Telecom Ramblings

In this fall’s least surprising lawsuit, Verizon on Friday fired off its best shot at the US Court of Appeals. They contend that the FCC overstepped its authority in setting up such rules, and basically suggest that the FCC should just butt out of everything related to the internet. You can’t blame them for taking a big swing though, otherwise this one would be too easy to justify the cost of the legal team they’ve put together.  And this is Verizon’s responsibility right now, as its fellow [Read more →]

Another new posting on the Ramblings’ Jobs Board this week in the vibrant Northeastern bandwidth market. [Read more →]

Another week, another deal for Global Crossing down in Brazil. Today they reported an expansion of their arrangement with BRQ IT Services. BRQ uses the network operator’s managed WAN to connect its data center with 2500 employees spread out amongst the [Read more →]

The news these days is full of doom & gloom over the macro economy, but it is not yet clear in just what form that is going to show up in the numbers.  The internet infrastructure segment overall weathered the last storm quite well compared to the rest of the economy, but are we prepared for a double dip if it happens?  Is there enough surplus inventory in the bandwidth and datacenter markets to even permit a slowdown in spending?  Here’s a Friday poll aimed at taking the market’s temperature ahead of earnings season: [Read more →]

This article was authored by Michael Carroll, and was originally posted on telecomasia.net.

Plans by the European Commission to probe bank’s efforts at self-regulation for electronic payments contain a stark parallel with comments by [Read more →]

It took five and a half months, but Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings) finally got what it has been waiting for.  The FCC and the DOJ have now approved the company’s purchase of Global Crossing.  The two companies now say they may complete the merger as early as next week.  Certainly they won’t waste any time. Actually, I had always thought the timing might work out for an October 1 close – it had always seemed like a likely target date for all concerned.   [Read more →]

Pan-European network operator Colt Group (LON:COLT, news) is adding integrated data encryption to its enterprise managed services. It’s a feature of packet-optical gear from Ciena (NASDAQ:CIEN, news, filings), in which ‘in-flight’, protocol-agnostic encryption can secure data streams without impacting network performance itself. [Read more →]

Easynet Global Services is teaming up with Telefonica International Wholesale in order to better reach Latin America. The agreement means the VPN MPLS services of the two companies will be connected, greatly expanding Easynet’s coverage in the region and letting them provide services in [Read more →]

Last night, Dan Rayburn posted a lengthy and very detailed screed about the pressure growing on Akamai (NASDAQ:AKAM, news, filings).  Dan suggests acquisitions, for example EdgeCast, to jump start its carrier-licensing efforts. That certainly might help a bit in the short term, but I think that perhaps the EdgeCast model doesn’t take advantage of Akamai’s sheer scale.  There is another option out there though if they’ve got the stones for it.  [Read more →]

Virgin Media Business has entered the cloud sweepstakes with a little help. They will be using virtual private data center services from Savvis (news, filings) [a subsidiary of CenturyLink (NYSE:CTL, news, filings)] to offer cloud solutions in the UK, also leveraging their own fiber network of course. [Read more →]

Several interesting bits from the world of metro fiber lately: [Read more →]

IP Networks, which operates a rather low profile metro fiber footprint in the San Francisco Bay Area, has signed on with Tinet and its EtherCloud. Tinet’s EtherCloud was unveiled back in April, and represents the evolution of Neutral Tandem’s earlier entry into the Ethernet Exchange market. [Read more →]

Access equipment specialist Calix offered up an early preview of its Q3 numbers today, and the picture wasn’t a pretty one. [Read more →]

Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU, news, filings) has had quite a news blitz lately, and it has continued this week with a bunch of interesting international wins. [Read more →]

The past few days have seen stories pop up on virtually every site I follow. Network Neutrality is about to go into effect as of November 20!  Except that it won’t, and we all know that.  What happened on Friday is the equivalent of the start of a nice game of T-Ball.  Ok, maybe a not-so-nice game of T-Ball. [Read more →]

UEFA, the organization governing European football (soccer to the USA of course), is moving its data infrastructure to the cloud, and more specifically to Interoute’s cloud. For the next three seasons, the pan-European backbone and cloud operator will be supporting all of [Read more →]

Ever since Carl Icahn finished taking full control of XO Holdings (news, filings), some sort of shift in leadership has been inevitable. With Grivner gone since May, and the chairman unlikely to sell the company for a year at least, there remains work to be done. But would they seek outside blood in an effort to rejuvenate the company? Or promote from within and give a ‘steady as she goes’ signal? [Read more →]

We don’t hear as much nowadays from glbc, as we await the completion of the company’s purchase by Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings). But this morning they announced an important deal with the Russian equivalent of Facebook, VK or VKontakte. VK has 150M users across the Russian-speaking world, with substantial bandwidth needs. [Read more →]

European colocation provider Telecity Group (LON:TCY, news, filings) hit the acquisition trail this morning, announcing the purchase of UK Grid for £11.7M. UK Grid operates over 50,000 square feet of carrier neutral colo space spread across [Read more →]

On Thursday, Level 3’s CEO Jim Crowe was asked about on-net building count (~8200), and he took the opportunity to comment the metric itself and offered an alternative: [Read more →]

Two new postings on the Ramblings’ Jobs Board this week, the first from a familiar Northeastern source and the second from a new player out in the Midwest. [Read more →]

The first Friday of Autumn, hope your week has been as good as mine was for once. A few interesting items on the international front before you go: [Read more →]