• Last week, Storage @ccess Technologies and Telseon agreed to develop and deploy fourteen Virtual Storage Network Access Points (Virtual SNAPs) in the New York City region.  The companies are collaborating on six more Virtual Storage Network Access Points in Miami, FL.

LEVEL 3 REDUCES REVENUE PROJECTIONS, CUTS COSTS AND CAPITAL EXPENDITURES, ANNOUNCES LAYOFFS
Level 3 Communications trimmed its revenue forecast for 2001 to $2.1 billion from its earlier estimates of $2.3-$2.4 billion.  Revenue for next year is projected to be in the $2.5-$2.6 billion range, down from an estimated $3.1-$3.3 billion.  In light of the continuing weakness and volatility in the market, Level 3 announced cost reduction plans totaling $2.3 billion through 2003, including a reduction of 1,400 positions out of a global workforce of 5,900 employees.  Level 3’s capital expenditures are now expected to be $3.0 billion in 2001, $1.5 billion in 2002 and $1.3 billion in 2003.  The company said it would focus its sales efforts on established companies with substantial needs for bandwidth services, rather than on early stage companies with high bandwidth applications.  Level 3 believes the near-term market for wavelengths and high speed private line services exceeds $15 billion and is dominated by approximately 300 companies.  Over the past 90 days, it has signed approximately $60 million in wavelength service contracts and remains optimistic that the industry will recover. 
http://www.level3.com/us/news/newsreleases/1,1345,2001Jun18-5478,00.html
Level 3 Communications, June 18, 2001

• Level 3’s actual capital expenditures totaled $5.9 billion in 2000, and $3.4 billion in 1999. 
• As of March 2001, the company estimated that its future capital expenditures would be $3.4 billion for 2001, and over $2.0 billion for 2002.

METROMEDIA FIBER NETWORK TRIMS FINANCIAL FORECASTS
Citing general economic weakness and a decline in business from dot-com customers, Metromedia Fiber Network (MFN) trimmed its quarterly and year 2001 revenue guidance downward.  For the year, the company issued revised revenue guidance of between $400 million and $420 million, yielding revenue growth of between 112% and 123% for 2001 compared to 2000.  MFN’s previous guidance for 2001 anticipated $478 million in revenue.   http://www.mmfn.com/mfn/news_events/press.html 
MFN, June 18, 2001

360NETWORKS DROPS PLANS TO ACQUIRE NETRAIL, AN ISP
360networks withdrew plans to acquire NetRail, a wholesale Internet service provider, in an all-stock transaction.  http://www.360.net 
360networks, June 18, 2001

• In February, 360networks announced plans to acquire NetRail a Tier 1 wholesale IP service provider, in an all-stock transaction.  Financial terms were not disclosed.  NetRail serves more than 150 customers and has private and public peering agreements with all Tier 1 Internet backbone providers.  NetRail has a leased backbone of OC3 and DS3 trunks spanning 50 POPs across the US.  The network uses Lucent's CBX-500 ATM switches and Juniper Networks' M-40 routers running Packet over SONET (POS) with MPLS and multicasting.  The company is based in Atlanta. 

NET.COM ADDS SIP AND H.323 SUPPORT TO SHOUTIP, CUSTOMER OFFERS MOBILE WEB ACCESS FOR VOICE MESSAGING
net.com added support for SIP and H.323 protocols to its ShoutIP 1100 Advanced Telephony Platform, enabling carriers to terminate and originate VoIP traffic between multivendor networks.  The ShoutIP platform features open programmability and a distributed architecture that combines gatekeeper, media gateway, media server, SS7/C7 signaling, time division multiplexing, and IP capabilities.  Tokyo-based Bellnet Corporation has selected ShoutIP systems to support mobile Web access for voice messaging.  Subscribers create personal profiles and dial into a mobile web server using a cellular phone. The server sends the direct-inward dialing information back to the phone, which in turn dials the SHOUT system.  After the SHOUT system performs the administration, authentication, and authorization (AAA) function, the user hears the pre-recorded message.  http://www.net.com/ 
net.com, June 18, 2001

AMCC INTRODUCES SWITCHING, NETWORK PROCESSING AND TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT CHIP
AMCC introduced a highly integrated single-chip solution that combines network processing technology with traffic management, search engine, switching, and MAC capabilities.  The software-programmable chip offers four 1.1 Gbps port interfaces that can optionally utilize the on-chip Gigabit Ethernet MAC or interface with either Packet-Over-SONET (POS) framers or fabric/ backplane logic.  It features a nine Gbps switch fabric capacity and an on-chip policy engine classification and search coprocessor to enable policy-based network services.  Target applications include edge routers, high-speed IP access solutions for multi-tenant and multi-dwelling units, voice gateways and VPN boxes.  Sampling is underway.  http://www.amcc.com/Compinfo/PressReleases/nP3404.htm 
AMCC, June 18, 2001

