNFV for software and services, and Open Compute for hardware will supported more virtualized, more open source network computing platforms and architecture. The trend will continue. SDN provides control to the enterprises and carriers on the complete network through a single logical point, thereby simplifying the network design and operation. The traditional, one-vendor, proprietary solution is transitioning to solutions involving many suppliers – and this offers customers with significant cost savings and performance optimization. Growing network virtualization functionality and programmability are both an opportunity and a threat to security. Keep in mind that everything connected to the Internet can, and will be hacked.
After COP21 climate change summit reaches deal in Paris there will be also interest in thinking how clean our networking is. It is being reported that communications technologies are responsible for about 2-4% of all of carbon footprint generated by human activity. The needs for communications and faster speeds is increasing in this every day more and more connected world – penetration of smart devices there was a tremendous increase in the amount of mobile data traffic from 2010 to 2014. When IoT is forecasted to be 50 billion connections by 2020, with the current technologies this would increase power consumption considerably. The trend to look for greener technologies is tackling first mobile networks because of their high energy use. Base stations and switching centers could count for between 60% and 85% of the energy used by an entire communication system. More and more facilities, especially big names like Google, Amazon and Microsoft, have looked to renewable energy.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Amir Efrati / The Information:
Source: Amazon weighs offering internet service in Europe in order to bundle broadband access with Prime Video — Amazon.com is considering offering internet service directly to consumers in Europe, said a person briefed on the discussion. That would allow Amazon to bundle internet access …
Amazon Eyes Internet Service Offering
https://www.theinformation.com/amazon-eyes-internet-service-offering
Amazon.com is considering offering internet service directly to consumers in Europe, said a person briefed on the discussion. That would allow Amazon to bundle internet access with its Prime streaming video offering, the person said, making it more competitive with cable operators which already offer a similar broadband-video package.
Tomi Engdahl says:
‘Cultlike’ Devotion: Apple Once Refused To Join Open Compute Project, So Their Entire Networking Team Quit
https://apple.slashdot.org/story/16/10/18/2248230/cultlike-devotion-apple-once-refused-to-join-open-compute-project-so-their-entire-networking-team-quit
Great story about the Open Compute Project from Business Insider’s Julie Bort here, including this fun tidbit: “‘OCP has a cultlike following,’ one person with knowledge of the situation told Business Insider. ‘The whole industry, internet companies, vendors, and enterprises are monitoring OCP.’ OCP aims to do for computer hardware what the Linux operating system did for software: make it ‘open source’ so anyone can take the designs for free and modify them, with contract manufacturers standing by to build them. In its six years, OCP has grown into a global entity, with board members from Facebook, Goldman Sachs, Intel, and Microsoft.
Facebook’s project to take on Cisco inspires such ‘cult-like’ devotion, it once caused a whole team to quit Apple
http://nordic.businessinsider.com/facebook-ocp-project-caused-apple-networking-team-to-quit-2016-10?r=US&IR=T
On Tuesday, Facebook made an announcement that should set Cisco’s teeth on edge.
Its second-generation computer network switch, called the Wedge 100, is now available for purchase though Chinese contract manufacturer Edgecore (owned by Accton Technology).
That’s the same company that manufacturers the Facebook-designed switch for Facebook’s own internal use.
This is a super-fast 100G switch and could be something that many other big companies (and certainly other internet companies) will want to buy.
While Facebook isn’t a direct competitor to Cisco (it’s giving away the switch design for free, not making money on it), it is doing something perhaps even more astounding: it has created an entire ecosystem of companies that are, collectively, taking on Cisco, which owns 59% of the market, according to IDC.
This is all part of Facebook’s Open Compute Project (OCP), arguably one of Facebook’s most important technology projects.
Joining the ‘cult’
“OCP has a cult-like following,” one person with knowledge of the situation told Business Insider. “The whole industry, internet companies, vendors and enterprises, are monitoring OCP.”
OCP aims to do for computer hardware what the Linux operating system did for software: make it “open source” so anyone can take the designs for free, modify them with contract manufacturers standing by to build them.
OCP allows the world’s best hardware engineers to collaborate and work openly together “without fear of transferring” their company’s secrets, this person explained.
In fact, there’s a famous story among OCP insiders that demonstrates this cult-like phenom. It involves Apple’s networking team.
This team was responsible for building a network at Apple that was so reliable, it never goes down. Not rarely. Never.
Think about it. When was the last time iTunes or Siri or Apple Maps were offline?
Building a 100% reliable network to meet Apple’s exacting standards was no easy task.
So, instead of going it alone under Apple’s secrecy, the Apple networking team wanted to participate in the revolution, contributing and receiving help.
But when the Apple team asked to join OCP, Apple said “no.”
“The whole team quit the same week,” this person told us.
Shortly afterward, Apple did publicly join OCP. But that was too late for the engineers that quit.
Instead, they founded a startup called SnapRoute led by former team leader, Jason Forrester.
While Facebook also gives away the software it designed to run its new switch as an open-source project, a whole list of startups and a few established players are standing by to sell commercial software that works with and improves upon the Facebook switch. That’s the whole point of doing this as an open source project.
For the Wedge 100, the list includes Big Switch Networks, Linux maker Ubuntu, and Apstra, the new startup from billionaire Stanford professor David Cheriton.
And the list includes that tiny startup, SnapRoute.
Word is that SnapRoute already has impressive roster of customers although it’s not alone in attacking this SDN market.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The first 5G mobile phone circuit brings five gigabit connections
5G networks are still far from commercial use, but it does not prevent annealing sandiegolaista Qualcomm’s latest smartphone modeemipiiriään. operating in the region of 28 gigahertz Snapdragon X50 is the world’s first 5G modem chip.
According to the company X50-modem allows up to five gigabit data rates. This is possible because the 28 gigahertz frequency band modem provides the use of a very wide band. In addition, a modem is used for new signal processing techniques.
In USA 5G starts precisely 28 gigahertz.
Qualcomm promises X50 modem sample circuits to equipment manufacturers as early as next year’s second half. In practice, this means that based on the scope of equipment could come on the market already in 2018. This schedule would be suitable to the Korean Olympic Winter Games in February 2018.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5251&via=n&datum=2016-10-19_14:15:38&mottagare=30929
Tomi Engdahl says:
Researchers Teleport Particle of Light Six Kilometers
http://www.techbriefs.com/component/content/article/1198-ntb/news/news/25550?eid=325267006&bid=1559670
Through a collaboration between the University of Calgary, The City of Calgary and researchers in the United States, a group of physicists led by Wolfgang Tittel, professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Calgary, have successfully demonstrated teleportation of a photon (an elementary particle of light) over a straight-line distance of six kilometers using The City of Calgary’s fiber optic cable infrastructure. This accomplishment set a new record for distance of transferring a quantum state by teleportation.
“Such a network will enable secure communication without having to worry about eavesdropping, and allow distant quantum computers to connect,” says Tittel.
The experiment is based on the entanglement property of quantum mechanics, also known as “spooky action at a distance” — a property so mysterious that not even Einstein could come to terms with it.
“What happened is the disembodied transfer of the photon’s quantum state onto the remaining photon of the entangled pair, which is the one that remained six kilometers away at the university,” says Tittel.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Whinge on: T-Mobile US docked $48m for limiting ‘unlimited’ data plans
Telco coughs up cash to make throttling complaints go away
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/19/tmobile_docked_48m/
T-Mobile US has agreed to pay the US comms watchdog the FCC $48m to settle claims that it illegally throttled the connections of some unlimited-plan data users.
The settlement package [PDF] ends an investigation the US broadband watchdog launched over T‑Mobile’s handling of customers on its unlimited data plans.
