• Kabel BW tabs Harmonic for VOD trial
By Mike Robuck

Kabel BW, a cable video service provider with more than 2.3 million subscribers in Germany, will use gear and technology from Harmonic and eventIS for its video-on-demand commercial trial that will be launched later this year. The trial is Germany’s first major cable VOD service deployment, according to Harmonic.

Harmonic is powering the VOD delivery infrastructure with its StreamLiner 2000 video servers, Armada intelligent asset manager, Clearcut offline content preparation, Rhozet Carbon Coder universal transcoding software, NSG 9000 universal edge QAMs, ProStream 1000 stream processing platform and NMX Digital Service Manager. Kabel BW is using eventIS’ VOD back office products.

Kabel BW is also using NDS’ MediaHighway middleware, XTV integrated DVR technology and NDS’ video-on-demand solution for the introduction of new entertainment services (story here).

• Cedar Point, Ericsson to demo PacketCable 2.0 VoIP services
By Traci Patterson

Cedar Point Communications and Ericsson are demonstrating PacketCable 2.0 VoIP features that enable cable operators to increase revenue at this week’s Anga 2009 Exhibition and Conference in Cologne, Germany. 

Cedar Point and Ericsson are displaying Fused Services, which – according to the companies – are a direct result of an IMS-based, PacketCable 2.0 architecture . The demonstration illustrates interworking between PacketCable 1.x and PacketCable 2.0 and showcases the delivery of new PacketCable 2.0/IMS services to PacketCable 1.x subscribers, such as Intelligent Call Forwarding.

Also being shown in the joint demonstration are Converged Multimedia Services over IMS, which will show communication sessions between TV and PC endpoints.  Specific features being shown are Instant Messaging (IM) and chat sessions, presence-based picture Caller ID displayed on the TV and PC, and voice/video calls between the TV and PC.

• Mixed Signals lands reseller for German cable market
By Traci Patterson

Mixed Signals has added Anedis – a full-service reseller focused on the German cable industry – as its latest European reseller. 

Mixed Signals offers cable operators its Sentry, a comprehensive and scalable monitoring solution that enables operators to closely and continually monitor their video content to quickly identify, localize and rectify video and audio imperfections. Sentry enables ops to identify irregularities in the network at the IP and MPEG layers, as well as in quality of experience. 

“Anedis is a tremendous addition to our reseller program, providing us with a partner in the German cable market that has established relationships with Germany’s leading cable television operators,” said Eric Conley, CEO of Mixed Signals. “Anedis’ trained staff, extensive systems integration experience and impressive knowledge of QoE requirements will help us to make Sentry as popular in Germany as it is with U.S. cable operators.”

• Ciena forms advisory council for BizConnect Partner Program
By Traci Patterson

Ciena has formed a Partner Advisory Council to support its global BizConnect Partner Program, which enables partners to tailor their relationship with Ciena – which can include portfolio offerings, promotions, training, incentives and more.

The council brings together a group of networking executives to provide collaborative market knowledge on the state of the communications industry, as well as to offer direction on the strategic alignment of Ciena’s BizConnect program with the needs of its partner and end-user communities.

The initial members of Ciena’s Partner Advisory Council include: John Breen, assistant vice president of design engineering for AT&T’s Equipment Solutions Engineering organization; Carlos Busso, executive president of Adexus; Kevin Delane, vice president of global accounts at EMC Corp.; Angus Flett, director of customer service management at BT Wholesale; Angelo Germani, vice president of sales engineering with AboveNet; Glenn Johansen, president and CEO of LightRiver Technologies; Ingo Kierse, managing director, co-founder and partner of Xantaro Holding; and Gerhard Schrott, manager of business solutions networks at Kapsch BusinessCom.

• Teleste, Edgeware combo on turnkey TV system
By Brian Santo

Teleste Corp. has become a global reseller of Edgeware’s video server products. The two have already integrated Edgeware’s Orbit and Web TV server products with Teleste’s MyCast hybrid IPTV/DVB middleware.

In combination with the Teleste Luminato digital headend and edge QAM platform, products can be used to build advanced TV services, including VOD, time-shifted live TV and video over the Web.

“Partnering with Edgeware enables Teleste to offer its customers an advanced, pre-integrated on-demand solution, which is both cost-effective, reliable and fast to deploy,” said Seppo Kalli, business director at Teleste. “This enables us to serve our customers better by offering a complete turnkey solution, which, in addition to software and hardware components, includes world-class professional services for installation, maintenance and support.”

• Emulex again tells shareholders to reject offer
By The Associated Press

COSTA MESA, Calif. (AP) – Network gear-maker Emulex Corp. said Tuesday it sent a letter to its shareholders continuing to urge them not to tender their shares into an unsolicited $9.25-per-share tender offer from chip-maker Broadcom Corp. Emulex has already recommended that its shareholders reject the offer, worth $764 million, and the company also rebuffed an earlier cash offer of the same amount.

Emulex said in its letter to shareholders that Broadcom's offer "significantly undervalues Emulex" and called it an "opportunistic attempt to capture significant value that rightly belongs to all of you."

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last week, Broadcom said that after "refusing to engage in constructive discussions," the Emulex board "has suddenly produced a set of new, rosy, 'hockey stick' projections, which may or may not become reality sometime in 2012." "We encourage Emulex shareholders to evaluate these forecasts in light of Emulex's disappointing history of missing forecasts and its recent failure to grow either revenue or market share," Broadcom said on May 19.

Emulex, meanwhile, said it has achieved 12 new design contracts with tier-one manufacturers, and expects these to "support the vast majority of our projected $150 million in converged networking revenues in fiscal year 2012, increasing Emulex's total revenue to $600 million in the same time period." The company said the 12 design contracts were not public prior to the Broadcom proposal.

• Nokia’s Ovi Store open for business
By Andrew Berg, Wireless Week

Nokia today announced the opening of its long-awaited Ovi Store, which is now available globally to an estimated 50 million Nokia device owners across more than 50 Nokia devices, including the forthcoming flagship device, the Nokia N97.

While the Ovi Store is available now in Australia, Singapore, Spain, Italy, Germany, Russia, Ireland and the U.K., it will not be immediately available in the United States. However, AT&T did announce that it will make the Ovi Store available to its customers later this year, putting the Ovi Store in parallel competition with Apple’s App Store.

Nokia has long been criticized for its reluctance to partner with U.S. carriers, preferring to release its devices and services internationally before bringing them to the U.S. Many say this is the reason Nokia’s sales have fallen off in the U.S. in the past few years. This year, Nokia has vowed to change that model, working more closely with North American carriers.