Business News Holding

Tag: hardware-and-technology

  • T-Mobile HSPA+ Network to Deliver Broadest Reach of 4G Speeds in U.S.

    T-Mobile today announced the continued expansion of its super-fast mobile broadband network to more than 85 million Americans-the most pervasive network to offer 4G speeds in the country.

    The company is on track to deliver HSPA+ speeds in 100 major metropolitan areas with backhaul in place, covering 185 million people in the U.S. by the end of this year.

    "The aggressive pace of our HSPA+ network rollout means our customers can enjoy a better mobile broadband experience on more devices in more places today-but we’re not done yet. Our first HSPA+ smartphone is coming soon and our footprint will double between now and the end of the year," said Neville Ray, chief network officer for T-Mobile USA.

    Now HSPA+ network service is available in nearly 50 major metropolitan areas across the country.

    According to the company, 16 of T-Mobile’s current 3G devices, including more than a dozen smartphones, can benefit from enhanced speeds when they’re on the HSPA+ network in all of these major metropolitan areas, including the newest smartphone available from T-Mobile-the Samsung Vibrant.

    The company also said that later this summer it will unveil its first HSPA+-capable smartphone.

    In addition, T-Mobile has introduced the webConnect Rocket 2.0 USB Laptop Stick, an updated form factor of its first HSPA+-capable device. Featuring a new rotating swivel USB form factor, the webConnect Rocket 2.0 is designed to deliver the same home broadband experience on the go as its predecessor, so customers can surf the Web, download large files or watch video from a laptop anytime on-the-go with a blazing-fast connection.

    The webConnect Rocket 2.0 enables customers to take full advantage of T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network in areas where the service is available-delivering 4G speeds.

    Related articles
    T-Mobile USA CEO Robert Dotson to Leave Company in May 2011
    Everything Everywhere Joint Venture by Orange and T-Mobile Unveiled
    3 Scandinavia Launches World’s First 84Mbps HSPA Network
    T-Mobile Confirms 21Mbps HSPA+ Rollout for Mid-2010

  • Nokia Siemens to Acquire Motorola’s Wireless Network Infrastructure

    Nokia Siemens and Motorola jointly announced that the companies have entered into an agreement under which Nokia Siemens will acquire the majority of Motorola’s wireless network infrastructure assets for US $1.2 billion in cash. The companies expect to complete closing activities by the end of 2010.

    According to Nokia Siemens, as part of the transaction, the company expects to gain incumbent relationships with more than 50 operators and to strengthen its position with China Mobile, Clearwire, KDDI, Sprint, Verizon Wireless and Vodafone.

    Nokia Siemens expects that based on revenue, with the addition of the Motorola wireless network infrastructure business, it will become the #3 wireless infrastructure vendor in the United States, the #1 foreign wireless vendor in Japan, and strengthen its current #2 position in the global infrastructure segment.

    Motorola’s networks infrastructure business provides products and services for wireless networks, including GSM, CDMA, WCDMA, WiMAX and LTE. This business is a market leader in WiMAX, with 41 contracts in 21 countries; has a strong global footprint in CDMA with 30 active networks in 22 countries; and a robust GSM installed base, with more than 80 active networks in 66 countries; and excellent traction with LTE early adopters.

    Approximately 7,500 employees are expected to transfer to Nokia Siemens Networks from Motorola’s wireless network infrastructure business when the transaction closes, including large research and development sites in the United States, China and India.

    Motorola retains the iDEN business, substantially all the patents related to its wireless network infrastructure business and other selected assets.

    The companies expect to complete closing activities by the end of 2010 and therefore do not expect the transaction to have any impact on Nokia Siemens Networks’ financial performance in 2010.

    Nokia Siemens and Motorola also are exploring a global relationship in the public safety arena. According to the companies, this relationship would combine Motorola’s leadership in providing solutions to public safety organizations with Nokia Siemens Networks’ commercial LTE solutions.

