Core Switches on Blade Servers: Nokia Siemens

Core network infrastructure is moving along a path that will have software functions running on standardized hardware, such as blade servers. That's quite a change from a world where you could tell the difference between major brands of Class 5 switches just by looking at them.

So note that Nokia Siemens Networks now has a new strategy focusing on hardware-independent solutions for core networks. Nokia Siemens Networks has introduced a new, open hardware architecture, where Nokia Siemens software runs on off-the-shelf hardware blades.

The long-term goal for the strategy is to provide an open, multi-application, hardware-independent platform, where the same open hardware platform can be used for a variety of different network elements.

The switch means the MSC Server mobile softswitch, which is currently implemented on the Nokia Siemens Networks DX 200 hardware platform, will run on open and standard blade servers.

“This is the beginning of a major shift in the way we design our core network products,” says Michael Clever, Head of Next Generation Voice and Multimedia, Nokia Siemens Networks. “The future of control servers clearly belongs to pure software solutions that give network operators more choices to meet their hardware requirements.

Operating on blade servers should allow for smaller equipment footprint and smaller power draw than the proprietary approach.

The open hardware approach is already being applied to other Nokia Siemens Networks core network “control plane” applications, such as IP Multimedia Subsystem and the hiQ VoIP application server, which then can be combined with the MSS application.

Tweet, Tweet and More Tweet

As of December 2008, 11 percent of online American adults said they used a service like Twitter or another service that allowed them to share updates about themselves or to see the updates of others, say researchers at the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

Just a few weeks earlier, in November 2008, nine percent of Internet users used Twitter or updated their status online and in May of 2008, six percent of Internet users responded yes to a slightly different question, where users were asked if they used “Twitter or another ‘microblogging’ service to share updates about themselves or to see updates about others.”

Good thing the company just raised $35 million more in investment capital. It still is growing really fast.

Small Business Demand Remains Stable

Small businesses (zero to 500 employees) represent 99.7 percent of all firms, employ about half of all private sector employees, pay nearly 45 percent of total U.S. private payrolls and have generated 60 to 80 percent of net new jobs annually over the last decade, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.

It's no surprise that smaller businesses therefore represent much of the underlying demand for communications and information technology purchases as well.

It's a darn-near sure thing that such businesses will represent the only new net private sector jobs for the balance of the year. So it is noteworthy that small businesses were able to add new employees in January 2009, according to actual payroll processed by Surepayroll, which handles payroll data for more than 20,000 small businesses.

There was a 0.3 percent increase in the average small business size between the December 2008 and January 2009 periods, meaning that the average small business grew in size in January.

Hiring growth has been relatively flat of late, with the last five months all being in the 0.2% to 0.3% range. But small businesses added employees every month of 2008, the SurePayroll data shows.

Of course, other data is not so comforting, if lethargic job growth can be called "comforting." A Gallup Poll survey suggests that small-business owners are cutting jobs. About 11 percent of respondents say they have increased the number of jobs at their companies over the past 12 months while 27 percent say they have decreased them.

On average small businesses are still creating more jobs than they are destroying, SurePayroll says. And some of the resilence can be explained by greater reliance on outsourced contractors. In fact, January saw contractors representing 3.78 percent of total payrolls, the highest level SurePayroll ever has seen.

But there are warning signs on the small company start-up front, however, which logically is a result of tight credit conditions.

"In prior recessions, small businesses have ended up being net job creators," SurePayroll says. "This is not likely to happen in this recession because fewer companies are being formed."

Perhaps the only good news here for providers of communication services is that potential small business demand remains a bit of a bright spot.

Charter to Declare Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

Charter Communications will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as part of a financial restructuring on or before April 1. Charter says it has reached an agreement with a committee of some debt holders to reduce its obligations by about $8 billion. 

The company had net debt of slightly more than $21 billion as of Sept. 30, 2008, so despite wiping out what remains of the equity value, and paring debt by $8 billion, Charter will still have to contend with as much as $13 billion of remaining debt. 