At issue was the carrier’s policy of deliberately limiting connections for customers when they had passed a certain limit of data usage, in order to prevent them from slowing network speeds for other customers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
European Telecoms Standards Institute to World+Dog: please start caring about 5G
Industry verticals, busy trying to make money, aren’t paying attention to the telco biz’s future
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/20/etsi_to_worlddog_please_start_caring_about_5g/
5G is on the way – no, really, it’s on the way, stop giggling – but outside the telcos and their suppliers, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) is having trouble getting industries to care.
That’s a problem, because the business case for 5G depends not only on flogging fast broadband dongles, but flogging low-latency services to industrial Internet of Things applications.
At Broadband World Forum, the chief technology officer of ETSI’s specifications group Adrian Scrase said getting interest from industry verticals – the putative customers that will help push billions of Things into industry – is difficult.
LightReading says he identified factory automation, agriculture and mining industries as problematic.
Without their input, he said, 5G’s roadmap is hard to achieve: “we need actors to work together coherently with this challenging timeline”.
ETSI, he said, isn’t used to dealing with these industries, nor the disparate government departments that are assigned responsibility for them around the world.
The telco sector is pushing ahead with work in different part of the spectrum – Qualcomm has just announced a 28 GHz chip that will reach sampling next year, a band that Nokia’s also working in, while others like AT&T are pushing the 70-80 GHz band.
Engagement With Verticals Is Biggest 5G Challenge, Says ETSI
http://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/engagement-with-verticals-is-biggest-5g-challenge-says-etsi/d/d-id/727113?
Broadband World Forum — The difficulty of involving other vertical markets in discussions about 5G is proving to be one of the biggest risks to the timely development of a 5G standard, according to Adrian Scrase, the current chief technology officer of the ETSI specifications group.
Much of the 5G focus right now is on coming up with “use cases” for a whole range of vertical markets, but engagement with some of these industries remains problematic, Scrase told attendees at today’s Broadband World Forum in London.
On the plus side, European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) and the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) , which leads 5G standardization efforts, reckon engagement with the public safety and broadcasting sectors has been excellent. Efforts to involve the rail, automotive and education sectors are also proceeding well, according to Scrase.
Yet there are a number of red flags, including difficulties communicating with the factory automation, agriculture and mining industries.
The ETSI executive also acknowledged that organizations outside the telecom sector do not understand its standardization processes and can sometimes feel threatened by what he calls “industry giants.”
In the meantime, recent competition between telcos that want to be first to market with 5G services is putting pressure on organizations like ETSI and the 3GPP to get standards written.
The race to 5G has even triggered some breakaway initiatives focused on the 28GHz band, which operators in the US, Japan and South Korea are looking to use with 5G services in the next few years.
Despite the various challenges, ETSI remains confident that a Phase 1 5G standard will appear in 2018, allowing operators to take advantage of specifications in some areas, with a more comprehensive Phase 2 standard scheduled to arrive in 2020.
The initial priority for ETSI and the 3GPP is to tackle the use case for “enhanced mobile broadband” capability, simply because operators believe they can monetize this more easily. “Standardization must be driven by market demand,” said Scrase.
Following that, attention will necessarily turn to “massive machine type communications” that can support applications in a number of the vertical markets to which ETSI is reaching out.
In the meantime, LTE-based technologies, such as the recently standardized NB-IoT, are expected to satisfy demand for services requiring low-power and wide-area connectivity.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Global Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) market forecast 2016-2021 now available
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2016/10/moca-forecast-available.html?cmpid=enl_CIM_CablingInstallationMaintenanceDataCenterNewsletter_2016-10-20
“MoCA is an alliance developing technology for connected home solutions. The technology uses in-home and in-building coaxial cabling which aids in connecting all consumer electronics devices, making for a smart home. The technology helps in building backbone for wireless networks. The technology’s major applications are multiroom DVRs, OTT streaming, and gaming. The MoCA group has currently 45 members including TV operators, OEMs, consumer electronics devices manufacturers, and electronic IC vendors.”
2.0 and 2.5 version MoCA supports 400 mbps, 800 mbps, to 2.5 gbps speed.
Tomi Engdahl says:
TIA-1152-A Category 8 testing standard approved
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/2016/10/tia-1152-a-category-8-testing-standard.html?cmpid=enl_CIM_CablingInstallationMaintenanceDataCenterNewsletter_2016-10-20
At its October meeting, the TIA’s TR-42.7 subcommittee resolved all comments on the ANSI/TIA-1152-A standard and authorized publication of the document. TIA-1152-A covers Category 8 testing in the field. In development since late 2013, the standard specifies Level 2G testing accuracy. Category 8 cabling systems are specified to a frequency up to 2 GHz (2000 MHz).
Two producers of twisted-pair cabling test equipment—Softing and Fluke Networks—recently commented on the Category 8 testing specifications.
Softing’s
“WireXpert is the only tester out there with the necessary frequency range.”
Fluke Networks
“If you’re not familiar with deploying and testing shielded cable, you will have to be with Category 8. That means installers and contractors will need to ensure prudent cable-connector shield termination and proper grounding and bonding measures.”
“Only the DSX-5000 CableAnalyzer offers shield integrity testing using a patented AC measurement technique for preventing grounded racks in a data center showing that the shield is connected, even when it isn’t.”
“You’ve got plenty of time to get a handle on all the ins and outs of Category 8. There are no Category 8 components currently shipping, nor is there any 25GBase-T/40GBase-T equipment commercially available.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Vodafone says it’ll launch NB-IoT network in EU early next year
Nobody’s really impressed, but take a look at the long term
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/20/vodafone_nb_iot_rollout_4_eu_countries/
Vodafone has announced it will start rolling out its narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) focused network in four EU countries from the start of next year – and folk across industry are rolling their eyes.
NB-IoT is a low-power network aimed at devices such as smart meters. Vodafone has said it is wheeling out the new tech in Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and Spain beginning in Q1 2017.
This is all well and good but NB-IoT has received a less-than-enthusiastic welcome so far. While the British telco has been pumping out press releases promoting it, the parts of the world likely to actually use it have been fettling about with other standards such as LoRaWAN – which enjoyed a network rollout across a slice of central London earlier this year.
As TelecomTV reported, Vodafone “has control over its spectrum slivers so can theoretically ensure better quality of service than the other LPWAN operators, who usually compete with each other (and other applications) in the public ISM band”.
The NB-IoT standard was adopted by the standards-setting body 3GPP in September last year.
This suggests that in the long run, despite all the hype and resulting derision, NB-IoT may slowly catch on as telcos roll it out within their existing infrastructures at minimal cost.
“The news from Vodafone puts pressure on technologies that compete with NB-IoT, such as LoRa, SIGFOX and Ingenu. LoRa in particular is looking robust, though.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
The future of wireless is 5G but the real focus should be on broader 3GPP mobile wireless technology
http://intelligentsystemssource.com/the-future-of-wireless-is-5g-but-the-real-focus-should-be-on-broader-3gpp-mobile-wireless-technology/?utm_source=Wireless+Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Wireless+October&utm_campaign=eNewsletter
January 2016: Everyone on the planet is familiar with cellular technology in one way or another. Fewer know or care that 5th Generation or 5G cellular technology is coming. However, no one knows precisely when or how 5G appears. No doubt, the 5G + LTE Advanced Pro promise of ubiquitous wireless information and communication technology (ICT) networking creates incredible opportunity for companies and organizations worldwide. Their collective challenge is to either figure out a way to capitalize on 5G ROI before their competitors else secure schedule-tolerant 5G-related R&D funding. A lot has been made of partners in the Verizon 5G Technology Forum claims they will deploy 5G technology in early 2016. People ask, “how is 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) 5G deployed before it’s defined?