    "This is an exciting acquisition that I believe has significant benefits for customers, employees and our shareholders," said Rajeev Suri, Chief Executive Officer of Nokia Siemens Networks. "Motorola’s current customers will continue to get world-class support for their installed base and a clear path for transitioning to next generation technologies while employees will join an industry leader with global scale and reach. Nokia Siemens Networks will see the benefits of a deal that is expected to enhance profitability and cash-flow and to have significant upside potential."

    Greg Brown, Co-CEO of Motorola, said: "Motorola is very proud of the operational and financial performance of our Networks business and its employees, who will now become a valuable addition to Nokia Siemens Networks. We are excited to have reached this agreement to combine our Networks team with such an industry leader."

    "This is great news for our customers, our investors and our people and will allow us to sharpen our strategic focus on providing mission and business critical solutions for our government, public safety, and enterprise customers," he added.

    Related articles
    Motorola Milestone XT720 Announced
    Forum Nokia Hails African Developers
    Motorola: TD-LTE is Now a Commercial Reality
    Nokia Announces Skype for Symbian

  • Sharp to Introduce VR-100BR1 Triple-Layer Blu-ray Disc Media

    Sharp will introduce the VR-100BR1 triple-layer Blu-ray Disc media (write-once) that conforms to the BDXL format specification, the new multi-layer recordable Blu-ray Disc format, a world first. These new Blu-ray Discs will be available in Japan beginning July 30, 2010.

    This disc media product conforms to the new BDXL format specification that extends the storage capacity of Blu-ray Discs to 100GB, twice the 50GB storage capacity of existing dual-layer discs.

    This new format enables recording approximately 12 hours of terrestrial digital TV broadcasts or approximately 8.6 hours of BS digital TV broadcasts. It expands the range of applications for Blu-ray Discs to include recording and saving long-duration HDTV programs or multiple episodes of serial dramas onto a single disc with the same high-definition image quality as the original.

    Major Features

    1. World’s first triple-layer Blu-ray Disc media featuring large 100GB recording storage capacity.

    This disc media is the first in the world to conform to the new BDXL format specification that extends the storage capacity of Blu-ray Discs by increasing the number of recording layers. The dual-layer structure used up to now has been augmented with an additional layer where image data can be recorded to create a new triple-layer structure.

    2. “Hard coat” process provides peace of mind for users by protecting important video data from scratches and fingerprint contamination.

    A “hard coat” process applied to the disc surface forms a protective barrier coating to protect stored data from scratches and dirt that may cause read and write errors.

    3. Users can print directly on discs down to 24 mm inner diameter.

    Wide print area of 24 mm inner diameter and 118 mm outer diameter for disc labeling. In addition to enabling vivid color labeling to be printed over nearly the entire disc, oil-based or water-based marker pens can be used to hand-write labels on these discs.

  • IPsmarx Wants to Revolutionize the Calling Card Industry

    IPsmarx released their newest innovation for the prepaid phone card industry that is said to allow Calling Card and Pinless Service Providers to expand their network of sales agents, increase their customer base, and reduce operating costs.

    The development came about when IPsmarx discovered, through internal client surveys, that there are two unmet needs in the prepaid calling card industry:

    1. The ability for end users to recharge pinless accounts in person, without using internet or a credit card.
    2. The ability for an agent at a retail location to recharge an end user’s pinless account over the phone.

    “Traditionally, the prepaid calling card market has consisted of consumers who pay cash in person for printed cards,” said Carrie Fedders, Account Manager with IPsmarx.

    "This segment of the market typically doesn’t have access to the Internet, may not feel comfortable using a credit card or simply do not own a credit card. However, with the growing trend of pinless dialing, which is much more convenient for consumers, we decided to develop a solution so cash paying customers can still take advantage of the convenience of having a pinless calling account, without having to pay online with a credit card,” he said.

    With the new Retail Store Recharge feature, service providers can now enable their retail store agents to recharge customers’ PINless calling accounts in person. Agents also have the ability to recharge customers’ accounts over the phone through IVR (Interactive Voice Response,) allowing service providers to sign up agents that may not have access to a computer or internet at their retail locations.

