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  • IPsmarx Technology with Encore Networks to Deliver Global SS7 Connectivity


     

    Encore Networks announced that IPsmarx Technology, VoIP solution provider, has selected Encore’s SP-201-Z Signaling Gateway to deliver C7 to ISDN protocol conversion and other VoIP based solutions to Long Distance carriers and global operators.

    The SP-201-Z is an advanced signaling gateway that facilitates out-of-band interoperability between incompatible voice networks, as well as providing interworking capabilities between legacy TDM voice networks and VoIP networks.

    IPsmarx is dedicated to delivering customer management and billing solutions for carriers, VoIP Calling Card Operators and Internet Service Providers (ISPs). With locations throughout North America, IPsmarx provides Internet Telephony Service Providers (ITSPs) in 63 countries with fully integrated turnkey solutions to deploy and run applications like wholesale, residential VoIP, calling card, and termination. Encore joins other industry leading IPsmarx partners including Cisco and Quintum Technologies.

    “Many types of out-of-band signaling protocols exist globally while many countries have different protocols simultaneously in use within its networks,” said William Pourmajidi, Technical Support Manager of IPsmarx Technology. “With its extensive list of seamless protocol support, the SP-201-Z breaks down the barriers presented by these different protocols and enable the flow of information across any network.”

    “By adding the flexible signaling conversion capabilities of the SP-201-Z to their product portfolio, IPsmarx offers customers the opportunity to customize signaling solutions for their specific needs minimizing the risks of entering new international markets,” added Bill Ferguson, Encore Networks Vice President of International Signaling Sales.

  • West & Central African Com: “Customer Relationship Management is at the heart of the operator’s activities"

    VIDEO INTERVIEW: Abdoulaye Sarre, Chairman and co founder of PCCI Group, was interviewed at the recent West & Central African Com conference held in Abuja, Nigeria.

    He talks about the importance of customer relationship management and he thinks that in the near future more and more operators will outsource their CRM operations.

  • Intel partner applies for WiMAX allocation in South Africa

    Broadband provider, iBurst, has applied to ICASA to extend its WiMAX allocation to 30MHz of frequency spectrum in the 2.6MHz and 3.5MHz ranges. This allocation will be used to support its plans to increase download speeds and to roll out nomadic WiMAX services.

    iBurst was one of the first providers in South Africa to launch a commercial WiMAX service. The iBurst WiMAX network went live in 2008 and has since grown to over 200 base stations in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban and Cape Town, making it the largest commercial WiMAX network in South Africa. iBurst plans to roll out additional WiMAX base stations over the next year.

    WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability Microwave Access) is a new generation technology that is a wireless alternative to leased line and ADSL services, and offers connectivity to small, medium and large businesses. iBurst’s current WiMAX solutions are perfect for businesses that want a wireless alternative to ADSL or Diginet at their premises.

    Although it is not a portable or mobile solution as it requires the installation of a fixed antenna, businesses are able to choose between a broadband (best effort) and a dedicated (assured) solution to accommodate for a range of applications and requirements. Nomadic WiMAX, by contrast, gives business’ and individuals more freedom to roam within WiMAX network coverage and still enjoy the same level of high-speed Internet access as they do at their office or home. Since it is faster to install at the customer’s premises and uses cheaper embedded equipment (for example, a chip in a notebook), nomadic WiMAX will help iBurst to roll these connectivity services out to more people countrywide. However, the additional 15MHz of spectrum is key in deploying nomadic services.

    "The fixed WiMAX offering from iBurst has seen widespread adoption in the parts of South Africa where it is available, giving users a high-speed alternative to fixed-line technologies," said iBurst CEO Jannie Van Zyl. "But provided we are able to secure additional frequency spectrum from ICASA, we will be able to make this technology even more accessible by activating the nomadic version of the WiMAX standard across our network. The network is ready, we are ready. Now we just need the spectrum."

    iBurst’s parent company, Wireless Business Solutions (WBS), recently signed a commercial agreement to jointly roll out WiMAX products with international technology giant, Intel. Intel has been a major driver of both Wi-Fi and WiMAX adoption. In terms of the agreement, Intel will embed WiMAX capability within a range of devices while iBurst will provide the connectivity between the devices and iBurst’s WiMAX network. Although the agreement has been signed, the network and WiMAX enabled laptops will only be available later in 2009. Recent compatibility tests conducted with Intel showed that these devices are now ready to be deployed if the spectrum allocation is increased to 30MHz.

