All Our Yesterdays

Feliz Navidad, Joyeux Noel, Merry Xmas, Καλά Χριστούγεννα

“The basic Goal of Data Engineering, is to transfer the burden of the mundane from man to machine” – by a famous McGill professor back in 1982 in an introductory course on Computer Architecture.

Technology is the practical application of our determination to expand beyond our physical limitations, defy any preset fate, and control our destiny.

Technology is not good, or bad. How we use it depends on what we want to accomplish, our inherent strengths and…weaknesses.

Ωραιάνθη Παναγκάρου - blue note Athens, foto by Toni

With technology comes a certain beauty, a certain harmony. No wonder the first computer programmer, was a lovely woman, and the daughter of one of the greatest romantic poets of all time. 

The   projection of human falacies, complexes and fears through technology will lead to ugliness and destruction.  

Technology will provide the tools that will allow the artist to be “the creator of beautiful things “.

We can forgive a man for making a useful things as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.

All art is quite useless - Oscar Wilde

 

Led Zeppelin Ohio 1975 doin' Rock'n Roll - foto Chantal "on my neck"

Scientists as back as the 1800s predicted that the emissions brought about by the industrial age will eventually lead to the greenhouse effect. Surely a species intelligent enough to predict the future consequences of the dawning of  a new age will eventually be able to use that same prowess to resolve this aftermath and forge the way ahead for a better world, Copenhagen or no Copenhagen.

I guess the real challenge for humanity is to first of all come to terms with itself. The rest is just simple application of principles.

Finally, there ain’t nothing like a British Accent to make that ol’ Rock, Roll

Enjoy your holidays;see y’all in the New Year.

Chinese Market Share Gains into European Telecom Supplier Turf

Assorted News from Europe :

Ericsson snubbed in own backyard for LTE deal

By Paul Rasmussen

 
The #1 infrastructure vendor Ericsson has been caused significant embarrassment by failing to win an LTE contract jointly awarded by Tele2 Sweden and the Swedish unit of Norway’s Telenor.
To make matters worse – much worse, the deal was won by the Huawei – a company that is fast becoming Ericsson’s arch-rival and major irritant to its ambitions to win a majority slice of the LTE market.
The two celcos used their joint wireless infrastructure venture, Net4Mobility, to place the contract with the aim of commercially launching LTE services in 2010. The goal is that 99 per cent of the Swedish population will be able to access the LTE network before the end of 2013, starting with densely populated areas. The deployment will also include increasing the number of base stations for 2G voice traffic by 30 to 50 per cent, with enhanced indoor and outdoor coverage across the country as a result.
Earlier this week, Swedish operator TeliaSonera launched the world’s first commercial LTE services in Oslo, Norway and Stockholm, Sweden – the Stockholm network being provided by Ericsson, while Huawei won the contract in Oslo.
Commenting on the lost deal, Mikael Backstrom, head of Ericsson Nordics and Baltics, said, “We are disappointed that we did not manage to reach an agreement with Net4Mobility. In the negotiations, we went down as far as we could in price, but it was not enough.”
According to analyst David Hallden at HQ Bank, Ericsson risks lower profit margins if it cuts prices to defend its market share from Huawei, adding that the company may have no choice but to accept lower-priced contracts because it needs to sell equipment in order to secure service deals, which are getting increasingly important.

Huawei scores in Europe with LTE
November 25, 2009 — 12:33pm ET |

By Paul Rasmussen

 Having already registered some notable wins with European operators for LTE–Telenor being the latest–Huawei has continued to infuriate Ericsson and NSN by announcing further contract awards and trials.

Huawei said that Telecom Italia, which has already started a “pre-commercial LTE trial” in Turin, had selected the vendor as its technology partner for testing data speeds up to 140Mbit/s. The trial network involves 14 LTE base stations installed in the centre of Turin with each configured to handle three simultaneous high bandwidth voice and data connections.

The company also said that Belgacom has chosen Huawei to upgrade its mobile network, which operates under the Proximus brand. This deal is similar to the Chinese vendor’s recent contract with Telenor, in that the cellco is looking to integrate its GSM, HSPA and LTE systems in the future to a converged RAN – supported by Huawei’s SingleRAN platform and a unified packet core.

Proximus’ incumbent RAN and core supplier is NSN, whose Flexi base station line competes head-on with SingleRAN in the mixed-radio environment. Although NSN may retain the core business at the LTE stage.

And in Greece, Vodafone has gone live with a Huawei-based HSPA+ upgrade to its network, offering a peak download rate of 28.8Mbit/s and upload rate of up to 5.8Mbit/s. HSPA+ MIMO mobile broadband services will initially be provided in selected areas of capital Athens, and then expanded to other cities – and the Huaweii UTRAN seems to be performing far better than the previous Siemens one-.

Vodafone draws Huawei into mobile core R&D lab
November 18, 2009 — 1:13pm ET | By Paul Rasmussen
 
In a move that must have sent alarm bells ringing within the HQs of its established infrastructure suppliers, Vodafone has announced the opening of a new lab in Italy dedicated to mobile core networks, in association with Huawei.

While this R&D effort was reported to be focusing on IMS, mobile broadband support and FMC, observers have taken Huawei’s move as a firm indication for further involvement within the evolved packet core sector, and to push its credentials higher up the LTE value chain.

Unstrung reported the news as Huawei manoeuvring for a position deeper in Vodafone’s mobile network and which could be seen as muscling in on the operator’s current mobile core suppliers, which are Ericsson, NSN and Starent Networks. Huawei already supplies Vodafone with circuit-switched mobile soft switches in Hungary, Romania and South Africa and, on the mobile core front, the vendor won a contract with T-Mobile International in December 2007 that was viewed as a European breakthrough deal.