    Since only a phone is needed to complete the transaction, this new system enables service providers open up a non-traditional network of PINless agents such as ethnic grocers, restaurants, and small convenience stores.

    “The release of this unique feature, furthers our mission to help our existing client base of Calling Card Service Providers expand their businesses,” says IPsmarx CEO, Arash Vahidnia, “The calling card market is changing rapidly and with the development of cutting edge features such as this, we can be certain that our clients are in the forefront of the competitive marketplace.”

    According to IPsmarx, Calling Card Service Providers who implement this new feature benefit from reduced operating costs – namely calling card printing and marketing costs. Further, they are able to expand their existing network of sales agents and increase their recurring business, thus increasing market share, and, lastly, by offering a singularly unique feature in the competitive calling card landscape, “they are leaps and bounds ahead of their competition.”

    The company claims that customers who depend on calling cards to stay in touch with friends and family living in foreign countries will be the biggest winner of this new technology. “They’re able to experience greater convenience by retaining one primary calling card carrier instead of buying single use cards each time they need to make a phone call.”

    Watch a video on the new Retail Store Recharge Over the Phone system.

     

    ###

    IPsmarx SIP Based Calling Card Platform has been named our “Product of the Year Award” in 2008 and 2009.

    Related articles
    IPsmarx Partners with snom to Deliver VoIP Services for SMBs and Global Enterprises
    Winning VoIP Philosophy: Interview with Arash Vahidnia, CEO of IPsmarx
    IPsmarx Introduces IP-PBX And SIP Trunking To Its “All In One” Solution
    IPsmarx SIP-Based Calling Card Platform Wins “Best VoIP Product of the Year”

  • Broadvox Announces SMB IP Multimedia Communications

    Broadvox has announced that Grandstream Networks‘ new GXV3140 is the first IP Multimedia CPE device to deploy with Broadvox GO! SIP Trunking.

    According to the company, the solution enables businesses to save up to 70% a month over their previous TDM systems. Along with that, they also receive the added benefit of using and exploring additional features and functions available with SIP.

    Broadvox SIP Trunking solutions are delivered on a private network designed with state-of-the art-equipment, enabling customers to benefit from SIP regardless of their existing infrastructure.

    Broadvox GO! SIP Trunking offers unlimited local calling, discounted long distance, and Toll-free calling. Additional DIDs, Local Number Portability, and other options are also available. The network is monitored 24×7 and delivers service to the United States (excluding Alaska), Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands, and Canada.

    The first multimedia CPE endpoint used with Broadvox GO! SIP Trunking and the GXV3140 enable video and voice calling upon installation. With a 4.3" digital color LCD screen, the "always-on" GXV3140 has an integrated web browser which gives convenient, one-touch access to personalized RSS feeds of real-time online information services (news updates, stock updates, weather forecasts, directory searches, etc.), and thousands of Internet radio stations.

    This device also lets the user IM with Yahoo, MSN, and Google, and gives access Yahoo Flicker web photo albums. It comes equipped with an alarm clock, calendar, games, and music ringtones. Broadvox claims that full duplex speakerphone and voice codec support deliver “best-in-class telephony features.”

    "Grandstream has developed a true multimedia product to enhance enterprise communications, reduce costs, and strengthen our customers’ network return on investment," said Sergey Galchenko, Chief Technology Officer at Broadvox.

    David Li, CEO of Grandstream Networks, stated: "Broadvox enhances visual communications offered with Grandstream’s IP Multimedia Phone by assuring premium quality video and voice IP calls that are reliably delivered to every customer, every time."

    Related articles
    Grandstream Now Skype for SIP Interoperable

  • Pioneer Cellular Selects Jinny Software for its CDMA Business

    Jinny Software, a global supplier of messaging and media solutions to Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), announced it is to support Pioneer Cellular through its suite of next generation messaging solutions.

