REDBACK AND SIARA MERGER TARGETS NEXT GENERATION ACCESS SERVICES
Redback Networks announced plans to acquire privately-held Siara Systems in a merger aimed at combining advanced subscriber services with next generation IP/SONET access for metropolitan fiber networks.  The acquisition was valued at $4.3 billion based on Friday's prices ($4.7 billion based on Monday's closing prices), giving the combined company a market capitalization in excess of $11 billion. 

Redback Networks' Subscriber Management Systems are used to aggregate traffic from DSL, cable, and wireless service POPs onto a carrier network.  Redback's SMS 1000 platform acts as an edge device that can aggregate as many as 4000 virtual circuits or Frame Relay logical connections from various Central Office sources onto a high-speed link. The SMS 1000 also performs all of the management and conversion functions necessary to deliver router-ready IP data streams to the backbone.  Redback Networks currently supplies its broadband subscriber management and service creation platform to 120 network operators worldwide.  The company markets its products directly through its worldwide sales force and strategic distribution partners, including Nortel Networks, Nokia, and Fujitsu.  Redback is based in Sunnyvale, California.

In September, Redback Networks announced plans to scale its broadband service provisioning systems beyond the access level to more lucrative, value-added services, such as pay-per-view content management.  In the next evolutionary phase, Redback said its subscriber systems would be enhanced with a Director management system that interfaces directly with a carrier's existing Operations Support Systems (OSS) and Network Management Systems (NMS).  This would enable flow-through provisioning of all the network elements required to deliver and bill for broadband services to large numbers of subscribers.

Siara Systems is a start-up developing six IP/SONET ASICs, some with up to five million gates and near 80 billion instructions per second of combined processing performance.  Siaras system-on-a-chip ASICs will perform IP packet processing for per flow policing/shaping, CoS assignment, customized statistics collection, and custom/per-service creator processing.  The platform is designed for multi-layer network element integration, product density, high packet processing power, and carrier-class network provisioning.  Siara's ASIC design team, headed by Michael Yamamura, was responsible for creating Advanced Micro Devices' recent K6 and K7 microprocessors.  Siara Systems is based in Mountain View, California

The merged company will retain the name of Redback Networks and will be based in Northern California.  http://www.redback.com  http://www.siara.com
Converge! Network Digest, November 29, 1999

IAXIS SELECTS K-NET TO DESIGN ITS EUROPEAN IP BACKBONE
K-NET, a leading systems integrator based in the UK, will design, supply and install multi-vendor equipment for the European IP backbone of the new iaxis venture.  K-NET's proposed design uses Juniper Networks' M40 routers at the core connected directly at the optical and SDH layers.  The iaxis IP backbone will have major nodes in Amsterdam, Brussels, Frankfurt, London, New York and Paris.  Dual 2.5Gbps links will be deployed between each site to provide resilience.  The backbone will be extended out to a further 25 cities along the iaxisenroute network, using dual STM-4 links with the capacity to upgrade to dual STM-16.  FORE Systems ASX-200BX switches are also being used to provide ISP access concentration to the global backbone over both Frame Relay and ATM.  K-NET's design and integration contract was valued at $30 million.  http://www.k-net.co.uk/
K-NET, November 29, 1999

iaxis is a venture-backed group building a carrier's carrier network throughout Europe using leased dark fiber. Phase One of the Iaxis network -- a 3,000 km ring linking London, Paris, Strasbourg, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Antwerp and Brussels -- is currently operational.  Phase two of the iaxis network will be lit later this year, extending the reach into Switzerland, central France and Germany. The network uses Ciena's DWDM platform.  iaxis is led by Ray Dutton, a founder director of MFS Communications (acquired by WorldCom).   
http://www.iaxisbv.com/