Vodafone and Huawei have teamed up before to co-operate over mobile R&D, with the effort then being on RAN technologies which helped Huawei develop its SDR radio for base stations which Vodafone subsequently trialled.

Commenting on this latest move, Vodafone said: “We’re planning our core network architecture evolution and making sure that Huawei’s [roadmap] is aligned to match that.”

While Vodafone has stated several times it has no plans to deploy LTE until 2011 or 2012, there is growing speculation that it may award some initial contracts as early as a year from now. This could open the doors to new suppliers if Vodafone is willing to adopt a new approach where the core and RAN vendors are more separated.

Telenor picks Huawei for 4G upgrade, rejects Ericsson and NSN
November 6, 2009 — 12:27pm ET | By Paul Rasmussen
 
In a move that will be closely watched across Europe, Norway’s Telenor has given its incumbent infrastructure providers, Ericsson and NSN, a bloody nose by selecting Huawei to construct its 4G network.

The deal, valued at around €170 million over the next six years, is the largest LTE in Europe to date and calls for Telenor’s existing Ericsson and NSN network equipment to be merged into the new infrastructure provided by Huawei. The contract will see the delivery of equipment across technology generations and frequency bands, as well as base stations for 2G, 3G/UMTS and 4G/LTE. The change of providers will also entail digitisation, with the entire wireless network and core network being migrated to an IP-based platform supplied by Starent Networks, which was acquired by Cisco Systems last month in a US$2.9 billion deal.

Commenting on the contract award, Ragnar Kaarhus, head of Telenor Norway, said that it would involve the biggest upgrade of the mobile network in Norway that has ever been carried out. He attributed the choice of Huawei to “a combination of technical quality, reliability … and commercial terms”–which some might speculate as Huawei pricing the offer to win.

Market analysts said that the three per cent fall in Ericsson’s share price last week was in part attributable to the contract loss, although the significance was more symbolic than material for the Swedish company.

Huawei makes play for LTE patent leadership
September 4, 2009 — 11:37am ET | By Paul Rasmussen
 

As infrastructure vendors battle for survival, Huawei has increased the pressure on its rivals by claiming to be leading the race for being granted LTE patents. The company, which recently demonstrated the world’s first LTE mobile broadband Internet connection with TeliaSonera in Oslo, said that ETSI had confirmed the award of 147 LTE patents to the Chinese equipment manufacturer.

According to Huawei, the patents granted were across several key LTE sub-sectors, such as physical-layer air interface, radio resource management and connection management, and represented 12 per cent of the total existing 1,272 LTE patents assigned by ETSI as of August 2009.

Yin Weimin, Huawei’s president of its LTE division, said that this achievement reflected the company’s vision and commitment to operators as they evolve to LTE networks. “We have always adopted a forward-looking approach and will continue to collaborate closely with the industry in driving the development of next-generation mobile communication solutions.”

Separately, the patent portfolio management firm, Sisvel, has responded to a request from the Next Generation Mobile Networks (NGMN) Alliance to help select the patent pool administrator for parties owning patents essential to the LTE standard.

In May, Sisvel called upon the wireless industry for patents and patent applications essential to the LTE standard, in an effort to support the creation of a joint licensing program to make LTE technology accessible to all users on fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms and conditions.

This move by the NGMN to establish an open and fair approach to LTE patents has perhaps been motivated by the many long and protracted legal battles that have been fought for years over wireless patent ownership and infringements.

Siemens, Nokia affirm support for struggling NSN

Fri Dec 11, 2009 7:20am EST

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 Reporting by Marilyn Gerlach and Tarmo Virki

FRANKFURT/HELSINKI, Dec 11 (Reuters) – Executives of Siemens AG   and Nokia Oyj   sent a rare joint letter to clients of struggling telecom gear making venture Nokia Siemens Networks  affirming their support for its future.

“We continue to support investment in the future of the company, both in terms of expenditure and potential acquisitions and partnerships,” Siemens Chief Financial Officer Joe Kaeser and Nokia Chief Executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said in a letter dated Dec. 9.

The letter to NSN’s customers was a signal of confidence in NSN, particularly at a time when Siemens had indicated its willingness to divest some of its non-core assets, said an analyst who declined to be identified.

A Nokia Siemens spokesman confirmed such a letter had been sent. Siemens declined to comment, while Nokia was not immediately available to comment.

The telecoms equipment market has seen cut-throat competition for new business, driven by Asian vendors such as China’s Huawei  forcing Nokia to book a 908 million euro ($1.34 billion) third-quarter charge for NSN. 

Kaeser met analysts on the same day Siemens disclosed fourth-quarter results which were pulled down by a 1.6 billion euro writedown on its stake in NSN. 

He said there had been “disappointment” since the partners founded NSN in 2007, adding the two between them have a 1.5 billion euro shareholder loan to NSN.

“I would not necessarily rule out, since this is a subordinated shareholder loan, that we would convert at least part of it into equity,” Kaeser had said.

“But I would be extremely difficult to be convinced about spending materially more money from the shareholder base rather than look into other options,” he added.

Analyst Andreas Willi of J.P. Morgan said in a note late in November that Siemens had reclassified its equity investments, of which NSN is the largest, from “strategic” to “financial” last year, indicating the German conglomerate would look to exit NSN over time.

He said he believed Nokia might not be interested in buying out Siemens’ 50 percent stake as the Finnish company had also expressed an interest in reducing its exposure to NSN.