    Pioneer Cellular is an Oklahoma-based CDMA carrier which offers voice and data services, and will now utilize the power of Jinny’s messaging solutions, specifically its SMSC, MMSC and OTA products, in its service offering.

    According to Pioneer Cellular, they was seeking a trusted partner and able messaging provider to deliver key systems in its network. "Experience and quality of support combined with the cost/benefit ratio, flexibility and capability of Jinny’s solutions were the key determining factors in securing this deal," as the company says.

    Jinny Software offers a wide range of messaging, call & media and mobile advertising solutions. They claim that their messaging solutions "drive increased efficiency in traffic management and enable the rapid introduction of secure, innovative and revenue-generating services."

    Pioneer Cellular provides services with 3G EVDO Rev A technology, such as Picture and Text Messaging, Data Browsing and downloadable BREW applications.

    “We are delighted to be working with Jinny Software,” said Richard Ruhl, General Manager at Pioneer Cellular. “Jinny’s comprehensive product set will allow us to offer our subscribers a full range of messaging services in a short timeframe.”

    Fintan Supple, Americas Regional Sales Director at Jinny, added, “We are pleased to announce this latest CDMA customer win and we are looking forward to forging a long-term relationship with Pioneer Cellular. This project reinforces the position of Jinny Software in North America, as a trustworthy and reliable partner for delivering complete and comprehensive messaging solutions in aggressive timelines.”

  • Yealink Release New Firmware for SIP-T2x Series IP phone

    Yealink network, a manufacturer of IP voice and video phone, announced that it has released the latest firmware for its award winning IP phone series–SIP-T2x. They provide high quality audio, a broad range of voice codecs, security protection for privacy, and rich telephony features.

    According to the company, the new firmware enhancement, available for downloading from Yealink’s website, will include a number of features such as security protection, performance improvement as well as bug fixes.

    Specially, the added XML-support enables customization and integration, connecting business processes and people to critical information by providing display-based access to services and applications. "Users can easily access information and perform tasks, for example, use the displays on the IP Phones in hotel rooms to make dining reservations, set up wake-up calls, purchase attraction tickets, get directions, and check on flight status and so on," as Yealink said in the press release.

    The other new features:

    XML Screen/Browser — XML browser is a simple sip-phone-custom browser function based on XML. With XML browser, customers can personalize their features，Such as weather forecast inquiry, stock information, date inquiry, access to address book, and other functions.

    Hot Desking     — Hot Desking allows users to login their personal accounts on different phones anywhere. It is used in office where staffs are shifting to work especially like call center to maximize the resource.

    Open VPN    —Open VPN allows for remote and secure access to your network and application resources. So you can register the phone to your local office while you are on business.

    There are some other features like 802.1x, call completion, call recording and BLF support for linekey.

    The SIP-T2x was honored with Technology Marketing Community (TMC) 2009 Innovation award and was selected as the Best VoIP Hardware Finalists by United Kingdom Internet Telephony Service Association (ITSPA).

  • ip.access & Kineto Complete Femtocell Interoperability Testing

    ip.access and Kineto Wireless have announced successful interoperability testing between ip.access’ Oyster 3G femtocell Access Point and Kineto’s Multi-Service Access Gateway (MSA-GW).

    The testing was based on 3GPP’s Release 8 Iuh specification, which defines the standard interface between femtocell Access Points and the femtocell gateway. The Iuh standard makes it easier for mobile network operators to deploy femtocells in multi-vendor environments, ultimately giving them a wider choice of suppliers.

    According to the companies, they have separately deployed femtocell solutions successfully for mobile network operators. The two companies have taken a leading role in the development of the Iuh standard through their involvement in the Femto Forum and 3GPP, and both companies participated in the world’s first femtocell plugfest organized by the Femto Forum and ETSI in March 2010.