Controlled by Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen and based in St. Louis, Charter has about 5.6 million customers in 28 states.

The cable company has sold the most U.S. high-yield bonds of any company in the past decade, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Allen bought Charter in 1998, amassed the company’s debt burden while building it into the fourth-largest U.S. cable provider. 

Charter has reported losses every year since going public in 1999. In some ways, Charter is less a victim of the current credit tightness and more a victim of the 2001 Internet and telecom crash, though, as the company has been struggling with high debt loads since that time. 

Carriers Move to More "Open" App Environments

The parlay initiative (www.parlay.org), which aims to create APIs enabling telecom service providers to work with developers and industry technology suppliers, seems to be bearing fruit. 

TDC A/S, the Danish service provider, is using open application programming interfaces and making those APIs available to third-party application developers.

TDC is using the service delivery platform marketed by Aepona Ltd., which has experience with this sort with Canadian carrier Telus Corp. TDC expects to be up and running by late summer of 2009.

Aepona also provides similar capabilities for France Telecom, KPN Telecom, Sprint Nextel Corp. and TeliaSonera.

The GSM Association is working with Aepona on a new initiative called Open Network Enablers API (OneAPI), as well.

Vodafone Group, Telenor, Telecom Italia and France Telecom's Orange France are part of the OneAPI initiative. 

Iridium Losts Satellite, Globalstar Also Has Issues

It had to happen some time, and now it has. Two satellites, an operating Iridium communications satellite, and a defunct Russian satellite, collided in orbit on Feb. 10, 2009, destroying both objects and creating 500 to 600 new pieces of orbital debris, adding to about 18,000 other orbiting pieces of "space junk" softball-sized or larger that routinely are tracked. 

Iridium, which owns a fleet of 66 low-earth orbit satellites, expects minor outages, and will move an in-orbit spare into position within 30 days. 

Iridium isn't the only satellite communications provider facing at least some issues. Frost & Sullivan compared performance of more than 1,000 calls on Iridium and Globalstar networks, from Northern California and Central Texas.

In initial testing, analysts found that more than 99 percent of calls placed through the

Iridium handset were successfully connected, compared to 51.3 percent of calls from the

Globalstar handset. 

Tests also indicate that 98.1 percent of calls on the Iridium handset and 36.2 percent of calls on the Globalstar handset were successfully connected and completed without being dropped during a three-minute period.

Globalstar admits it has  a problem with duplex communications (not simplex). "As previously announced, many Globalstar satellites are experiencing an anomaly resulting in degraded performance of the amplifiers for the S-band satellite communications antenna," Globalstar says.

"The anomaly is adversely affecting two-way voice and data services," the company says. "Customer service continues to be available, but at certain times at any given location it may take substantially longer to establish calls and the duration of calls may be limited."

Until the new second-generation Globalstar satellite constellation is operational, Globalstar is offering its Optimum Satellite Availability T-tool (OSAT) on its Internet site, which subscribers may use to predict when one or more unaffected satellites will be overhead at any specific geographic location.

Globalstar has launched eight spare satellites for its existing constellation with a view to reducing the gaps in its two-way voice and data services pending commercial availability of its second-generation satellite constellation, scheduled for initial launch in the second half of 2009.

Telecom in Uncertain Times, Multi-Part Video

Click the "related article " link below to get the video, in 7 parts on YouTube.

Today's telecom and cable companies face an increasingly complex and uncertain world in which continual and rapid change is the norm. But different providers face distinctly unique challenges. This panel will evaluate the ways contestants operating in different geographies and customer segments; with distinct business models and products; diverse regulatory and technology environments, evaluate where they are, and where they want to go.

We'll take a look at:

Which challenges contestants believe are most crucial
Which opportunities are most relevant
Which customer behaviors and desires offer the greatest upside
How contestants respond to the competitive environment
Where unique value can be created in their chosen markets
How core competencies can be leveraged to create more growth

Recorded at Voice Peering Forum (c) 2008 Stealth Communications