    Van Zyl said "We believe that nomadic wireless products that bundle hardware and access technologies will help more South Africans to get online. In addition, it will help us to make internet connectivity available wherever and whenever our customers need it. Accessing the spectrum we need to roll out nomadic WiMAX is essential if we are to maximise the potential of this technology."

    iBurst was originally issued with 15MHz of WiMAX spectrum by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) in July 2006. WiMax implementations across the globe have demonstrated that at least 30MHz of spectrum is required in order to provide end users with the speeds and quality of service which can be achieved on the WiMax technology. Accordingly, WBS is applying for additional spectrum to take it to the 30MHz level. WiMAX is a family of technologies based on the IEEE 802.16 wireless standards with the iBurst network implementing the later 802.16e standard. Most other WiMax networks in South Africa still deploy the older 802.16d standard.

  • Teradata Announces Availability of Its Newest Database for Enterprise Intelligence

    Teradata Corporation, the company solely focused on data warehousing and enterprise analytics, today announced general availability of Teradata 13, which includes Teradata Database 13, Teradata Tools and Utilities 13, services and partnerships.

    Teradata acts as a single data store that can accept large numbers of concurrent requests from multiple client applications. Teradata Enterprise Data Warehouses are often accessed via ODBC or JDBC by applications running on operating systems such as Microsoft Windows or flavors of UNIX. The warehouse typically sources data from operational systems via a combination of batch and trickle loads.

    Teradata 13 enables data to stream up to two times faster into the data warehouse. Simultaneously, tens-of-thousands of variables can be analyzed directly in the database. The high-speed data loading and analysis do not interrupt or slow each other, providing agility for business users. The loading of data at high speed has been made possible by using specialized tables to support businesses that accumulate massive data volumes like retail and financial services.

    The query optimizer interprets a query and determines the most efficient way for the database to process it providing business users with a rapid response to their queries. Database administrators and application developers don’t have to be involved, because these enhancements deploy automatically.

    “A data warehouse must deliver analytical muscle, not just scalable storage. Teradata 13’s ability to balance complex workloads is key to this effort. The addition of geospatial and temporal capabilities will provide Teradata customers with entirely new opportunities for business models.” said Scott Gnau, head of development, Teradata Corporation.

    According to Gnau, “Teradata customers will be able to improve the processing of selected geospatial queries by as much as 20 times by integrating and analyzing geospatial or location data along with customer and operational data in-database. Geospatial processing is the latest process that is executed in parallel inside the Teradata Database along with in-database OLAP (On-Line Analytical Processing) and in-database data mining with SAS. The integrated geospatial data and the high performance of Teradata Database will add a significant new data dimension for customers seeking to increase the intelligence of their enterprise.”

    For customers using OLAP for standard business analytic queries, some type of queries are supposed to run up to 20 times faster on Teradata 13. The Teradata Database patented “intelligent scanning” innovation, eliminates the need to scan data whenever possible, unlike some vendors that focus on brute force, which wastes resources by unnecessarily scanning rows and rows of data.

    Teradata is a massively parallel processing system running a shared nothing architecture. It is offered on Intel servers interconnected by the proprietary BYNET messaging fabric. Teradata systems are offered with either Teradata-branded LSI or EMC disk arrays for database storage.

  • HTC opens Android Market in South Africa


     

    Leaf International Communications, the sole distributor of HTC in South Africa launched three phones, Touch Pro2, Touch Diamond2 and the Snap for the local market.

    The Leaf team presented their new offerings to the media at Central Grill in Fourways. The company also confirmed the Android Market, Google’s mobile application directory, will be available to South African users from August 2009.

    “HTC was the first to launch Android-based handsets in South Africa during May 2009,” said Stephen Strachan, marketing director at Leaf. “At the time, the Android Market was unavailable to local users and, while we have developed a local application portal, it is great that consumer demand has resulted in Google allowing local users to access this popular global portal. Leaf, together with HTC is exceptionally proud to bring the Android market to the South African consumer”.

    For the first time, HTC Magic and HTC Dream handset owners have access to literally thousands of free applications. They can download a complete spectrum of apps, ranging from functional downloads to those designed purely for fun. The assortment is limitless and consumers can choose between a variety of gaming applications, business & social networking tools and a multitude of other exciting content for download direct to their HTC Android handsets.

