Cisco

Huawei ascends to optical networking prominence in $3.6B market

<Did you see the blaze of light as Huawei’s streaked past Alcatel-Lucent on its way to becoming the top optical networking equipment vendor for the first time in Q3? Upsetting long-term record-holder Alcatel-Lucent, Ovum reported Asia-Pacific markets are tearing up the market segment, especially in China, which Ovum said is propelled by 3g mobile network builds. And when China builds, Huawei benefits. Huawei now leads the optical market by almost 3%, Ovum said.

Clearly on a roll, the Del’Oro group reports Huawei is in second place in the mobile networking market in Q3, still far behind Ericsson, but Huawei’s market share went from 11% last year to 20%.

Overall, the optical networking market is down 10% compared to Q308, but global spending still totaled $3.6 billion in Q3 and a recovery appears to be in progress. Several of the top 10 optical vendors have seen improved revenue (including Cisco, Fujitsu, NEC, Tellabs and possibly Nortel), but ZTE, the other Chinese powerhouse, edged out Fujitso for #4. In the hard-knock life category, Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) fell from #5 in Q308 to #8th, behind Tellabs, a year later. Comeback-kid Cisco also edged out Ciena to re-enter the top 10.

Cisco to compete for 3G and 4G mobile multimedia delivery with Starent acquisition

Wall Street and the analyst community think Cisco’s acquisition of Starent Networks will be $2.9 billion well spent in order to seriously vie for 3G and 4G mobile gateway business from service providers delivering more and more multimedia traffic that needs to move from wireless networks to IP networks via someone’s packet gateway.

The packet gateway is Starent’s niche, and soon will be Cisco’s. Among the many takeaways from this announcement, other telecom equipment vendors must take serious note of Cisco’s focus on mobile. And in case there’s any confusion, that means Juniper, Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson and Huawei, to name a few.

If all goes well, Starent will become Cisco’s official Mobile Internet Technology Group when the acquisition is completed in the first half of 2010. “Cisco is all about IP, but Cisco doesn’t have that kind of heritage on the mobility side. So this acquisition has a big upside,” said IDC Wireless and Mobile Infrastructure Research Manager Godfrey Chua. “This is the segment in the mobile infrastructure market that is growing faster than the others.”

A niche player but a survivor (through the dot-com and the telecom crashes from early in the decade), Starent already has marquis clients – including Verizon Wireless and Sprint, to name two big ones, and one assumes Cisco will inherit Starent’s client list.

Starent Networks enables wireless operators to deliver multimedia (data, video, wireless TV, games, etc.) on wireless devices. Starent’s technology is positioned to help operators deliver that content over 2.5, 3G and 4G networks. Starent’s role will be to play on Cisco’s video and IP strengths in mobile infrastructure solutions that will extend quality multimedia experiences to mobile subscribers on 3G and 4G networks.

“Starent already has a good client base in terms of service providers, so it gets Cisco into the mobility discussion more and paves the way for more discussions as more carriers look at LTE,” Chua said. “Now it will be natural to include Cisco at the table.”

More 100 GigE edge router positioning, but why?

The news is this: Cisco is doubling the density of its Aggregation Services Router 9000 edge router series, which puts density well above the 100 Gig mark. The new line cards, which will be available in the next few months, have 16 10-gigabit-per-second Ethernet ports.

Cisco is claiming top-dog position at the moment, but its competitors have taken turns with edge router announcements of late. Juniper expects to start trialing 100-GigE cards for the MX 960 edge router before the end of the year. Alcatel Lucent is on a similar timetable. Huawei expects to introduce a 100-GigE line card, as well. So, different day, different vendor announcement.

The bigger question is why? What’s really happening is that vendors are positioning to help service providers engineer the next generation of services, according to CIMI Corp. President Tom Nolle. The approaches equipment vendors are announcing are extremely subtle; the point is to be a player in the network edge carrier build-up.

The likely reason service providers are interested in beefing up the network edge is not to serve up video for over-the-top players more efficiently, but to get into the content delivery network (CDN) business themselves so they get a bigger cut of the revenue, Nolle said. “If a provider is going to get a piece of the action by selling CDN services, they need to provide a better user experience.”

This isn’t the end of the port wars by any means, and who wins the most carrier market share will be interesting to watch.

Green Cisco recycles ASR 9000 advertising campaign

If I weren’t such a fan of kitschy 50’s send-ups and if the economy weren’t so tough I might be less forgiving, but Cisco’s special Father’s Day ASR 9000 advert is still good for a geeky telecom equipment chuckle, even if it is a little too reminiscent of the Valentine’s Day ASR 9000 ad. At least it beats the bizarre flash game-vertisements network administrators get. For your viewing pleasure:

And just for comparison’s sake, here’s the original Valentine’s Day spot:

Further Reading:

• The original Cisco Aggregation Services Router 9000 (ASR 9000) announcement
• The Cisco ASR 9000 Valentine’s Day video
• Networking equipment ad games: Who’s even playing them?

Telecom Timeout: Video investments

Telecom Timeout: Video Investments covers the latest on Nortel’s application delivery business sale to Radware, Cisco’s lay offs, a continued evaluation of Alcatel-Lucent’s future plans, as well as AT&T’s self-investment and the beginning of the process to distribute the broadband stimulus grants. Futher coverage also highlights the future plans involving IPTV by service providers, as unified communications, development of the 802.11v standard and new legislation for an updated Internet Safety Act.

Keeping you up-to-date on the latest in telecommunications industry news, views and strategy, Telecom Timeout and its weekly video blog track the highs and lows of the industry. Join us daily on Telecom Timeout for conversations on developing telecom trends and in-depth analysis of service providers, VoIP, wireless, IPTV, telecom regulation, and more.

The ultimate telecom Valentine?

Amy Kucharik from sister blog Network Hub sent along some Valentine’s Day gift advice from Cisco. We won’t ruin the surprise, but it sure has put my shopping-phobic heart at ease: