Universal Broadband: The Begging Begins

from GigaOM by Stacey Higginbotham

OK, now that everyone has accepted the need for better, faster broadband (and why not, if the government is paying for it?), the serious negotiations can begin. Today’s Wall Street Journal has an article detailing who wants what, and who will be at a disadvantage. Think of it as the telecommunications carriers fighting the cable guys, and the rural carriers begging for mercy so they don’t have to deliver 50 Mbps to every last farm in America.

There are debates over the new definition of broadband (anywhere from 1.5 Mbps from the rural DSL guys hoping to keep their existing infrastructure, all the way up to 10 Mbps from the equipment providers trying to sell more gear), and infighting over how to fund such efforts (bonds, tax incentives or handouts). There are the typical pleas for net neutrality tied to any government aid, and the also typical pleas from the industry that the government should just hand over the cash and let them move forward.

It’s frustrating to see a worthy goal like universal broadband get mired in a quest for cash by cable guys and carriers already making profits. Seriously, AT&T and Verizon are spending billions investing in upgrades, but still recorded third-quarter profits of $3.2 billion and $1.7 billion, respectively. The biggest cable companies — Comcast and Time Warner Cable — also reported profits for the period, with Comcast generating $771 million in net income and Time Warner pulling in $788 million. Both reported softening demand, yet touted that so far this year they have generated increased free cash flow as a result of their operations.

I’m glad they’re making money, especially because they’re doing so while simultaneously investing in next-generation infrastructure in their service areas. If there’s profit in a venture, a corporation can take it without picking Uncle Sam’s pocket. Look at Verizon’s FiOS deployments. It’s not spending $23 billion laying fiber out of the goodness of its heart, but in order to offer competitive services that will keep it in business.

If there’s no profit — and that’s why rural broadband and fiber deployments in poor neighborhoods aren’t happening — then the government should grease the wheels through subsidies for subscribers, or make it possible for rural municipalities to take control of their own destiny through a bond issue or cooperative, such as the people in Monticello, Minn. and Eastern Vermont are doing. Hopefully the new regime won’t be taken in by the industry’s whining — and its money.

HP finalizes 2009 orders for up to 18 million notebooks

from DIGITIMES: IT news from Asia

Hewlett-Packard (HP) has finalized its outsourced production schedule for 2009, with 17-18 million 16:9 aspect ratio notebooks ordered from Taiwan notebook makers, according to sources at the makers. The orders cover a series of medium- to large-size models, with the 15.6-inch segment accounting for more than 45%, indicated the sources.

Quanta to supply monthly shipments of 800,000 all-in-one PCs to Apple in 1Q09, says paper

EDN, December 23; Joseph Tsai, DIGITIMES [Tuesday 23 December 2008] The Chinese-language Economic Daily News (EDN) has cited sources inside the component supply chain as saying that Apple plans to launch a new iMac all-in-one PC in the first quarter of next year, and the company's sole manufacturing partner, Quanta Computer, is gearing up to supply monthly shipments of around 800,000 units during the first quarter of 2009. According to the paper, the new iMac will start shipping in January next year. Quanta declined to comment on client relationships, the paper added. In addition to Apple, Quanta is also manufacturing all-in-one PCs for Sony and NEC.

Alcatel-Lucent remains the worldwide leader in the fixed broadband DSLAM, GPON markets

Posted by VlAD @ 04:53 pm

Alcatel-Lucent today announced that it remains the worldwide leader in the fixed broadband access market, supporting the largest mass deployments of video, voice and data services. Today, one out of three fixed broadband subscribers around the world is served through an access network provided by Alcatel-Lucent. This market leadership is driven by a strategy of continuous innovation and quality assurance.

According to the latest access report of industry analyst firm Dell’Oro*, Alcatel-Lucent continues to lead the DSLAM market with 6.1 million lines shipped in the third quarter of 2008, a market share of 34.9%, and a worldwide installed base of 180 million lines. Alcatel-Lucent also leads in IP DSLAM with a market share of 32.6%, and of 34.2% in VDSL. Alcatel-Lucent maintains its regional leadership in North America, EMEA and rest of the world, while retaining a second position in Asia Pacific.

Furthermore, Dell’Oro confirms Alcatel-Lucent’s market leadership in GPON shipments in the third quarter of 2008 with a market share of 46,1%. Alcatel-Lucent is present in every country engaged in FTTH and has more than 90 fiber deployments ongoing worldwide, with a mix of GPON and point-to-point roll-outs.