The simple answer is that this group and many others have secured funding for early 5G R&D in a quest to make meaningful contributions to the 3GPP Release 14 work that begins in 2016. Specifically the international community that creates mobile wireless technology has agreed on fundamental 5G requirements. Furthermore, as the hub for cellular technology development since 1999 the 3GPP will start specific 5G technology development this year that will result in commercial deployment—defined as serving existing cellular customers—of end-to-end 5G networks by 2020.
The proven and time-tested 3GPP cellular and now wireless R&D process partitions 5G development work into manageable study items (SIs) and work items (WIs) assignments in parallel with “Continued LTE evolution” technology development. What is not emphasized in most all 5G content is that it does not exist in isolation rather 5G capability is minimally tightly coupled and for R15 phase 1, wholly dependent “5G and LTE technology’s” seamless integration and interworking whereas currently LTE always includes 4G, 3G, and 2G which is 3GPP technology.
What sets the 3GPP (5G+) wireless technology work apart from other pay-to-play specification and technology development work is twofold, first its proven international success and second that most all study/work groups (4 of 6) are accessible to anyone. The 3GPP 5G technology must coexist with LTE/4G and legacy 3G/2G as R15 based on the International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT) and its International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) framework of standards developed by its Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R) work group. This group published ITU-R M.2083 titled IMT Vision – “Framework and overall objectives of the future development of IMT for 2020 and beyond” in September 2015 and by doing so set baseline 5G requirements. The ITU-R experts will review and issue a detailed report on R15.
5G and LTE-A Pro technology developers come from commercial, educational, and governmental entities. Of all participants Intel, Nokia-ALU, Ericsson, NEC, Samsung, Huawei, and Qualcomm, along with the many worldwide carriers they work, appear to have the biggest commitment to 5G-related success. The 5G+ technology plan has attracted more networking, automotive, and telematics experts who are committed to the broad-based success and rapid expansion of IoT and M2M services.
While all the 5G-goodness is well on its way thanks to international cooperation concerns exist that Silicon Valley may not reap the benefits from higher LTE and 5G download rates. The US, and Silicon Valley in particular ranks #10 in LTE coverage worldwide but close to the bottom (#54) for LTE download speed. Japan, Korea, and even Europe download speed is double and triple that of the US.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Network Manufacturer Ericsson told according to preliminary data, operating results decreased significantly from a year earlier.
Net sales decreased by 14 per cent in July-September, and a comparable operating profit of 73 per cent.
Ericsson’s operating profit excluding restructuring costs decreased by SEK 1.6 billion during the third quarter of last year by 6.1 billion kroons.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/Kaikki_uutiset/ericsson-kertoi-arvattavia-huonoja-uutisia-6592589
Tomi Engdahl says:
Huawei rose to number one in the base stations
Ericsson it lost the number one network for the Chinese Huawei.
Ericsson’s net sales in July-September, to SEK 51.5 billion, which is 14 percent less than the year before. Ericsson recorded in the third quarter of the first unprofitable quarter in four years.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5269:huawei-nousi-ykkoseksi-tukiasemissa&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
AT&T in advanced talks to buy Time Warner: sources
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-time-warner-m-a-at-t-idUSKCN12L1Y0
AT&T Inc (T.N) is in advanced discussions to acquire Time Warner Inc (TWX.N), sources said on Friday, a deal which would give the telecom company control of cable channel HBO, the CNN news network, film studio Warner Bros and other media assets.
Time Warner Chief Executive Jeff Bewkes rejected an $80 billion offer from Twenty-First Century Fox Inc (FOXA.O) in 2014 but sources said Friday that it had no plans to renew its bid.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Peter Kafka / Recode:
Why AT&T would want to buy Time Warner: content packaged with data connections, a shrinking DirecTV business, and competition with Verizon, Facebook, and Google — AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is busy, so we’ll answer for him. — More than 16 years ago, AOL bought Time Warner for $160 billion
The last Time Warner deal was the worst deal in history. What is AT&T thinking?
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is busy, so we’ll answer for him.
http://www.recode.net/2016/10/21/13358928/time-warner-att-deal
Tomi Engdahl says:
AT&T:
AT&T announces a half-stock, half-cash deal to acquire Time Warner, valuing the company at $85.4B — – New company with complementary strengths to lead the next wave of innovation in converging media and communications industry. —Combination unlike any other …
AT&T to Acquire Time Warner
http://about.att.com/story/att_to_acquire_time_warner.html
New company with complementary strengths to lead the next wave of innovation in converging media and communications industry.
-Combination unlike any other — the world’s best premium content with the networks to deliver it to every screen, however customers want it
-The future of video is mobile and the future of mobile is video
-Time Warner is a global leader in creating premium content, has the largest film/TV studio in world and an unrivaled library of entertainment
-AT&T has unmatched direct-to-customer distribution across TV, mobile and broadband in the U.S., mobile in Mexico and TV in Latin America
Combined company positioned to create new customer choices — from content creation and distribution to a mobile-first experience that’s personal and social
New York Times:
AT&T-Time Warner deal will likely face tougher regulatory scrutiny and higher political hurdles than earlier Comcast-NBCUniversal deal — A cable and internet provider decides to buy an entertainment conglomerate. — The merger is met with skepticism by industry analysts and outrage …
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/23/business/dealbook/regulatory-microscope-lies-ahead-for-att-and-time-warner.html
Peter Kafka / Recode:
Why AT&T would want to buy Time Warner: content packaged with data connections, a shrinking DirecTV business, and competition with Verizon, Facebook, and Google — AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is busy, so we’ll answer for him. — More than 16 years ago, AOL bought Time Warner for $160 billion …
http://www.recode.net/2016/10/21/13358928/time-warner-att-deal
Kara Swisher / Recode:
Resistance from Time Warner execs like Jeff Bewkes, head of HBO at the time, doomed the AOL merger, which raises questions about the prospects of the AT&T deal — The 2000 merger with AOL made Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes nauseated, so what’s different now? — In the end, I guess you could finally say Steve Case was right.
http://www.recode.net/2016/10/23/13369308/aol-time-warner-att-deal-history
Tomi Engdahl says:
AT&T Is Buying Time Warner Because the Future is Google
https://www.wired.com/2016/10/att-buying-time-warner-future-google/
Telecommunications companies are becoming media companies. That explains AT&T’s agreement to buy Time Warner for $85.4 billion. But something else explains it, too.
Media companies are becoming telecoms.
Internet firms like Google and Facebook and Amazon and Netflix are the new media companies. They deliver enormous amounts of video online, posing a direct threat to old-school television and movie companies. But they also are becoming telecoms, threatening the likes of AT&T and Verizon.
They finance undersea cables that link their data centers. They buy fiber optic infrastructure. Facebook builds open source telco gear, Google offers high-speed Internet service, Amazon hopes to become an Internet service provider in Europe.
As this happens, telecoms must fight back. And this means challenging tech giants on the media front.
The proposed AT&T/Time Warner deal combines two powerhouses. AT&T is the nation’s largest pay TV provider, the second-largest wireless provider, and the third-largest home Internet provider.
Time Warner owns a dizzying array of media properties, including HBO, CNN, Warner Brothers, DC Comics, TBS, TNT, the Cartoon Network and broadcast rights to many live sporting events.
How things have changed. AT&T, Comcast and Verizon have watched Amazon, Facebook, and Google take their place among the world’s most valuable—and powerful—companies, using infrastructure owned by the telcos. The entertainment industry rebounded as well, with upstarts like Netflix having reinvented the very idea of television.
