Telecom Ramblings

There has been some interesting consolidation in the cloud space over in Europe this week, as one of the continent's largest network operators has made another move to augment its capabilities in cloud-based infrastructure. Orange Business Services has agreed to acquire Basefarm Holding. [Read more →]

The African fiber market may finally have a terrestrial link from North to South. Liquid Telecom and Telecom Egypt have signed an MOU to link up their fiber networks and enable Liquid Telecom to hook up Cairo to Cape Town without going under the waves. [Read more →]

This Industry Viewpoint was contributed by David W Wang

According to the market status of 1^st half of 2018, while SD-WAN adoption by enterprises of all sizes and verticals is accelerating, there are some barriers along the road as well. [Read more →]

This article was authored by Dylan Bushell-Embling, and was originally posted on telecomasia.net.

The US government has lifted its denial order against ZTE, finally clearing the way for the vendor to resume major operations. [Read more →]

Crosslake Fibre, Metro Optic, and Utilities Kingston have unveiled plans for a new and unique fiber route hooking up the key markets of eastern Canada. The project will be part terrestrial and part under water, starting in Toronto and finishing up in Montreal via a diverse route. [Read more →]

This Industry Viewpoint was contributed By Jabulani Dhliwayo, founder of FiberGuide

The demand for high bandwidth continues to grow, driven by video streaming, cloud services, Internet of Things (IoT), upcoming 5G mobile networks, and other bandwidth hungry applications. This in turn is driving the need for very high transmission speed in [Read more →]

This Industry Viewpoint was authored by the Oregon Fishermen’s Cable Committee.  It's not a perfect fit for this section, but given their status as a nonprofit with a unique point of view I decided to relax the usual restrictions.

Around the globe commercial fishermen and owners of undersea telecommunications cable are typically at odds—cables get laid across prime fishing grounds, then fishermen are told not to fish near them, angering fishermen.  On a global scale, more submarine cables are severed or damaged by fishing vessels than any other cause, frustrating cable owners.  [Read more →]

This morning brings an interesting but somewhat difficult to parse M&A in the service provider space.  Lingo has announced an agreement to acquire Impact Telecom.   [Read more →]

AT&T made a move yesterday to bolster its network security portfolio with the announcement of plans to acquire AlienVault.  San Mateo-based AlienVault specializes in threat detection, analyzing data from the Open Threat Exchange to enable collaborative defense. [Read more →]

Three bits of mid-week news worth noting: [Read more →]

Frankfurt-based internet exchange provider DE-CIX has unveiled a new Project Reach initiative to extend its effective reach into more data centers across Europe. To get that done they'll be tapping the network of pan-European bandwidth infrastructure provider euNetworks. [Read more →]

This article was authored by Jouko Ahvenainen, and was originally posted on telecomasia.net.

Digitization is coming to all services, also linked to physical services. It will change the user experience significantly. It helps us to get rid of many [Read more →]

A quick rundown on some news items worth a look: [Read more →]

In an interesting network MA move up in the Pacific Northwest, Fatbeam today announced the purchase of the IP Connect division of Ednetics. The deal widens Fatbeam's customer base in its core region while broadening its product portfolio with more lit services. [Read more →]

A few stories from around the world worth noting to start the week: [Read more →]

What has three ends, two webscales, and 130ms round trip latency?  A new transpacific cable system of course.  The Bay to Bay Express Cable System consortium has signed up NEC to build the new system which will connect California to Hong Kong and Singapore. [Read more →]

What do you get a data center REIT that operates over 200 data centers in 11 countries on 4 continents? The fifth continent so it would seem. According to a report from Bloomberg yesterday, that's what Digital Realty is working on. [Read more →]

Two interesting colo items from overseas during the break, and two from the US in the week prior that are worth noting: [Read more →]

According to a piece over on Bloomberg, a substantial chunk of data center infrastructure may be about to change hands. The Australian private equity group Macquarie Group is said to be closing in on a majority stake in T5 Data Centers. [Read more →]

Another Chinese firm has run into a wall when it comes to accessing the U.S. telecommunications marketplace. The NTIA has recommended that China Mobile's application to offer telecommunications between the USA and other countries be denied. [Read more →]

The engineering and construction folks that underlie the expansion of all the infrastructure we use tend to operate behind the curtains, but there are expansion and consolidation stories there too. Today one of those companies, New Jersey-based Hylan, made a significant move to expand its presence out in the Midwest with the acquisition of the utility field services units of Tetra Tech. [Read more →]

This article was authored by Dylan Bushell-Embling, and was originally posted on telecomasia.net

5G networks will have a critical role to play in the safety design of autonomous vehicles, according to Gartner. [Read more →]

Colt has been steadily expanding its network lately, both in terms of geographic reach and nextgen technology. This morning the company announced an expansion into EdgeConneX's edge data center footprint, and late last week unveiled plans to move into the uCPE market as well. [Read more →]