BROADCOM INTRODUCES SINGLE-CHIP DWDM TRANSPORT PROCESSOR
Broadcom introduced a single-chip DWDM processor that integrates a digital wrapper, Forward Error Correction (FEC), and a SONET/SDH framer with performance monitoring logic and a serial 10 Gbps transceiver.  Applications could include DWDM transmission equipment and terminals, DWDM regenerators, and DWDM cards on SONET/SDH add/drop multiplexers and cross-connects.  The device supports the emerging ITU G.709 recommendation for the Optical Transport Networking (OTN) digital wrapper standard with embedded Forward Error Correction (FEC). The digital wrapper provides a standard method to encapsulate any traffic payload with FEC, enabling transmission over longer spans without the need for signal regeneration. Broadcom said the level of integration results in one-third the power and one-quarter the board space requirements compared to competitive alternatives.  http://www.broadcom.com 
Broadcom, June 18, 2001

ZETTACOM RAISES $47.5 MILLION FOR ITS OPTICAL SILICON
ZettaCom, a start-up developing configurable optical silicon solutions, secured $47.5 million in second round venture financing.  The company claims over twelve major design wins in the last seven months.  ZettaCom has raised $58.5 million since its inception in 1999.  Second round investors include Granite Global Ventures, Venrock Associates, Norwest Venture Partners, J. & W. Seligman & Co., Development Bank of Singapore, JPMorgan Partners, k1 Ventures, Vertex Management, Crimson Ventures, Infineon Ventures, U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray, SG Cowen Ventures Fund, Banc of America Securities and United Investments.  ZettaCom is based in San Jose, California.  http://www.zettacom.com 
ZettaCom, June 19, 2001

• Last month, ZettaCom announced commercial availability of its terabit class hybrid switching fabric and its OC-192 traffic manager.  ZettaCom’s ZEST-200 hybrid switching fabric implements an architecture that can scale up to over 1 Tbps of non-blocking switching capacity allowing for flexible implementation of high-density single-shelf to terabit multi-shelf switching systems and offering a migration path to OC-768.  ZettaCom's ZEN-QM200 provides predictable traffic management capabilities and highly granular QoS differentiation at full-duplex OC-192 wire speed.
• ZettaCom was co-founded by Daryn Lau, Chris Bergen and Bob Divivier, all formerly with Cisco Systems and previously StrataCom.

STARBAND OFFERS NEW SATELLITE MODEM, SWITCHES TO WHOLESALE BUSINESS MODEL
StarBand Communications introduced a new consumer-oriented modem for its two-way satellite Internet access service in the US.  The product is multicast-enabled, allowing consumers to receive multicast-encoded data streams initially of up to 3 Mbps in addition to high-speed Internet browsing.  In the future, the multicasting capacity will increase to up to 48 Mbps.  StarBand is also changing to a wholesale distribution model under which its channel partners would take up the marketing and sales efforts to end users.  The company claims 40,000 installations since the service was introduced last year.  http://www.starband.com 
StarBand, June 18, 2001

• StarBand's investors and strategic partners include Gilat Satellite Networks Ltd., Microsoft Corporation, EchoStar Communications Corporation and ING Furman Selz Investments.
• The StarBand Internet service is currently being provided over one of two different satellites: the GE-4 satellite located at 101° west longitude (W.L.) or the Telstar 7 satellite located at 129° W.L.

FRANCE TELECOM'S ETRALI AND CISCO TEST IP-BASED VIRTUAL TRADING ROOM
Etrali, a France Telecom subsidiary, is currently testing a new IP-based virtual trading room that provides geographically dispersed traders the ability to work transparently, as if they were in the same trading room.  Tradition SA, a Swiss financial institution, will beta test the concept.  Cisco Systems is the lead supplier.  http://www.etrali.com 
Etrali, June 18, 2001

NEC USA SPINS OFF PERMEO TECHNOLOGIES FOR SECURITY SOFTWARE
NEC USA announced the formation of a new company, Permeo Technologies, to provide platform-independent security products and services.  The company's products use a Dynamic Port Management technology that is application neutral and can interoperate with all firewalls and VPNs.  Permeo is based in Dallas, Texas.  http://www.permeotechnologies.com 
Permeo Technologies, June 18, 2001

PACTOLUS SECURES $6M FOR SIP-ENABLED SOFTWARE
Pactolus Communication Software, a start-up based in Westborough, Massachusetts, secured $6 million in second round venture funding for its development of XML-based enhanced services for SIP-enabled networks.  The Pactolus RapidFLEX Application Server and Service Creation Environment (SCE) is an open, extensible, Unix-based software environment for writing XML-based applications for softswitch-enabled, converged networks.  http://www.pactolus.com/Co_PressReleasesNewFunding.htm 
Pactolus, June 18, 2001