“The promise of new services delivered to anybody anywhere will require a profound transformation to next generation wireline and wireless access. Bandwidth demand continues to grow, and network capacity remains one of the determining factors to successfully deliver high-bandwidth voice, video and data applications to consumers and business customers,” says Luis Martinez Amago, President of Alcatel-Lucent’s fixed access activities. “Leveraging our leadership in GPON and VDSL, we are dedicated to further boost innovations helping operators offer advanced applications at home, on the move, and to businesses.”

Alcatel-Lucent brings its customers the strongest product portfolio, customer-focused business consultancy programs, ongoing investment in innovation, and unmatched experience in supporting very large, complex, end-to-end deployments. Alcatel-Lucent’s IP access portfolio builds on its Intelligent Services Access Manager (ISAM) family - the industry’s most renowned IP access platform, supporting a flexible mix of future-proof access technologies such as xDSL, GPON and Point to Point fiber, and a variety of network topologies (central office as well as remote architectures). More than 200 service providers around the world have already selected the ISAM platform.

Three of four undersea internet cables get cut, hasn't affected you yet

from Engadget by Darren Murph

So, there's good news and bad news, and per tradition, we'll be starting with the latter. Three of four undersea cables that route internet traffic from Asia to North America have inexplicably been cut, meaning that your international Quake III server may be a bit slow this evening. The good news is that this fiasco clearly hasn't affected you yet. The APhas confirmed via Egypt's communications ministry that the cables have indeed been severed, causing massive outages in select portions of the world. Oddly, no suspicions of subterfuge have been mentioned, but we have all ideas rumors will start to swirl if another gets snipped. So, tell us readers -- are you still online? Wait, don't answer that.

Apple buys a little Imagination -- 3.6 percent to be exact

from Engadget by Tim Stevens

It's been a busy couple of months for the mobile PowerVR gurus at Imagination Technologies. First the company got picked to handle the polygon-shuffling duties in Sony's PSP2 (which may or may not be actually happening), and has now received a $5 million cash infusion from Apple -- in exchange for a measly 3.6 percent of its soul. What does it all mean? As much as we'd love to fling out crazy speculation about an Apple / Sony hybrid iPSP or hardware support for a mobile 3D operating system, we're putting our money on the most sensible explanation: a next-gen iPhone witheven more emphasis on games. Place your bets now, folks.

Conroy rejects Telstra's NBN bid - but is he bluffing?

Telstra's arrogance has seen it kicked out of the race to build Australia's National Broadband Network, but have we heard the last of Sol?

The telco giant made the surprise announcement to the Australian Stock Exchange this morning that its proposal has been rejected because it didn't meet the conditions of the Request For Proposals. Telstra already knew this, but thought it could bully the government and Communications Minster, Senator Conroy, into accepting the bid - making a mockery of the process and putting Telstra back in the driver's seat. It seems Conroy might be a tougher opponent that Telstra thought.

Telstra isn't keen to give up its stranglehold on Australia's telecommunications and it wants to build the NBN on its own terms. The telco has been throwing around threats for a long time, especially once a bully like Sol Trujillo took the reigns. The Howard government didn't have the balls to stand up to Telstra, but it seems Conroy has grown a pair, calling Sol's bluff and kicking Telstra out of the race to build the NBN.

The telco called a phone briefing for analysts and press this morning with only three minutes notice. Telstra chairman, Donald McGauchie, claimed Conroy, has "ample powers" to accept Telstra's bid. If this is the case, it would seem Conroy is playing the biggest game of chicken of his life.

Rather than calling Conroy's bluff and threatening legal warfare, McGauchie was more diplomatic at today's press briefing;

"The decision to exclude us from the RFP is the Commonwealth's decision to make. But Telstra is the only company to have submitted a proposal with a real financial commitment - of $5 billion. And Telstra is the only company with the existing technical know-how, world-leading vendor, skilled workforce, established wholesale systems and proven track record of building world-class networks."

McGauchie says Telstra will now put its efforts into DSL and cable, leaving Conroy to build his precious NBN with someone else.

Conroy is currently the villain of the internet community thanks to his mandatory internet filtering proposals, but today he also finds himself the hero for standing up to Telstra. After a lot of grandstanding, I'd expect to see a somewhat more humble Telstra back at the NBN negotiating table early next year.

While Conroy's determination not to back down may have saved the NBN from falling into Telstra's clutches, it's perhaps bad news for those hoping he will back down on mandatory internet filtering.

DVI and HDMI 2008: A Time of Transition

http://www.instat.com/abstract.asp?id=161&SKU=IN0804099MI

 

Digital visual interface (DVI) and sister technology high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI) are both high-bandwidth digital interface specifications. DVI-enabled shipments will peak at 117 million in both 2007 and 2008, but should decline thereafter due to the entry of the DisplayPort in the PC and PC peripheral segment.
 