Tomi Engdahl says:
For Presidential debate at UNLV, Cox Business provides temporary, redundant 10-gigabit fiber-optic connection for full internet/IP phone plus HD cable services
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/pt/2016/10/for-presidential-debate-at-unlv-cox-business-provides-temporary-redundant-10-gigabit-fiber-optic-con.html
On Oct. 19, the temporary media center will be powered by Cox Business for the presidential debate at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas (UNLV). Cox will provide telephone service, a back-up internet connection and cable and broadcast channels for use in the Cox Pavilion, a multi-purpose indoor arena and site of the media center.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Copper vs. fiber considerations for industrial networks
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/print/volume-24/issue-10/features/design/copper-vs-fiber-considerations-for-industrial-networks.html
Engineers strive for maximum productivity with minimal downtime, but this goal is only attainable with the right network infrastructure. No matter the industry, if a team doesn’t have the right cabling system in place, network reliability and performance can be compromised, leading to very costly production downtime.
This is why investing in high-quality, rugged cabling is crucial; it can reduce both the direct and indirect costs of network failure and give you peace of mind that the system is working properly. There are a variety of cabling options out there, so how do teams know they have the right one to support their specific infrastructure and network requirements? Deciphering whether you need fiber or copper cabling is a great place to start.
Copper: The classic cabling mix
Copper cabling is the traditional option in industrial installations and is best suited for the majority of industrial data transmission needs. Copper cables come in a variety of forms, including Category 5e, Category 6 and Category 6A twisted-pair cables using any number of conductor types, insulations, shielding and jackets. Armoring is also available for extremely harsh environments.
Category 5e cables are the most widely used copper cables today, but new installations favor the use of Category 6 cables
Fiber: The ultimate for futureproofing
Fiber-optic cabling is ideal for industrial environments in which high-speed, high-bandwidth data solutions are needed. Because fiber-optic cables are typically superior in bandwidth, low attenuation and complete electrical noise immunity, more information can be carried across the network without interruption. They are also smaller and lighter than copper cables, extremely durable and intrinsically safe, with no risk of spark hazards.
Fiber-optic Ethernet cables are available for both indoor and outdoor use
Knowing whether you need copper or fiber-optic cables and understanding the physical cabling components critical to the success of your application are the first steps in ensuring optimal performance in the face of demanding environments.
During the product selection process, it is very important to take the time to evaluate the marketplace and select top-quality, end-to-end cabling that can withstand tough environmental conditions and also fit with your specific application needs.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Remote powering equals opportunity
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/print/volume-24/issue-10/departments/editorial/remote-powering-equals-opportunity.html
No fewer than five presentations made during the conference included remote powering as a significant focus, and in some cases it was the primary focus. I use the term “remote powering” here rather than Power over Ethernet or PoE, because I view remote powering as a superset of PoE. All PoE is remote powering, but not all remote powering is PoE. One of the most-discussed applications for remote powering nowadays is lighting.
Another reason I use the term “remote powering” rather than “PoE” is that despite the term’s widespread use in the industry and close association with the IEEE 802.3af and 802.3at specifications, as well as the forthcoming 802.3bt specifications, “Power over Ethernet” has not been trademarked by the IEEE. A device does not need to comply with the “af” or “at” specifications in order to carry the term.
Yet the term PoE proliferates just like the technology does. And that is why I believe remote powering, including 802.3af-, at-, and bt-compliant technologies, represent such an opportunity for you as cabling professionals.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Futureproofing for FTTx: How to address the growing challenges of congested conduit
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/print/volume-24/issue-10/departments/perspective/futureproofing-for-fttx-how-to-address-the-growing-challenges-of-congested-conduit.html
In many cases, especially in large, developed metros, companies don’t have the benefit of utilizing existing conduit for new fiber runs similar to those Verizon handled in San Francisco. This may not be a possibility in places like Boston because existing conduits are already incredibly crowded, packed full of various cables from a range of different vendors, some of which aren’t even in operation any longer. In New York, for example, existing conduits are so congested that telecom companies are forced to route new runs via much longer-and much more expensive and time-consuming-detours.
While deploying FTTx within large, older cities has a myriad of challenges, some of that potential headache could be avoided by those cities looking to “futureproof” against similar problems. By avoiding the trap of trying to cut corners now to save time, FTTx owners and operators can look at emerging practices and deployment methods to ensure they’re set up for success-operationally and financially-in the long run.
There are several examples of public-private partnerships that help to address and possibly eliminate these issues. In some scenarios, a public entity (e.g. the state, county or city) takes ownership of the network infrastructure, working to deploy materials that can be easily upgraded as technologies change. The public organization then contracts out various vendors to operate the network systems and/or provide network maintenance as needed. This model ensures that the network is deployed in a way that enables local leaders to better plan for and finance FTTx, limiting the challenges of having multiple vendors fighting over the same infrastructure real estate. At the same time, telecom and other utility providers have assurance that they’ll have an available, organized infrastructure in place to meet their evolving needs.
In an ideal scenario, these deployments would focus on a “dig-once” mentality, installing minimal conduit, perhaps just one, limiting the amount of space needed. With the availability of segmented conduit, once a conduit is in place, multiple fiber cables could be run within a single conduit at the same location, thus increasing the limits of conduit capacity.
It’s worth noting that it is desirable from both a cost and time standpoint to make use of the dead space within an existing conduit, rather than laying a new length of conduit. However, it is difficult to insert fiber into a conduit that already contains cables or other wiring, which would be the case in most cities looking to deploy FTTx. When a new cable is blown or rodded into a conduit with an incumbent cable, the first cable often impedes placement.
With segmented conduit, a single conduit with multiple cells, network owners have spare pathways available to add capacity or bandwidth without requiring new construction-hence “digging once.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
AT&T, Ericsson, other LTE leaders join CBRS Alliance
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/pt/2016/10/at-t-ericsson-other-lte-leaders-join-cbrs-alliance.html
The CBRS Alliance announced today that Accelleran, Airspan Networks, American Tower Corp., AT&T, Baicells, CableLabs, Ericsson, ExteNet Systems, Nsight, Ranzure Networks, Rise Broadband, and ZTE USA have joined the Alliance to drive technology development and adoption of LTE-based solutions for the Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS).
“For LTE-based solutions in the shared CBRS band to be successful, we need a wide range of ecosystem partners, infrastructure, equipment and network providers, to work together closely,”
Back in April 2015, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) adopted rules for CBRS, which opens 150 MHz of spectrum (3550-3700 MHz) for commercial use — while providing necessary protection of incumbent users of the band.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nokia is a leader in small base stations
When macro cell network is largely built, network capacity will be increased in small cells, both outdoors and indoors. For this reason, it is promising to Nokia’s point of view, that a recent survey, 95 percent of small operators to keep the Nokia base stations, the number one manufacturer.
The result is based on the operator’s questionnaire IHS plant, which were involved in all of the world’s largest mobile operators. Nokia mentioned the 95 per cent of operators. Ericsson was read at 71 per cent and 57 per cent Huawei.
When you look at what investments will focus on operators, Nokia’s old station is good news.
According to IHS in urban centers there are currently 13 mini base stations per macrocell.
Next year the number will grow to one hundred, and in 2018 number will be 245 pieces.
IHS estimates that currently the world is almost 10100 Interiors, mini-base stations and nearly 2,500 outdoors. In 2020, the figures have increased by over 73 thousand indoors and outdoors for more than 20 thousand.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5278:nokia-on-ykkonen-pienissa-tukiasemissa&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
Gigabit broadband should be available to all real estate and homes in 2025, outlined the European Commission in September. Finnish operators’ current investment pace is inaccessible.
The European Commission justifies the objective of the fact that in 2025 gigabit connections, many such services and applications would become possible, which fail to meaningfully current connections.
The Commission cites the example taken from the patient computed tomography images with Charging current 20 megabit connections it would take 14 minutes, and gigabit connections to only 40 seconds.
As another example, it has been suggested to download 4k resolution (Ultra-HD) movie: 11 hours now, and half an hour gigs of broadband. Downloading or smartphone content: approximately four hours now, and later only 11 minutes.
