Avanex, Bookham agree on market upturn
Executives from Avanex (Fremont, CA) and Bookham (San Jose, CA) agree that optical-component suppliers are finally seeing an increase in demand for new technology, rather than cheaper versions of old technology. Giorgio Anania, CEO of Bookham, and Giovanni Barbarossa, CTO of Avanex, expressed their opinions in December at the 2006 Optoelectronic Industries Development Association (OIDA) Annual Forum in Washington, D.C.
Barbarossa said that carriers and their systems suppliers have begun to emphasize lower cost per bit when discussing their requirements, rather than the post-bubble emphasis on lower prices. Anania agreed with Barbarossa’s vision in his presentation, noting that customer interest in new technologies is leading to the healthy market outlook.
Eircom to build next-gen Irish network
ADVA Optical Networking (Martinsried/Munich, Germany) and Siemens (Munich, Germany) announced a major contract with Eircom (Dublin, Ireland), the Republic of Ireland’s largest telecommunications carrier. This contract will create a national next-generation network to provide Eircom’s business and residential customers with a range of bandwidth-intensive applications, including Internet Protocol TV (IPTV), voice over IP (VoIP), and triple-play services, combining voice, video, and data services in one bundle.
Eircom is the main provider of telecommunications services in Ireland, with approximately 1.6 million fixed-line telephone lines. To address the growing demand for high-capacity data services, Eircom will build an optical backbone spanning the length and breadth of the country, enabling networking speeds of up to 10 Gbit/s. This next-generation network will enable more flexible, cost-effective delivery of business and residential services.
Fiber revenue triples for Sterlite
For the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2006, Sterlite Optical Technologies (Mumbai, India)-India’s only integrated optical-fiber manufacturer and global provider of telecom cables and power transmission conductors-announced a tripling in net revenues to $85.3 million compared to $27.9 million in the same quarter last year. According to Sterlite, recent quarters signal a revival in global demand for optical fibers with annual demand in 2006 estimated to grow more than 25% globally and reach 90 million to 100 million kilometers; Sterlite plans to increase the manufacturing capacity at its optical-fiber plant from 4 million to 6 million kilometers.
Casabyte to enhance JDSU’s mobile offering
JDSU (Milpitas, CA) announced an agreement to purchase Casabyte (Renton, WA), a provider of automated end-to-end service-quality monitoring technology for the wireless industry. Casabyte will be integrated with JDSU’s communications test and measurement division to address the need for quality of service test solutions that enable network operators to identify, troubleshoot and prevent network degradation that can impair voice, data, video, and mobile service quality.
“JDSU has a leading position in the residential broadband market,” said Patrick Kelly, founder and analyst at OSS Observer. “Casabyte’s solutions should help JDSU provide a broader offering of products to support customers deploying fixed-mobile networks and services.”
Internet2 selects Infinera
The Infinera (Sunnyvale, CA) DTN-the switched wavelength-division-multiplexing or WDM network-has been selected by Internet2 (www.internet2.edu) for metro network extensions to its new national backbone network. This extension will allow Internet2 to expand the reach of the national network into key international exchange points in major cities including New York City, Chicago, and Seattle. The metro networks will provide Internet2 members additional connectivity points to its international partners providing better access to international research networks and leading-edge international scientific projects like the Large Hadron Collider operated by CERN in Switzerland.
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Also in the news . . .
Fi-ra Photonics Co., a subsidiary of Ignis (Lysaker, Norway), secured another fiber-to-the-home component contract in Korea with a value in excess of $4 million dollars. . . . Photon Control (Burnaby, BC, Canada) was granted a U.S. patent to protect its interferometric technology developed for sensing physical parameters such as pressure and temperature for the oil and power industry. . . . Firecomms (Cork, Ireland) introduced a Fast Ethernet fiber-optic transceiver that they say will enable plastic optical fiber to migrate more easily into consumer, industrial, and automotive applications. . . . CorActive (Quebec City, QC, Canada), a manufacturer of specialty optical-fiber products, entered into an exclusive worldwide partnership agreement with INO (National Optics Institute)-a Canadian center of optics and photonics expertise-in which CorActive will be responsible for sales and marketing of all INO-developed specialty optical-fiber products.