With the travel, I have been playing catch-up all week on other news. Here’s another roundup, this time of network operator news: [Read more →]
Streamlining for the Holidays at Windstream
November 21st, 2014
Windstream is sending out some cards just in time for the holiday season, but they aren’t of the festive variety. The hybrid ILEC/CLEC is planning to slim down its workforce by 2.7% by December 1 in an effort to improve its cost structure and efficiency. [Read more →]
GEN14 Vendor Bytes: CENX, Wedge, Fujitsu, Transition Networks, Ciena
November 20th, 2014
Lots of news from the vendors this week, especially around Ethernet, SDN, and NFV given GEN14. Here’s a quick look a few items I learned about at and around the event: [Read more →]
Would You Enter a Clouded Leopard’s Den?
November 20th, 2014

One of the more interesting and colorful items I ran into at the GEN14 conference this week was the unveiling of the Clouded Leopard’s Den. It’s not a new product or service, but rather an effort by the Cloud Ethernet Forum to bring the popular Shark Tank concept to the cloud, where the teeth this time belong to the endangered Himalayan big cat. [Read more →]
SummitIG Hands Virginia a New Intercity Route
November 20th, 2014

Virginia has been getting some fiber attention lately, and it got another key intercity piece this week while I was off traveling this week. Dulles-based SummitIG has completed the construction of its brand new dark fiber route between Richmond and the key data center hubs of northern Virginia. [Read more →]
Industry Spotlight: Level 3’s Jack Waters on Integration and Beyond
November 19th, 2014
One of the biggest deals in internet infrastructure this year was the combination of Level 3 and tw telecom, which just closed a couple weeks ago. Both companies had strong momentum in the enterprise markets, and once integrated the combined network and on-net building footprints will be quite formidable by any measure. The key, therefore, is to make that happen. With us today to talk about the integration ahead and the road beyond is Level 3’s longtime Chief Technology Officer, Jack Waters. [Read more →]
Int’l Roundup: NTT, KPN, Interoute, Vodafone
November 19th, 2014
Here’s a quick rundown of news from around the world worth a quick look: [Read more →]
Tuesday Roundup: NTT, Equinix, EdgeCast, BTI Systems
November 18th, 2014
I’m on the road this week, but here’s a quick rundown of some of the news out there: [Read more →]
Mitel Backs Off, Shoretel Shrugs
November 18th, 2014
A week after taking another swing at buying ShoreTel, Mitel has backed off — at least for now — and has publicly withdrawn the offer. ShoreTel seems happy with that. They had raised their earlier bid up to $8.50 per share, but ShoreTel’s board continued to be unimpressed and had described the offer as ‘highly inadequate’. [Read more →]
Lightower Polishes Off New Virginia Network
November 17th, 2014

The northeastern fiber operator Lightower Fiber Networks is now not properly called northeastern, having brought fiber to a piece of Dixie. Lightower has completed its 1,100 route mile fiber buildout throughout Virginia and now reaching down into North Carolina. [Read more →]
Level 3 Taps Debt Markets For Another Refinancing Move
November 17th, 2014
After every acquisition, Level 3 goes to work on that complicated balance sheet, and this morning they are doing so again. Although actually this one was probably in the works regardless. [Read more →]
FCC to AT&T: Err, What Fiber Roll-out Are You Pausing?
November 17th, 2014
On Friday, the FCC took AT&T’s show of displeasure toward President Obama’s net neutrality stance and turned it around. After AT&T’s CEO Randall Stephenson publicly pulled the emergency brake on its fiber network rollouts, the FCC wants to know just what it is they are pausing. [Read more →]
Smart cities to be driven from the bottom up: report
November 17th, 2014
This article was authored by John C. Tanner, and was originally posted on telecomasia.net.
Smart cities start with smart citizens, but many of those same citizens will expect the city, not operators, to provide smart-city services. [Read more →]
Ramblings Jobs: Southern Telecom
November 16th, 2014
This week we got a new listing to look at on the Ramblings Jobs board to look at from down south to go with an existing one from up north. [Read more →]
Friday Bytes: CityFibre, TelePacific, Zayo, Viawest
November 14th, 2014
Here’s a quick Friday rundown of the news ending the week: [Read more →]
Friday Poll: What form should Net Neutrality take?
November 14th, 2014
Ok, yesterday’s poll wasn’t terribly seriously composed of course, and was designed to express exasperation in its many forms. This one is about the actual issue. After six years of debate, where do you all come down on network neutrality? [Read more →]
Poll: What is your reaction to the latest Network Neutrality Debate?
November 13th, 2014
Obama wants Title II and he wants it now, AT&T is taking its ball and going home, and Tom Wheeler has no friends. What’s your reaction to it all? Here’s a quick, completely scientific poll to find out what Ramblings’ readers think. [Read more →]
Int’l Bytes: Hibernia Networks, Equinix, Liquid Telecom
November 13th, 2014
Time for a quick look at news from around the world: [Read more →]
How Mature Is Your Network – And Is It Ready for SDN and NFV?
November 13th, 2014
This Industry Viewpoint roundtable summary was authored by the MEF.
An older carrier network can be deceptive. It often is perfectly suited for today’s business needs, solid, predictable and reliable. It may be largely paid for, or at least depreciating on schedule, with minimal need for significant CapEx outlays. Yet that trusted technology can fall flat when faced with [Read more →]
To Make Its Net Neutrality Point, AT&T Pulls Plug On Fiber?
November 12th, 2014
So AT&T isn’t happy about Obama’s speech yesterday endorsing regulating broadband like a utility. Today they CEO Randall Stephenson said the company would suspend investing in its FTTH expansion until the situation is resolved. [Read more →]
Wilcon Lights Up Southern California
November 12th, 2014

Southern California has some new 100G metro connectivity today. Wilcon has taken the next step forward in its evolution, lighting its dark fiber network and introducing scalable Ethernet, wavelength, and internet access services. [Read more →]
Data Bytes: Zayo, Peak, Datapipe, vXchnge, CyrusOne
November 12th, 2014
For this Wednesday morning, here’s a quick rundown of data center and cloud news from this week: [Read more →]
Colt Spreads Its Wings, Acquires Its Way Into Asia
November 12th, 2014

Of all the deals I’ve ever thought the European network and cloud provider Colt might be involved in, this one never came up. Colt announced this morning that it plans to acquire Tokyo-based KVH for €130.3M. [Read more →]