 HDMI was immediately successful upon its 2003 introduction, driven primarily by the CE segment. There were HDMI ports in the vast majority of digital televisions, DVD players and recorders, and A/V receivers shipped in 2007. A smaller HDMI port is leading to increased penetration of portable devices, such as digital camcorders and digital still cameras.
 
 This report contains analysis and five-year annual worldwide forecasts for the penetration of DVI and HDMI into 22 different applications in PCs, PC peripherals, CE, and communications devices. Five-year average selling price forecasts for discrete DVI and HDMI transmitters and receivers are provided. Past history of penetration forecasts back to 2006 is also included, in addition to brief profiles of major DVI and HDMI silicon and IP suppliers. Survey data on HDMI familiarity and use from consumers in the US , UK , Germany , France , Japan , and Korea is also included.

 

1394 2008: Is FireWire Still Burning?

http://www.instat.com/abstract.asp?id=161&SKU=IN0804096MI

 

IEEE 1394 (1394) is a high-speed serial bus found in PCs, PC peripherals, and consumer electronics (CE) devices. The technology is facing significant challenges in 2008. 1394 suffers from being the second choice technology in many product segments. 1394 market share in the PC market is shrinking, and is dwarfed by high-speed USB’s 100% penetration. This has helped high-speed USB to become the interface of choice for PC peripherals such as printers, scanners, and external hard disk drives.
 
 In the CE segment, 1394 is being surpassed by HDMI as the digital interface of choice in digital televisions, set-top boxes, and DVD players. Even in markets where 1394 was very strong, such as digital camcorders, it is being challenged by high-speed USB. In the automotive segment, 1394 has been slow to market, and MOST is the dominant auto networking interface. In the industrial segment 1394 is found primarily in security and machine vision cameras.
 
This report contains analysis and five-year forecasts for all 1394-enabled products, breaking out each PC, PC peripheral, CE, automotive, or industrial application by penetration of 1394a and 1394b for each forecast year. Analysis is provided for all types of 1394, including 1394c and 1394 over Coax. Brief profiles of major 1394 silicon and IP suppliers are also provided.

Top 10 Telecom Websites - November 2008

Note: The Hitwise data featured is based on US market share of visits as defined by the IAB, which is the percentage of online traffic to the domain or category, from the Hitwise sample of 10 million US internet users. Hitwise measures more than 1 million unique websites on a daily basis, including sub-domains of larger websites. Hitwise categorizes websites into industries on the basis of subject matter and content, as well as market orientation and competitive context. The market share of visits percentage does not include traffic for all sub-domains of certain websites that could be reported on separately.

RELATED STORIES

Yahoo News, CNN Website Get Most Election-Day Visits

Top 10 Telecom Websites - May 2008

Top 10 Telecom Websites - February 2008

Top 10 Telecom Websites - March 2008

Top 10 Telecom Websites - April 2008

Sony’s eBook reader - the numbers are in

Sony’s eBook reader - the numbers are in

from last100 by Steve O'Hear

While Amazon remains deafeningly silent over how many Kindles it has sold - except to say that new orders won’t be fulfilled for the next eleven to thirteen weeks - Sony, its main competitor in the eBook reader space, isn’t being so shy.

Claiming to have exceeded the company’s own forecasts, Sony says it sold 300,000 units of its Sony Reader device since its October 2006 launch (WSJ). Interestingly, however, Forrester Research estimates that 400,000 Kindles have sold since its launch in November 2007, which, if true, means that Amazon has done considerably better in a much shorter amount of time, possibly due to better marketing — it’s hard to beat the Amazon brand and e-store when it comes to selling anything book-related.

Although both sets of numbers are nothing to be scoffed at, it doesn’t yet amount to an ‘iPod moment’, notes paidContent. Apple sold 1.3 million units of its music player in the first two years, even if it took considerably longer for the iPod to really go mainstream.

Apple's in-ear headphones finally, really available now

from Engadget by Laura June

Remember those new in-ear headphones we heard about from Mr. Jobs himself back in September? Well, he promised them for October (see the giant slide behind him), and here we are, in December, and they've finally appeared. Each earbud's got its own woofer and tweeter, so be prepared forMaster of Puppets to sound better than ever. They've got a built-in remote and mic -- yet curiously aren't compatible with the iPhone -- and they come with three sets of interchangeable silicone tips for small, medium, and large ears. Are you rocked to the very core of your existence yet? Well, the $79 price tag should finish the job.