Even in the 2020s will be fast 5g networks alone will not solve the problem, because they too require in order to speed fixed connections.
Finnet Association estimates that reaching the target would require the withdrawal of an optical fiber to every Finnish approximately 2.3 million homes, businesses, and other property.
Work is thus still a lot of face if Finland intends to achieve the EU target set – now optical fiber is pulled to approximately 500 000 in real estate, and an additional 100 000 to the apartment.
Source: http://www.tivi.fi/Kaikki_uutiset/suomi-ei-nykytahdilla-mitenkaan-ylla-kansainvalisiin-tavoitteisiin-pitaisi-herata-6593455
Tomi Engdahl says:
Verizon boss: Yahoo! email hack ‘is a big deal to us’, we’ll decide new price next month
Lowell McAdam talks acquisitions, 5G and IoT
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/24/verizon_to_decide_yahoo_price_nov/
Verizon is going to decide how much it is willing to pay for Yahoo! next month when an investigation into its massive security breach is completed.
Speaking at Intel Capital’s Global Summit in San Diego on Monday, Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam said that the breach last month, which saw 500 million people’s email accounts compromised, was “a big deal. A big deal to Yahoo! management and a big deal to us.”
He dismissed the notion that Verizon could walk away from the deal however – something that the company’s general counsel had publicly pondered earlier this month – saying that the acquisition of Yahoo! was “a part of our digital strategy.”
He did lend weight to the suggestion that Verizon is going to ask for a significant discount on its agreed $4.8bn purchase, however. Once the investigation was over, “then we can make a determination” as to the purchase price, McAdam said, adding: “The impact on the overall deal will be decided in the next few weeks.”
As for the other big acquisition news – AT&T’s proposed $85bn purchase of Time Warner – McAdam was sanguine.
5G
The rest of the time, McAdam waxed lyrical about the advantages of the next generation of mobile phone technology – 5G.
The introduction of 5G opens up all sorts of new possibilities, he noted, telling one story about how, over a 5G connection, Verizon execs were able to drive a remote car around a track. “When we switched back to 4G, no one could get it around the first curve,” he noted.
5G will provide much greater bandwidth and much lower latency – making it ideal for a new generation of devices from virtual reality to autonomous cars to smart city technology to drones – but due to it using a much higher frequency, data cannot travel as far.
McAdam thinks of 5G as “wireless fiber” and said that Verizon’s big focus was on how to provide it to people without having to directly connect up their homes.
Tomi Engdahl says:
WiGig spec hints at 5G offering 8 Gbps over 10 metres
Wi-Fi Alliance certification program kicks off with Intel, Qualcomm chipsets to the fore
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/25/intel_qualcomm_get_to_peel_the_back_off_the_wigig_sticker/
The WiFi Alliance reckons it’s bestowed on a waiting world the first hint of what 5G will look like, and apparently it’s a radio link that can manage 8 Gbps over 10 metres.
The group has announced the first products to carry its freshly-minted WiGig certification.
Chipsets to carry the certification come from Qualcomm (the QCA9500 chipset with reference solutions for clients and routers) and Intel (Tri-Band Wireless).
There are also reference adapters from Socionext, and Dell’s Latitude E7450/70 laptop.
The big advantage the 60 GHz band offers over what we’re familiar with for Wi-Fi – 2.4 GHz or 5 GHz – is that there’s plenty of room for extremely wide channels that provide multi-gigabit per second capacity.
The sort range of 50 GHz WiGig makes it most suitable for applications like docking and in-room device-to-device interconnect – file transfers, multimedia streaming, and (if enough people eventually care about it) virtual reality headset connections.
Stretching the use-case out to the 5G business, a Wi-Fi alliance bod told LightReading that with a long-range directional antennae WiGig’s range could be extended to distances sufficient to provide cellular base station backhaul.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Copper solves the problem of large data centers
Data centers want to constantly faster links. For a long time it has seemed that the only photonics achieve the desired data rate of one hundred gigabit servers, backing plates, but the kind of Silicon Valley Aquantian new SERDES switches bring the desired speed devices with copper.
Crehan Research’s study shows that the so-called. hyper data centers, the majority of storage and server connection is less than 3 meters. These switches based on optical fiber optical solutions are too expensive.
Aquantia has developed its own solution, with GlobalFoundries 56-gigabit circuit will operate on the basis of a rate of 100 gigabit SERDES GlobalFoundries circuit.
In practice, Aquatnia technology makes copper as fast as fiber. However, the cost of connections at a fraction of the price of fiber optic links.
Aquantia calls technique QuantumStream and licenses it to GlobalFoundries – wants to become the technology of copper-based 100G-standard links.
Aquantia believes circuits get in time for the 2018 season.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5282:kupari-ratkaisee-datakeskusten-ison-ongelman&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
While much is being made of the upcoming deployment of DOCSIS 3.1 technology, cable operators continue to make significant investments in fiber.
Source: https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=reg20.jsp&partnerref=em1&eventid=1295954&sessionid=1&key=8325A1A3161711E5B5A85540DFAA6626®Tag=&sourcepage=register
Tomi Engdahl says:
Every LTE call, text, can be intercepted, blacked out, hacker finds
Emergency fail over provisions abused
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/23/every_lte_call_text_can_be_intercepted_blacked_out_hacker_finds/
Ruxcon Hacker Wanqiao Zhang of Chinese security house Qihoo 360 has blown holes in 4G LTE networks by detailing how to intercept and make calls, send text messages and even force phones offline.
The still-live vulnerabilities were documented and discussed at the Ruxcon hacking confab in Melbourne, Australia, this weekend, including a demonstration of recording a call on a live network. To do this, an attacker must exploit fall-back mechanisms designed to ensure continuity of phone services in the event of overloads.
The team tested their work against Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) LTE networks, which are more popular than Time Division Duplexing (TDD) LTE and are used in Britain, the US, and Australia. The competing TDD-LTE design is more common in Asian countries and in regions where population densities are higher.
To exploit the LTE network, an attacker exchanges a series of messages between malicious base stations and targeted phones. This results in miscreants gaining a man-in-the-middle position from where they can listen to calls or read SMS, or force phones back to 2G GSM mode where any voice and basic data services can be intercepted.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google Fiber Pauses Operations, CEO Leaves, and About 9 Percent of Staff Is Being Let Go
https://news.slashdot.org/story/16/10/26/0121232/google-fiber-pauses-operations-ceo-leaves-and-about-9-percent-of-staff-is-being-let-go
The future of Google Fiber has been shaky ever since Google’s parent company, Alphabet, was founded. The original plan was to expand Fiber’s blazing fast internet service to more than 20 cities, with the goal of eventually delivering nationwide gigabit service. However, Alphabet hit the reset button on those plans Tuesday. Not only is Google Fiber CEO Craig Barratt leaving, but about 9 percent of staff is being let go. That translates to about 130 job losses, since the business has about 1,500 employees.
Alphabet Cutting Jobs in Google Fiber Retrenchment
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-25/alphabet-access-unit-to-cut-about-9-of-google-fiber-staff
Google in the past two years put in place plans to expand its Fiber fast internet service to more than 20 cities. Inside the company, executives harbored bigger ambitions: to deliver service nationwide and upend the traditional broadband industry.
Barratt wrote in a blog that the company is pulling back fiber-to-the-home service from eight different cities where it had announced plans. Those include major metropolitan areas such as Dallas, Los Angeles and Phoenix.
Moving into big cities was a contentious point inside Google Fiber
“I suspect the sheer economics of broad scale access deployments finally became too much for them,” said Jan Dawson, an analyst with Jackdaw Research. “Ultimately, most of the reasons Google got into this in the first place have either been achieved or been demonstrated to be unrealistic.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nokia grown larger than Ericsson?
