Easter Roundup 4/9: SRP, Altibox, Qtel, Level 3

Happy Easter to everyone!  Most readers are probably still on break but for those who aren’t here are some quick looks at some news items that happened since or slipped through the cracks last week.

A metro dark fiber operator that we don’t hear from too often had some interesting news last week. Phoenix’s SRP Telecom has launched lit transport services up to 40Gbps across its 1,600 metro route miles. That will bring both Ethernet and Wavelengths to and between the major hubs at IO Phoenix, IO Scottsdale, and Phoenix NAP. I’ve always thought that SRP’s fiber assets were underutilized, and thought perhaps the public energy and water utility would monetize them, but apparently they’ve decided to invest in them instead.

Norwegian service provider Altibox has teamed up with Huawei to demonstrate 200Gbps routing technology, calling it the “world’s fastest online network” (as opposed to offline? but I digress). The demonstration featured Huawei routers in Oslo and Hamar and DWDM gear in between, covering 180km. We’re just now getting used to 100G as a commercial force, is 200G almost ready for prime time too?

Qatar’s Qtel has signed a strategic memorandum of understanding with Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO, news, filings). The two will collaborate on new services for ‘building cities of the future’ by exploring the usage of a wide range of technologies. It’s a fairly general target, but one must recall that Qatar is one of the key nodes in the Persian Gulf, whose connectivity to the rest of the world is undergoing a dramatic transformation both by sea (EIG, GBI, TGN-Gulf) and by land (EPEG, RCN).  The new bandwidth, the large corporate presence, and of course the oil money make it a great test bed for Cisco to fine tune its technologies.

Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings) reported some changes to its board of directors. Mr. Lee Theng Kiat will leave to devote his efforts to his new position as president and general counsel of Temasek, and will be replaced by Steven Terrell “Terry” Clontz – also representing the major Singaporean shareholder ST Telemedia. General Kevin P. Chilton has also been appointed to the board after recently retiring from the US Air Force, bringing the total to an even dozen.

 

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Categories: Internet Backbones · Mergers and Acquisitions · Telecom Equipment