GALILEO OUTLINES ITS VOICE/DATA SWITCHING ARCHITECTURE PLANS
Galileo Technology outlined its third generation processor architecture for converged voice/data network switches.  The GalNet-3 architecture introduces an "Availability-of-Service (AoS)" concept that guarantees the priority of specified data packets and the availability of network bandwidth across the switch fabric.  AoS works by reserving bandwidth within the switch for specific flows of data.  Galileo said its AoS implementation borrows the ideas of traffic policing and input rate conformance checking from the ATM world.  The GalNet-3 system can make bandwidth reservation decisions on a packet-by-packet basis, and is designed to track 128,000 different flows simultaneously with either strict or flexible limits set for flow policing.  The architecture will support wire speed Layer 2/3/4/5 switching with a maximum port density of 256 10/100 Ethernet ports and up to 32 Gigabit Ethernet or Packet-over-SONET/SDH ports.  http://www.galileot.com/news/GalNet-3pr.htm
Galileo Technology, November 29, 1999

LUCENT ANNOUNCES SILICON-GERMANIUM TECHNOLOGY FOR OC-192 APPLICATIONS
Lucent Technologies announced silicon- germanium (SiGe) integrated circuit technology with the potential to significantly reduce the cost and the power dissipation for optical interface ICs in both OC48/STM16 and OC192/STM64 systems.  Unlike SiGe integrated circuits already offered by other vendors, Lucent's SiGe technology uses common 0.25 -micron feature sizes.  Lucent's Microelectronics Group said the technology would enable to build optical interface ICs at OC192/STM64 and above while paving the way for system-on-a-chip integration with SONET/SDH digital devices.  http://www.lucent.com/press/1199/991129.mea.html
Lucent Technologies, November 29, 1999

CHROMATIS RECEIVES $38 MILLION IN SECOND ROUND OF FUNDING
Chromatis Networks, a start-up developing metropolitan optical networking solutions, received $38 million in its second round of financing.  Total financing now stands at $50 million.  The Chromatis Selective Wave Division Multiplexing (SWDM) architecture creates two rings on the same fiber: one is an inexpensive single-channel ring that is shared by all network elements and runs at 1310 nanometers, and the second is a multi-channel DWDM ring running at 1550 nanometers. Chromatis technology manages the two separate wavelength regions to make them appear as a single network.  All sites can communicate at a variety of speeds using the 1310nm-shared ring, while only the sites that need very high bandwidth tap into one or more of the 1550nm DWDM wavelengths.  Investors include Eucalyptus Ventures, Soros Private Equity Partners, Anschutz Family Investment Company, Chase Capital Partners, Hambrecht & Quist Access Technology Partners, ComVentures, Crosspoint Venture Partners, Jerusalem Venture Partners, and Lucent Venture Partners.  http://www.chromatis.com/
Chromatis Networks, November 29, 1999

MARS POLAR LANDER WEB SITE BUILT FOR 250 MILLION HITS PER HOUR
The official website for the Mars Polar Lander mission (http://www.marspolarlander.org) expects to draw more than 250 million hits in the first few hours after the spacecraft's landing on December 3 (currently scheduled for 12:30 PM PST).  Cable & Wireless is providing co-location, hosting management and network connectivity for the site using Network Appliance's NetCaches in it hosting centers in Chicago, New York, Reston (VA) and San Francisco. The network utilizes F5 Networks' 3DNS Controllers to distribute end-user requests across the four distributed Internet sites based on geographic proximity and server availability.  http://www.f5.com
F5, November 29, 1999

ECI TELECOM'S CEO ANNOUNCES PLANS TO RETIRE
David Rubner, President and CEO of ECI Telecom, announced plans to retire effective March 5, 2000.  Doron Inbar, the company's CFO, will occupy the position until a permanent replacement is found.  Rubner led ECI from a $70 million company to almost $1.2 billion in revenues in just 8 years.  http://www.ecitele.com
ECI Telecom, November 29, 1999

A Daily Journal For Broadband Networking
Copyright 1999 ATM News Inc.
All Rights Reserved. ISSN 1084-2438
News sources are listed for your reference.