Mobile phone base stations does not go fast now. Ericsson makes a loss and the Chinese company Huawei has caught it past the market leader. Today, the third quarter results of public power Nokia is expected better.
Credit Suisse analysts expect that Ericsson’s problems explained by the market situation. This means that Nokia would have fared better in the market and that Ericsson’s problems stem from the head of the crisis.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5296:nokia-kasvanut-ericssonia-suuremmaksi&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
In its current state, Ubiquiti’s EdgeSwitch won’t have much of an edge on anyone
Fantastic price, but connectivity more roulette than reliability
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/10/27/ubiquiti_edgeswitch_review/
REVIEW Members of the IT community rave about networking kit vendor Ubiquiti. You’ll find praises sung both on Spiceworks and amongst vExperts for their UniFi devices. Unfortunately, my recent purchase of Ubiquiti’s latest offering, their EdgeMax EdgeSwitches, has proven that Ubiquiti are also capable of putting out gear that is outright dire.
On paper, the EdgeSwitches are fantastic. The two models I have tried thus far are the Ubiquiti EdgeSwitch-16-XG, which offers 12 SFP+ and 4 RJ-45 10GbE ports and the Ubiquiti EdgeSwitch-48-Lite, which has 2x SFP+ 10GbE ports, 2x SFP 1GbE ports and 48 RJ-45 1GbE ports. We got the 16-XG for $620 USD and the 48-Lite for $430 USD.
The switches themselves
The switches themselves are feature-packed. If they worked, they’d be an astonishing find at the rock-bottom prices they’re selling for. Unfortunately, I need to place some pretty heavy emphasis on “if they worked”.
Bad decisions
It is incumbent upon the customer to do some research into the widget they are buying before they buy it. I deserve a right good smack for not having actually checked to see what cables the Ubiquiti units would work with.
To be perfectly honest, I didn’t give it a lot of thought.
Ubiquiti, however, has also made some pretty awful decisions here. These products should never have seen the light of day with their current firmware. The narrow range of connectivity options in these switches makes them unusable in practice.
Ubiquiti’s website doesn’t actually list officially supported transceivers or cables for these models, leaving the job up to a generalised, community-curated list.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fixed networks now important to Nokia
Nokia’s share price fell after the morning’s results announcement. Ericsson, Nokia fared better, but the Finnish company is not immune to any of the mobile networks lack of investments.
This place is fine with Alcatel-Lucent Evening become fixed network business.
Nokia’s infrastructure sales in July-September amounted to EUR 5.3 billion.
According to Nokia, reported a drop in mobile networks sales was compensated in the same segment, Fixed Networks, ie fixed network business growth.
Nokia a better that expected result is largely based Technologies Group, lucrative licensing agreement with Samsung.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5302&via=n&datum=2016-10-27_14:41:28&mottagare=30929
Tomi Engdahl says:
It’s Official: Google Fiber Easing off the Gas
http://www.btreport.net/articles/2016/10/it-s-official-google-fiber-easing-off-the-gas.html?cmpid=enlmobile10272016&eid=289644432&bid=1570907
Confirming recent rumors, Google Fiber (NASDAQ:GOOG) has announced a slowdown in its expansion plans, to include employee layoffs. In a blog post, the company said it will continue to operate in its deployed markets, including those where construction has begun, but will pause its push to add new markets.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Enhancing Revenues by Mining Subscriber Data
http://www.btreport.net/whitepapers/2016/09/enhancing-revenues-by-mining-subscriber-data.html?cmpid=enlmobile10272016&eid=289644432&bid=1570907
Cable operators have long collected data on the operation of their networks. Such data has helped warn of impending problems or assisted in overcoming failures to ensure reliable service delivery.
However, as digital service competitors in the telco and over-the-top (OTT) worlds have demonstrated, information on what subscribers are doing with the services they receive can prove invaluable. OTT providers in particular are well-positioned to gather and mine such data to improve their offerings and sales strategies. Cable operators, unfortunately, often find they are not.
Tomi Engdahl says:
A Radiologist Has the Fastest Home Internet In the US
https://tech.slashdot.org/story/16/10/27/2057251/a-radiologist-has-the-fastest-home-internet-in-the-us
Jason Koebler via Motherboard has interviewed James Busch — a radiologist and owner of “the first 10 Gbps residential connection in the United States” — at a coffee shop in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Motherboard reports: “For reference, the Federal Communications Commission officially classifies ‘broadband’ as 25 Mbps. His connection is 400 times faster than that. Busch found a way to make good use of his 1 Gbps connection, and now he’s found a use for 10 Gbps, too.
‘An X-ray averages around 200 megabytes, then you have PET scans and mammograms — 3D mammograms are 10 gig files, so they’re enormous,
This Guy Has the Fastest Home Internet in the United States
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/10-gbps-fiber-internet-fastest-home-internet-in-the-united-states
What does the guy with the fastest internet in the United States use his jealousy-inducing bandwidth for? Analyzing X-rays… and gaining an advantage in Call of Duty, of course.
Startup and community-run internet service providers have grabbed headlines over the last two years as they’ve begun rolling out the first 10 gigabit-per-second residential internet connections in the United States. As far as I can tell, though, only one person in the entire country has actually bought one of these connections, which are still incredibly expensive because the technology is so cutting edge.
I met with James Busch—a radiologist and the proud owner of what I am almost certain is the first 10 Gbps residential connection in the United States
An argument that’s increasingly being raised by policymakers and telecom companies is that gigabit fiber networks—which generally offer 1 Gbps connections—have had relatively slow uptake, because no one needs a connection that fast. Busch found a way to make good use of his 1 Gbps connection, and now he’s found a use for 10 Gbps, too.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:
FCC approves privacy rules requiring ISPs get customer permission before sharing sensitive data like location, financial information, and browsing history
Internet providers will soon need permission to share your web browsing history
New privacy rules require opting-in to sensitive sharing
http://www.theverge.com/2016/10/27/13428976/fcc-passes-isp-privacy-rules
In a win for privacy advocates, the FCC voted this morning to place new restrictions on internet providers that limit the information they can share about their subscribers.
When the rules go into place, likely sometime early next year, internet providers will be required to get explicit permission from subscribers before sharing “sensitive” information about them, such as their browsing history, their app usage, their location, and the content of emails and other communications.
This is all particularly revealing data, and none of it has been governed by FCC privacy rules until now. That means internet providers have been able to share or sell it to their partners, who might have used the information to advertise their own products and services to those customers.
Tomi Engdahl says:
4G delay is just too long
Ericsson demoed yesterday in Kirkkonummi 5G TVs and the Internet of Things. The two future technologies, which are inseparably linked. Demo on it became very apparent why 5G is required for.
The robot is equipped with sensors, which measure the balance. The measurement data is sent to the cloud – in this case, Ericsson’s server – in which the basis of the measurement data to the robot navigation instructions are given. This all happens so fast that the robot manages to juggle.
However, the demo shows that reliable balancing requires pressing latency of about 10 milliseconds. Latency can be extended, and once we get the values of the existing networks, ie 20 to 30 milliseconds, the robot keel over.
Roughly speaking, this is the reason why 5G technologies are examined in such as Nokia, Ericsson Kilo Jorvas. Multi-application robotic cars in virtual universes requires a link that is virtually real-time. In yesterday’s demo latency of a Wi-Fi link for more than 10 milliseconds. 5G sought in one millisecond latency to the terminal via an access point to the cloud and back.
