Qwest announces first FTTP deployment

Metro Ethernet equipment market to double by 2008

Yipes gets $24M C round

ICG sells Southeast operations to Xspedius

Municipal broadband advocates fight back

No Sycamore profits for two years, says S&P

Verizon buys out critic

Redback launches rural initiative

Lucent partner delivers Compact Switch to Industry Telephone

Nortel's new execs bring Cisco experience

MEF defines carrier Ethernet; creates certification process

Fiber miles deployed in the U.S.

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Retro-innovation
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 13, 2005

If necessity is the mother of invention, who are its children?

The question occurred to me as I pondered the Metro Ethernet Forum's ambition to eventually elevate Ethernet to a globe-trotting protocol through a rigorous, standards-based certification process.

Though Ethernet was designed to transport data quickly over very short distances, you'd never know it from the killing the industry is making shooting this stuff across town and even cross-country. Ethernet was originally instructed not to get too upset about packet loss, but now it's being saddled with sensitive applications like voice and video for which packet loss is abhorrent. And though its popularity has been attributable in large part to its simplicity, it's getting a whole lot more sophisticated, as new applications require new levels of protection and quality of service. (Continued after ad)
 

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This departure from original design is par for the course, I guess. IP, which is becoming the lingua franca for everything from long-haul networks to residential phone service, was originally designed to mitigate the threat of a Soviet nuclear attack on U.S. military communications. But you don't see Vonage ads on TV promising protection from thermonuclear war. (Conversely, the guys at DARPA who developed packet switching probably had no idea at the time what the long-term implications were for porn.)

The MEF's Nan Chen told me that the group has no plans to change its name (created just four years ago), even as it strives to push Ethernet far beyond the metro. AT&T didn't change its name when it got out of the telegraph business (the second "T"), he reminded me. But when "carrier Ethernet," as the MEF calls it, supports 50-millisecond protection, TDM traffic and guaranteed end-to-end service level agreements, and it is used in everything from intercontinental transport to video-on-demand, will it still make sense to call it Ethernet?

E-mail me at egubbins@primediabusiness.com.

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Top News
Qwest announces first FTTP deployment
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 13, 2005    TelephonyOnline
Though the FTTP deployment at the Ridgegate development in Lone Tree, Colo. (south of Denver) was a response to the developer's RFP, Qwest plans to deploy FTTP in select greenfields in the future.

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Metro Ethernet equipment market to double by 2008
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 12, 2005    TelephonyOnline
Last year's $3.8-billion global market for metro Ethernet gear will become $7.6 billion by 2008, according to Infonetics Research.

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Yipes gets $24M C round
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 12, 2005    TelephonyOnline
With 6500 customers, Yipes claims to have tripled its customer base in the past two years.

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ICG sells Southeast operations to Xspedius
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 11, 2005    TelephonyOnline
Following the transaction, ICG will serve eight remaining markets in Ohio and Colorado.

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Municipal broadband advocates fight back
By Carol Wilson
Apr. 11, 2005    TelephonyOnline
"This is a debate of philosophy versus facts," said Barry Moline, executive director of the Florida Municipal Electric Association. "We think we have the facts on our side."

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No Sycamore profits for two years, says S&P
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 8, 2005    TelephonyOnline
Standard & Poor's Equity Research downgraded optical equipment maker Sycamore Networks from "hold" to "strong sell" last week.

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Verizon buys out critic
By Carol Wilson
Apr. 11, 2005    TelephonyOnline
The telecom giant bought the 43.4 million shares owned by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim Helu and affiliated entities for $25.72 a share.

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Redback launches rural initiative
By Carol Wilson
Apr. 11, 2005    TelephonyOnline
The move comes after the company's subscriber management platform received the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Rural Utilities Service listing.

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Lucent partner delivers Compact Switch to Industry Telephone
By Tim McElligott
Apr. 12, 2005    TelephonyOnline
LightRiver Technologies will replace legacy Class 5s with the former Telica product.

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In Print
Nortel's new execs bring Cisco experience
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 11, 2005    Telephony
After taking heat for promoting too much from within, Nortel named two former Cisco execs as its COO and CTO, taking a bold step toward potentially transforming its identity to that of a more aggressive company with greater authority on the next generation of network technology.

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MEF defines carrier Ethernet; creates certification process
By Ed Gubbins
Apr. 11, 2005    Telephony
"We're choosing to call it 'carrier Ethernet' as opposed to metro Ethernet," said Ethernet inventor Robert Metcalfe. "Metro Ethernet is sort of a misnomer now."

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Fiber miles deployed in the U.S.
KMI Research
Apr. 4, 2005    Telephony
In 2008, TIA expects more than 12 million fiber miles to be deployed--more than twice the level of 2003, but still 36 percent below the 2000 peak.

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