    "The femtocell industry’s progress in defining and implementing open standards has been impressive, and we see this is an important step in proving and improving those standards. Kineto and ip.access are two companies distinguished by having their technology live in production networks. This step marks another important milestone in our lengthening technical leadership,” said Dr. Nick Johnson, CTO of ip.access.

    According to Ken Kolderup, vice president and general manager of Kineto’s Infrastructure Business Unit, delivery of standards-based femtocell systems are crucial to supporting the next phase of operator deployments. "The relative ease with which we were able to confirm interoperability with ip.access is a testament to both the completeness of the Iu h specification and the market-readiness of our respective products,” he said.

    Related articles
    Femtocell Base Stations Poised for Spectacular Growth
    MWC 2010: Interview with Chris Cox, Product Line Manager at ip.access
    VoLGA Significantly Outperforms Call-Setup Times
    Kineto Announces Combined VoLGA / IMS Client for Voice Over LTE

  • Digital Dividend Spectrum and Mobile Broadband in South East Europe

    Serbian Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Society has driven an initiative to develop a unified approach to the allocation of ‘digital dividend’ spectrum – the spectrum that will be freed up by the switchover from analogue to digital TV – in South East Europe.

    The Ministry hosted a Ministerial Summit on the digital dividend in Belgrade attended by regulatory bodies and government delegations from states in South Eastern Europe including Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Slovenia and Turkey.

    GSMA, that represents the interests of the worldwide mobile communications industry, said it applauds all governments’ actions to establish a harmonized approach to spectrum allocation in South East Europe.

    “The region of South East Europe lies on the borders of the European Union and achieving harmonised use of spectrum is important to the growth of the telecoms market and the wider economic well-being of the countries in it,” said Martin Whitehead, Director of GSMA Europe.

    “A cohesive regional approach from EU member states and their neighbours in South East Europe will maximise the affordability of telecommunications services in the area. We are delighted that Minister Matic and the Serbian Ministry have taken a lead on this issue by bringing together key nations from across the region to discuss and encourage a unified approach to spectrum harmonisation,” he added.

    GSMA informed that the objective of the meeting was to discuss how best to maximise the economic and social benefits promised by the digital dividend in South East Europe. Allocating some of the digital dividend to Mobile Broadband will increase Internet penetration and have a significant positive economic impact by driving innovation, job creation, productivity and competitiveness.

    However, harmonisation of the spectrum on a regional basis is needed to drive down handset and network equipment costs and make Mobile Broadband affordable to consumers.

    The unprecedented amount of spectrum that will be freed up in the switchover from analogue to digital terrestrial TV is known as the Digital Dividend. The Digital Dividend spectrum is located between 200 MHz and 1GHz. This spectrum band offers an excellent balance between transmission capacity and distance coverage.

    If just 25%, or around 100MHz, of the spectrum currently used by analogue TV (470 – 862 MHz) was re-allocated to mobile communications, the mobile industry could dramatically speed up the rollout of broadband communications and increase coverage.

    Because of its good signal propagation characteristics, less infrastructure is required to provide wider mobile coverage, meaning that communications services can be provided in rural areas at lower cost.

    This is of core importance in South East Europe where population density is typically lower than in other parts of Europe. The region’s position on the borders of the EU also makes coordination between states more complex and the high number of multiple border issues threatens to complicate coordination further.

    Harmonisation of digital dividend spectrum throughout Europe is an important element in the greater spectrum debate, as the mobile industry currently faces an urgent need for more spectrum to accommodate significant increases in Mobile Broadband usage.

    Extending coverage to rural areas and ensuring that the ‘digital divide’ between town and country is lowered is also a vital element of EU policy. Work on the digital dividend must continue to ensure universal connectivity.

    According to GSMA, the mobile industry needs around 100 MHz because:

    • Economic studies show that about 100MHz gives the optimum trade-off in Europe
    • It is in line with MEPs’ ITRE report
    • It leaves broadcasters with the spectrum they need to offer more content (75% of the resource)
    • This spectrum needs to be harmonised as much as possible to control cross-border interference and reduce terminal costs – separate national bandplans destroy value
    • LTE needs wider bandwidths to offer mobile broadband data rates (2 x 20 MHz for up to 100 Mb/s downlink) that consumers want, efficiently
    • Spectrum allocation needs to accommodate multiple operators to promote competition
    • More may be needed in some markets on a national basis, which may happen at different times in different markets

    What can be done to attain 100 MHz?
    Allocation of the digital dividend is a national prerogative, meaning that Member States of the European Union are entitled to manage the freed up spectrum according to their national interests, provided that they are in line with the decision taken within the International Telecom Union (ITU). The Member States are likely to be bound also by a spectrum management framework, as set out at the European level, in order to guarantee benefits that stem from a minimum common denominator of spectrum allocation.

    According to GSMA, these benefits include the possibility of harmonized frequencies, the balanced allocation of spectrum between the different service providers, and the avoidance of interference within the boundaries of the European Union. Overall, this would lead to faster, cheaper and better services with an increased possibility for content enhancement and interoperability of devices (e.g. Mobile TV).

  • SGI Releases InfiniteStorage 5000 SAS External Storage System

    SGI, a provider of HPC and data center solutions, today announced the release of SGI InfiniteStorage 5000, a RAID storage system that combines leading edge hardware with a choice of host interfaces and drive technologies in a powerful external storage platform.

    SGI InfiniteStorage 5000 is SGI’s first storage system to employ 6Gb/s SAS technology.

    SGI InfiniteStorage 5000 provides customers with improved performance and scalability, multi-protocol host connectivity, flexible drive support, data security features and advanced energy savings. With SGI’s DMF software, SGI InfiniteStorage 5000 is an ideal primary or secondary storage solution for tiered virtualization implementations.

    It is also ideal as a front-end for active archive architectures using an SGI® COPAN™ MAID solution on the back-end. It perfectly complements SGI® Altix® UV server and Rackable™ rackmount server environments.

    “As data volumes in the enterprise continue to grow, increased performance, reduced power consumption and system flexibility are of primary concern to customers,” said Rick Chapek, SGI senior vice president of hardware engineering. “By utilizing 6Gb/s SAS technology, SGI InfiniteStorage 5000 brings performance, reliability and a strong feature set normally seen in high-end Fibre Channel systems to an aggressive entry-level price point.”

    SGI InfiniteStorage 5000 delivers bandwidth up to 4,000 MB/s on sustained reads from disk, a 4X performance improvement compared to the previous generation product. The system delivers 40,000 IOPS (input/output operations per second) random disk reads, a more than 2X improvement over the prior generation.

    “Although 6Gb/s SAS for drives has already become common in the industry, completing that transition by including the host side has finally begun in earnest,” said Benjamin S. Woo, program vice president, worldwide storage systems research at IDC.

    “With both 6Gb/s host and drive-side architecture, InfiniteStorage 5000 should provide an affordable entry-point system that offers improved storage performance and scalability, and greatly decreased power consumption. Furthermore, it is ideally-suited for mixed workloads and virtualization, making it a top choice for storage upgrades.”

    SGI InfiniteStorage offers the ability to intermix drive types, allowing organizations to address a wide range of capacity and performance requirements. Customers can deploy high performance solid-state drives (SSDs) or SAS drives for the most demanding application workloads as well as cost-effective nearline SAS drives for less performance-sensitive, high-capacity applications.

    SGI InfiniteStorage 5000 consumes less energy with power supplies that meet the forthcoming Energy Star, 80 PLUS® energy efficiency and Climate Savers Computing specifications.

    Four native 6Gb/s SAS host interfaces can be intermixed with eight 1Gb/s iSCSI or eight 8Gb/s Fibre Channel (FC) host ports per dual controller. This flexible and multi-purpose dual protocol approach allows organizations to implement a variety of configurations – from rackmounted server and storage DAS implementations using SAS, to iSCSI and FC SAN environments for larger consolidation and virtualization projects.