    HTC Pro2

    The new HTC Pro2 runs off the windows Mobile 6.1 professional operating system and will be upgraded to Windows Mobile 6.5 when released. The phones features 3.6-inch touch-sensitive screen with ultra sharp WVGA resolution, an internal GPS antenna, Bluetooth 2.1 stereo that has enhanced data rate and a micro SD card slot which offers expandable storage. The PRO2 makes communication more natural thanks to HTC’s new Straight Talk technology.

    Touch Diamond2

    The slim 13.7mm handset features a 3.2-inch touch sensitive screen with ultra sharp WVGA resolution. The Touch diamond 2 also has an internal GPS antenna which is GPS and A-GPS ready, Bluetooth 2.0 with enhanced Data rate and micro SD card for storage. The Touch Diamond2 runs off Windows 6.1 which will like the PRO2 be upgraded to Windows 6.5 operating system once it’s released.

    HTC Snap

    The New Snap seamlessly integrates the familiar features of Microsoft windows and an exceptional mobile web experience. The HTC Snap operates the flexible Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 standard platform. The HTC Snap also includes an internal GPS antenna that is GPS and A-GPS ready, Bluetooth 2.0 with enhanced Data Rate, Wi-Fi and A2DP for wireless stereo headsets.

  • West & Central African Com: Opportunity Abounds as Nigeria Faces "Revolution" in Broadband Deployment


    VIDEO INTERVIEW: Lanre Ajayi, managing director of PINET Informatics and president of the Nigerian Internet Group, was interviewed at the recent West & Central African Com conference held in Abuja, Nigeria.

    He talks about the changes coming in broadband and the need for businesses to position themselves for the opportunities they will bring.

    Ajayi said these will include opportunities in terms of applications, e-business, e-commerce and e-government.

  • LSI Launches RAID Controller Cards Based On 6Gb/s SAS Technology


    LSI has launched a new generation of MegaRAID SATA+SAS RAID controller cards based on 6Gb/s SAS technology.

    The storage and networking solution provider has also announced its new channel strategy for worldwide customers.

    Compared with 3Gb/s predecessors, the company said the 6Gb/s SAS RAID-on-chip (ROC) system provides more video streams, more database transactions and faster backups.

    This enables the MegaRAID 9200 series controllers to double the data transfer rate and deliver up to 2.88 GB/s in sequential reads and 1.87 GB/s in sequential writes, according to the company.

    The 9200 series controllers also provide channel customers with a low-cost upgrade that is designed to easily integrate with existing 3Gb/s SATA and SAS infrastructure, the company said.

    Suresh Panikar, senior manager of worldwide channel partner marketing and communications at LSI, said the controllers also support both high-performance SAS hard drives and cost-effective, high-capacity SATA drives, as well as energy-efficient solid state drives (SSDs) and bring standardized zoning which improves storage efficiencies by allowing multiple servers to share storage devices.

    They come with four ports and eight ports to reach up to a storage capacity of 480 terabytes.

    The new LSI MegaRAID controllers include five models – MegaRAID 9260-8i (eight internal ports), MegaRAID 9260-4i (four internal ports), MegaRAID 9280-8e (eight external ports), MegaRAID 9260DE-8i and MegaRAID 9280DE-8e. The 9260-8i is available now while the rest will be available by September.

    In addition to the next-generation product, the company announced it has teamed up with channel partners include vertical OEMs (VOEMs), direct market resellers (DMRs), resellers, and distributors to service its customers worldwide. LSI also provides forward looking fundings to those channel partners quarterly in advance for them to have more sufficient resources in promoting and selling LSI products.

    Phil Bullinger, executive vice president and general manager of the Engenio Storage Group at LSI, said: "LSI’s strong channel partnerships are a key strategic advantage in the marketplace and central to the company’s business strategy."

  • EMC Releases New Version of Retrospect


    EMC has launched a new version of its Mac backup software Retrospect.

    As well as adding back support for PowerPC-based Macs, Retrospect 8.1 also improves performance on Intel-based Macs.

    Eric Ullman, director of product management for Retrospect, said the product, which underwent a significant user interface rework in version 8, debuted initially without any support for PowerPC-based Macs.

    But he said such systems still make up approximately 50 per cent of Retrospect users, so it was important for EMC to make sure to release a version of the software that ran on them.