Source: http://etn.fi/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5304:4g-ei-vain-riita&catid=13&Itemid=101
Tomi Engdahl says:
LinkedIn is working on a project that should terrify Cisco and the rest of the $175 billion hardware industry
http://www.businessinsider.com/how-linkedin-is-shrugging-off-the-175-billion-hardware-industry-2016-10?r=US&IR=T
In the shadow of its acquisition by Microsoft, LinkedIn has quietly begun talking about an internal project that has the potential to shake up the roughly $175 billion data-center hardware market.
LinkedIn’s plan is somewhat similar to what Facebook is doing with its Open Compute Project. OCP is creating brand-new “open source” data-center hardware, in which the engineers from different companies work together and everyone freely shares the designs.
In its five years, OCP has upended the data-center market and generated a cultlike following so big that when Apple forbade its networking team to join OCP, the whole team up and quit.
Likewise, LinkedIn is designing and building nearly all the pieces and parts of software and hardware that it needs for its data centers, poaching key people from Facebook and Juniper to do it.
“We are not building servers and switches and all these things because we want to be good at it. We are doing it because we believe it gives us an advantage to control our own destiny,” Zaid Ali Kahn, senior director of infrastructure architecture and operations at LinkedIn, told Business Insider.
This is a terrifying trend for vendors like Cisco and Juniper. In the past, only the biggest internet companies like Amazon, Google, and Facebook have gone this route: designing their own IT infrastructure from scratch.
A superfast network for $1
The story begins with a Facebook network hardware engineer named Yuval Bachar. He was part of a Facebook team in 2013 that had a big goal: reducing the price of building a super-high-speed computer networks tenfold. Facebook had stolen him from Cisco, and he did a stint at Juniper, too.
He wanted to pay $1 per gigabyte, or $100 for each piece of network equipment that normally costs $2,500 — and he publicly announced the goal at an industry conference.
He then went on to help Facebook build its industry-changing, l0w-cost, open source Wedge switch that put market leader Cisco on notice. Earlier this month, Facebook announced the second generation of that switch.
Deja vu
In the meantime, having been a part of OCP, Bachar came up with a similar plan for LinkedIn. OCP started by creating a rack that holds stacks of computers, storage drives, and network switches.
As a company grows, it simply adds more switches, servers, and disk drives to the rack.
Facebook had the same problem, so it built a stripped-down 21-inch rack, then designed its own servers and storage to put in it.
But hardly anyone else uses a 21-inch rack. “Probably 99.5% [of companies] are using a 19-inch rack,” Kahn told us.
That means for LinkedIn (or anyone else) to use Facebook’s rack, it had to renegotiate supply deals with its vendors to get gear in different sizes.
It was deja vu. Bachar led an initiative called Open 19 to create an open standard for a low-cost 19-inch rack. This rack can be stuffed with 96 servers for $50,000 total, saving $25 million across a 500-rack data center, the organization says.
Having seen the impact of OCP, vendors jumped on board
Microsoft, which expects its $26.2 billion acquisition of LinkedIn to close by the end of this year, is a member of OCP and has standardized its 21-inch racks and other OCP technology.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Alex Sherman / Bloomberg:
CenturyLink to buy Level 3 Communications for $34B in cash, stock deal, which values Level 3 at 42% above its stock price before reports of acquisition surfaced — @sherman4949 More stories by Alex Sherman — CenturyLink Inc. agreed to buy Level 3 Communications Inc. for about $34 billion cash …
CenturyLink to Buy Level 3 for $34 Billion in Cash, Stock
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-31/centurylink-agrees-to-buy-level-3-for-34-billion-in-cash-stock
CenturyLink Inc. agreed to buy Level 3 Communications Inc. for about $34 billion in cash and stock, creating a more formidable competitor to AT&T Inc. in the market to handle heavy internet traffic for businesses.
Both companies have struggled against larger competitors — AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. — in the business services market.
“We see this as addressing the opportunities in the enterprise business,” Level 3 Chief Executive Officer Jeff Storey said in an interview. “This is very consistent with the strategies at CenturyLink,” and will help us respond to things like the accelerating demand for network bandwidth, he said.
The deal “would not face undue hurdles” in winning regulatory approval, analysts at MoffettNathanson LLC said in a note. The transaction needs clearance from antitrust authorities and from the Federal Communications Commission, the companies said in the statement.
In the first half of the year, Level 3 was the second-biggest U.S. provider of ethernet services, which run high-bandwidth internet connections for companies, trailing only AT&T, according to Vertical Systems Group Inc. CenturyLink was fifth on the list.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Wi-Fi Alliance makes WiGig official for 60 GHz multi-gigabit networking
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/pt/2016/10/wi-fi-alliance-makes-wigig-official-for-60-ghz-multi-gigabit-networking.html?cmpid=enl_CIM_CablingInstallationMaintenanceDataCenterNewsletter_2016-10-31&eid=289644432&bid=1573049
Wi-Fi Alliance has officially launched certification for products based on the 802.11ad standard, known as Wi-Fi CERTIFIED WiGig, setting the stage for the multi-vendor interoperability needed to proliferate WiGig devices.
As noted by Wi-Fi Alliance, WiGig operates in the 60 GHz spectrum, which is less congested and complements existing Wi-Fi operating in the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands, to enable multi-gigabit performance for a range of applications such as wireless docking, augmented reality/virtual reality, multimedia streaming, gaming, and networking applications.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Silicon Photonics Comes Into Focus
http://semiengineering.com/silicon-photonics-comes-into-focus/
Using light to move large quantities of data looks promising, but gaps remain and the adoption timeline will vary by application.
Silicon photonics is attracting growing attention and investment as a companion technology to copper wiring inside of data centers, raising new questions about what comes next and when.
Light has always been the ultimate standard for speed. It requires less energy to move large quantities of data, generates less heat than electricity, and it can work equally well over long or short distances. Moreover, many experts contend it will be harder to hack data delivered with photons than over a copper wire.
The long-term goal is to use photons to carry data across a chip, eventually replacing SerDes, traditional interconnects and maybe even conventional transistors. But that could take a decade or more. The short- and mid-term goals are more focused on the data center and within the network, where data is ballooning from video, various types of imaging (including embedded vision and virtual/augmented reality), and a proliferation of sensors with the Internet of Things. The first mass deployment of light-based communication began in the 1990s, using fiber optics to lay the backbone for the Internet. It has since expanded into data centers, where silicon photonics is used to communicate between racks of servers, and between those servers and storage. The next phase is expected to involve communications between chips within a package.
But there are a number of technical and business-related challenges that must be resolved to really propel this technology forward. Light sources based on materials such as gallium arsenide, indium arsenide (InAs) or indium gallium arsenide (InGaAs) need to be more tightly coupled into the manufacturing process to achieve economies of scale, which has been problematic in the past because these III-V materials are difficult to work with using conventional silicon processes.
“What’s needed now is to increase the lifetime of these lasers,” said Bower. “The goal is 4,000 hours. We’ve seen 2,100 hours, which is not sufficient for anyone’s laser.”
Letavic believes the first major impact of silicon photonics will be the re-architecting of the data center. Rather than one or two huge data centers, he said the current thinking is to set up many smaller data centers and connect them with silicon photonics. “Optical interconnects will replace copper and be used to augment microwave and millimeter wave. And with 5G, you will need a high-speed interconnect from the data center to small cells. You will need at least 1 gigabit per second to the edge node, and 16 to 25 gigabits per second between the small cell and the base station.”
Adaptation vs. reinvention
Despite some fundamental differences in the technology between photonics and silicon-based semiconductors, there also are some overlaps.
“Thirty mask layers are common, and there are more than 400 elements per chip,” said Bower. “What we need is a photonics version of Moore’s Law.”
