Embarq move raises questions about quad-play model 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Embarq’s severance of its partnership with Sprint Nextel for the wireless portion of its bundled offerings raises questions about to what extent the company will remain true to the strategy of fixed mobile convergence laid out by former CEO (now Sprint CEO) Dan Hesse...

MultiService Forum readies global demo 

By: By Rich Karpinski

Carriers including Verizon, BT, Vodafone and new member China Mobile will be among the host test sites for the MultiService Forum's global interoperability demonstration of next-generation networks...

More disturbing numbers for telcos 

By: By Carol Wilson

Two separate sources this week are offering up more analysis showing the telcos are falling behind the cable companies in the broadband and video battle...

FiberNet expands nationally as capacity demand grows 

By: By Ed Gubbins

FiberNet is embarking on a $2-million network expansion project to add capacity to its network and connect new metro markets just as the company is reporting an increase in higher-bandwidth optical transport services not seen in some time...

Analyst: Occam’s Fairpoint deal could be worth $125M  

Occam Networks’ recent contract to supply a broadband access rollout by Fairpoint Communications could yield $125 million in revenue, according to an estimate by Andrew Schmitt, an analyst with Nyquist Capital...

Broadweave to heal iProvo by shedding wholesale fiber model 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Broadweave Networks, a provider of fiber-based triple-play services in greenfield developments, has acquired the municipal fiber network of Provo, Utah, vowing to improve the operation by replacing its open-access wholesale model with one in which Broadweave both owns the network and offers services over it...

Why Cisco’s U.S. service provider business is down 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Cisco Systems reported a decline in orders among U.S. service providers in the quarter ending in April but insisted it was a temporary phenomenon...

Qwest wireless switch adds another nail to MVNO coffin 

By: By Kevin Fitchard

Until Monday the main casualties of the mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) fallout have been small boutique operators, but now Qwest Communications is giving up on its virtual operator relationship with Sprint, opting instead to sell the standard Verizon Wireless service available at any cellular kiosk. The MVNO business model isn’t just failing the niche players; it isn’t working for the big retail operators either...

Wild idea? AT&T, others to launch Skype competitor, firm predicts 

By: Rich Karpinski

With voice lines eroding rapidly, AT&T, British Telecom, NTT and other incumbent carriers will soon launch their own IP telephony competitor to Skype, essentially writing off voice revenues entirely while moving customers to data, wireless and IPTV services, investment banking firm ThinkPanmure predicted today....

Allot expands NetXplorer options 

By: By Carol Wilson

Deep packet inspection, or DPI, has been under something of a cloud lately because of concerns from regulators and consumers alike that Internet service providers are using the technology to block some peer-to-peer traffic in the name of network management. ...

New tech woos MDUs 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Service providers at the Broadband Properties Summit in Dallas last week were eager to tell the audience of property owners about their progress in developing offerings to serve multidwelling units...

By the numbers 

By: By Rich Karpinski

The telecom industry is changing and evolving so rapidly these days, it's sometimes hard to keep up. It's also difficult to separate hype from reality and real trends from blind alleys. For that reason, we thought we'd take a look at a (large) handful of key industry numbers, figures and metrics hard data or at least very strong, educated guesses to create a snapshot of where the industry is today, and where it's heading...

XO finds demand for higher Ethernet speeds 

By: By Carol Wilson

Businesses are asking for higher Ethernet speeds than originally predicted, leading XO Communications to launch service offerings in the 15 Megabit per second and 20 Mb/s range, XO said today. ...

MDU exclusivity ban breeds questions, fears 

By: By Ed Gubbins

The Federal Communications Commission claimed to have “opened the door” to competition in March by banning exclusive contracts for bundled services in multidwelling units (MDUs). ...

Alcatel-Lucent: As CDMA declines, W-CDMA steps up 

By: By Kevin Fitchard

Alcatel-Lucent doubled its sales in Wideband CDMA in the first quarter as the synergies of Alcatel and Lucent Technologies' merged UMTS portfolios begin to emerge, company officials said today...

Rural FTTP 'perfectly economical,' says muni fiber veteran 

By: By Ed Gubbins

The notion that fiber-to-the-premises is economically prohibitive in rural areas is a myth, according to Dr. Timothy Nulty, director of ValleyFiber, a nonprofit organization focused on bringing municipal fiber to towns in Vermont’s Upper Valley...

Verizon income up, wireline sagging 

By: By Carol Wilson

Verizon isn’t seeing the ill effects of a slowing economy, Verizon officials said today in their first quarter earnings call. Verizon Wireless business continues to grow, deadbeat accounts actually fell and FiOS customers are actually spending more money with Verizon, CFO Doreen Toben reported. Verizon is actually planning to increase prices in the second quarter, Toben added....

Gambling on Utopia 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Municipalities participating in Utah's 11-city wholesale fiber-to-the-premises project, Utopia, are being asked to double down on that investment in the face of its current financial shortfalls...

Panning for MDU gold 

By: By Carol Wilson

Major telcos are targeting apartment dwellers for video services, spurred on by an FCC ruling and a new kind of fiber...

Qwest CTO on bonded VDSL2, PBT and more 

By: By Ed Gubbins

In the second part of a two-part interview, Qwest Communications Chief Technology Officer Pieter Poll lends his views on cutting-edge technologies including VDSL2 bonding and PBT...

Qwest comes clean on 20Mb/s FTTN 

By: By Carol Wilson

Qwest Communications today hailed two new DSL offerings, at 20 Megabits per second and 12 Mb/s, over its fiber-to-the-node architecture. Travis Leo, product director for broadband at Qwest, spoke to Editor-in-Chief Carol Wilson about Qwest Connect Quantum and Qwest Connect Titanium...

Level 3 claims order bottlenecks resolved 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Level 3 Communications claimed today to be making progress in eliminating the bottlenecks in its service-activation processes that clogged its operations last year and led to the departure of Chief Operating Officer Kevin O’Hara last month. ...

AT&T touts macro-economic defenses 

By: By Ed Gubbins

AT&T countered widespread fears of slow economic trends with growth in first-quarter profits aided by its wireless and wholesale businesses...

Qwest CTO on femtocells, open access and wireless broadband 

By: By Ed Gubbins

As the only Bell carrier without a wireless arm, Qwest Communications can claim a unique intersection with the wireless world and a unique view of the technologies and trends now bridging the wireless and wireline worlds. In the first part of a two-part interview, Qwest’s Chief Technology Officer Pieter Poll explores this terrain, lending his views on a range of pertinent technology issues, including femtocells, open access, fixed-mobile convergence, wireless broadband and more...

Fairpoint breaks silence, details integration process 

By: By Ed Gubbins

Fairpoint Communications held its first conference call as the country’s eighth-largest telco today, three weeks after closing its acquisition of Verizon’s local access business in three states...