    "Apple doesn’t make PowerPC-based Macs anymore, but plenty of people still use them," he said. "Whether they’re hand-me-downs from other users who have upgraded to Intel-based Macs, or people who are just trying to extend the lives of otherwise useful systems."

    Ullman said Retrospect is particularly well-suited for small and medium-sized businesses that may have outgrown Time Machine – Apple’s backup system integrated with Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard".

    He added that the software is also useful for businesses that want to centralise backups.

    With version 8.1, a PowerPC system that might have otherwise been relegated to a closet can now be used to manage a Retrospect backup server.

    Other changes have also been made in version 8.1 to improve performance on Intel-based Macs. Backup, data verification and restore activities are all faster, and EMC says that local backup performance has been increased from 10 to 15 per cent over 8.0, 30 to 35 per cent over 6.1. PowerPC-based systems will also see a boost over 6.1 – faster, multiple G5 systems run 10 to 15 percent faster under 8.1.

    Some more user interface tweaks have been made to Retrospect 8.1, as well – icons have been updated, workflow has been improved, and the software provides better responses to user actions, according to Ullman.

    Retrospect 8.1 is available as a free upgrade for 8.0 users; Retrospect 6.1 users who bought their software after January 14, 2008 are entitled to a free upgrade. Upgrade prices are also available for other users.

    The new release is available throughout EMC’s distribution network both as a boxed software product and through download services.

  • WD Ships First 1 TB Mobile Hard Drive


    WD has announced a one terabyte mobile hard drive for mobile storage applications and notebooks – the industry’s highest-capacity available 2.5-inch drive

    The 333 GB-per-platter technology in the new WD Scorpio Blue SATA 2.5-inch hard is available in 1 TB capacity as well as a 750 GB.

    The launch came as WD announced Q4 Revenue of USD $1.9 Billion and Net Income of USD $196 Million.

    Both hard drives have a 12.5 mm form factor, which Jim Morris, senior vice president and general manager of client systems at WD, said is ideally suited for use in portable storage solutions.

    Other applications include select notebooks and small form factor desktop PCs, where quiet and cool operation are important. Both WD Scorpio Blue drives deliver high-performance with 3 gigabits per second (Gb/s) transfer rate.

    "The convergence of the growing mobile computing and digital media trends produces demand for desktop-like capacities in portable devices," he said.

    "Our new WD Scorpio Blue drives enable people to take even more of their digital collections with them wherever they go and, realising the value of their data, back up their notebooks on their My Passport drives."

    Morris said the WD Scorpio Blue hard drives offer high-performance, low power consumption and cool operation in portable applications.

    They are designed with WD features to be reliable and shock resistant while also delivering industry-leading capacity and performance.

  • Verbatim Releases 500 GB "Gold" 2.5-inch Portable Hard Drive For 40th anniversary


    Verbatim is to mark its 40th anniversary by releasing a limited edition ´gold` portable external hard drive.

    The gold-coloured UV coating of the special Anniversary Edition, houses a 500 GB 2.5" hard drive that includes easy-to-use backup and synchronization software.

    The Dmailer backup software makes backing up very quick and easy for professionals and novices alike.

    The Verbatim Sync software – also pre-loaded – supports users with reliable synchronisation of files and folders, from Microsoft Outlook or Windows mail contacts and calendar entries to documents, photos and videos.

    Users can take their PC’s content wherever they go and work on other devices while safe in the knowledge that Verbatim’s Sync software will synchronise new content to their own PC on returning to base.

    Complete with a USB 2.0 port that supplies the power and ensures data transfer at up to 480 Mbit/sec, the Anniversary Edition HDD is lightweight – only 161 grammes – optimizing it for mobility.

    Gary Milner, president of Verbatim EUMEA, said that forty years on, Verbatim has entered its anniversary year as the third-largest brand overall in the European digital storage market and the world leader in optical storage media.

    "From our early years in tape and floppy disks to our current broad product range of Optical, Flash Memory, External Hard Drives and Accessory Products, the Verbatim brand has always been associated with quality and reliability," he said.

    "This has been the foundation of our success and will always to be at our core as we celebrate our 40th anniversary and continue to innovate and market popular consumer and professional products into the future."

    The drive is compatible for PCs and Macs and is available for a limited period only at GBP £79.99 (RRP).