There are other similarities, as well. “The most sensitive parameters like line width and edge roughness are already being dealt with in silicon,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Facebook’s Tiny Cell Station Eyes the Remote and Rural
http://mwrf.com/systems/facebook-s-tiny-cell-station-eyes-remote-and-rural?code=UM_NN6RE3&utm_rid=CPG05000000121597&utm_campaign=3038&utm_medium=email&elq2=a57eef2552564c75a161cac6b2fdc466
By partnering with hardware and cloud computing companies, Facebook bet that the new equipment would be easier to reprogram and to expand its sprawling data centers. Lately, Facebook has applied this model to wireless hardware, in an attempt to bring cellular and internet service to remote locations that might not have access to the social media site.
Facebook recently revealed the plan’s latest building block: A new device called OpenCellular that allows wireless carriers to bring connectivity to places lying outside the reach of cell towers. The small device, which can be attached to telephone poles or tree trunks, contains processors and storage capacity to support wireless networks.
According to Facebook, the hardware inside can support anything from simple 2G cellular networks to significantly faster 4G and Wi-Fi services. The device contains a general baseband computing system, in addition to radio hardware with an integrated RF front-end. With both parts, OpenCellular can be configured as an access point—or a cellular network that lets people make local calls and texts.
According to Facebook, the new device is aimed at extending broadband service to the roughly 4 billion people isolated from the internet at the end of 2015. The company estimated that about 10% of the world’s population lived outside the range of cellular connectivity in 2015.
Introducing OpenCellular: An open source wireless access platform
https://code.facebook.com/posts/1754757044806180/introducing-opencellular-an-open-source-wireless-access-platform/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Is AT&T’s vision of ultrafast 5G wireless technology actually just a mirage?
http://www.cablinginstall.com/articles/pt/2016/10/is-at-t-s-vision-of-ultrafast-5g-wireless-technology-actually-just-a-mirage.html?cmpid=enl_CIM_CablingInstallationMaintenanceDataCenterNewsletter_2016-10-31&[email protected]&eid=289644432&bid=1573049
Mr. Stephenson has indicated this ultrafast next-generation wireless technology, known as fifth-generation technology or 5G, would compete with traditional TV services. “I will be sorely disappointed if we are not going head-to-head” with cable providers by 2021, he said in a recent interview.
Yet the vision Mr. Stephenson describes as a pillar of the Time Warner deal may be a mirage.
That is because 5G is unlikely to be deployed in any meaningful capacity in the next decade. The technology, which is supposed to offer connectivity at least 100 times faster than what is now available, is at the center of a bitter fight between carriers and telecom equipment makers about how it should work. No resolution is expected until at least 2020, said Bengt Nordstrom, co-founder of Northstream, a telecommunications consulting firm. “Anything before that will just be window dressing,” he said.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Sweden axes 700MHz spectrum sale over ‘national security’ fears
Say goodbye to better mobile coverage and hello to happy spies
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/11/01/sweden_cancels_spectrum_auction_over_national_security_concerns/
n a surprise announcement, the Swedish government has scrapped its plans to auction off 700MHz spectrum citing security concerns.
The auction was due to begin on December 1 but acting director of the country’s telecoms agency, Post & Telestyrelsen (PTS), Catarina Wretman announced she had decided to cancel it a month before launch citing “a changed security situation” and noting that “an investigation is underway on a developed and secure broadband solution for operators in the public order, health, security and defense.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft tweaks TCP stack in Windows Server and Windows 10
Ideas dreamed up by BitTorrent and Google people should speed Windows
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/07/20/microsoft_tcp_changes/
Microsoft has announced it will add five new features – some experimental – to the TCP stack it will ship in Windows Server 2016 and the Anniversary Update to Windows 10.
Redmond says the following five features will make it into its new TCP stack:
TCP Fast Open (TFO) for zero RTT TCP connection setup. IETF RFC 7413
Initial Congestion Window 10 (ICW10) by default for faster TCP slow start
TCP Recent ACKnowledgment (RACK) for better loss recovery (experimental IETF draft)
Tail Loss Probe (TLP) for better Retransmit TimeOut response (experimental IETF draft)
TCP LEDBAT for background connections IETF RFC 6817
Microsoft says the changes are needed “to reduce latency, improve loss resiliency and to promote better network citizenship.” It’s hard to argue against any of those goals, or the outcomes these additions will allow.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The ARRIS AgileMax® is an exciting new breakthrough in RF-over-Glass (RFoG) FTTH network technology. Replacing the optical splitters commonly found in traditional RFoG architectures, next-generation HPON™ powered by AgileMax optical distribution technology allows operators to completely eliminate Optical Beat Interference (OBI) from their networks—even in networks with multiple, active upstream lasers. By eliminating OBI, operators can significantly expand their networks’ upstream and downstream capacity and data speed without changing back office infrastructure.
ARRIS: Introducing a Technology that Can Evolve Networks for the Future
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlXQGEqMFOQ
In this video, Leslie Rysdale discusses the challenges associated with evolving to an all-fiber network such as the bandwidth and upstream limitations of RFoG and optical beat interference (OBI). ARRIS introduces AgileMax with RFoG to eliminate those roadblocks. With this new technology, service providers can evolve their networks with a Hybrid PON (HPON) solution that enables upstream bandwidth growth, expansion of services and support for DOCSIS 3.1.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How Service Providers can own the smart Gigabit Home
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5stmcD3dtfY
This webcast panel considers how cable operators and telcos can ensure that they, and not ambitious smart home service providers or retail giants, own the smart Gigabit home. It talks about how home Wi-Fi will cope with ultra-fast broadband and the potential for someone to aggregate services and guarantee QoS and security across complex applications. It discusses as well how service providers can maintain the primacy of their gateway over all other devices, and how you make money in the smart Gigabit home.
Tomi Engdahl says:
StatCounter Global Stats:
Mobile and tablet devices, accounting for 51.3% of internet usage worldwide, exceeded the 48.7% by desktop, for the first time in October — – Increased traffic plus Google search rankings stress importance of mobile friendly websites — San Francisco, CA and Dublin, Ireland; 1st November …
Mobile and tablet internet usage exceeds desktop for first time worldwide
http://gs.statcounter.com/press/mobile-and-tablet-internet-usage-exceeds-desktop-for-first-time-worldwide
Tomi Engdahl says:
Supantha Mukherjee / Reuters:
Chipmaker Broadcom to buy network gear maker Brocade for $5.5B in cash, $12.75 a share, to expand its fiber channel and storage businesses — Chipmaker Broadcom Ltd (AVGO.O) said on Wednesday it would buy network gear maker Brocade Communications Systems Inc (BRCD.O) for $5.5 billion in cash …
Chipmaker Broadcom to buy network gear maker Brocade for $5.5 billion
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-brocade-commns-m-a-broadcom-idUSKBN12X1A8
Chipmaker Broadcom Ltd (AVGO.O) said on Wednesday it would buy network gear maker Brocade Communications Systems Inc (BRCD.O) for $5.5 billion to expand its fiber channel and data storage businesses, the latest in a flurry of chip sector deals.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Linaro Ltd.’s OpenDataPlane
http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/linaro-ltds-opendataplane
The OpenDataPlane (ODP) project is a founding initiative by the Linaro Networking Group to produce an open-source, cross-platform application programming interface (API) for the networking Software Defined Data Plane. Linaro Ltd. recently announced the availability of the first Long Term Support (LTS) Monarch release of OpenDataPlane, which will enable other projects to leverage the acceleration provided by the ODP APIs now that the code base will be fully supported for the foreseeable future.
Linaro adds that work already has begun on network protocol stacks, such as OpenFastPath (OFP), products like the nginx web server accelerated with ODP and OFP and libraries like OpenSSL that provide crypto acceleration via ODP. In addition, ODP and ODP-based products, such as OFP, nginx and OpenSSL, now can be made available as packages in popular Linux distributions like Debian, CentOS and OpenEmbedded.