Catching up on events - Lattelecom to go to IMS by 2017

Followup on the Tele2 fiasco

I have been remiss in updating this blog and there have been some noteworthy events that I will now belatedly relate.

First, I was more or less right about the cause of the big Tele2 crash on July 14. It was, as I said in a previous post, a “piecashit” gadget that brought down the house, but after talking to Tele2 technical director Ervīns Kampāns, the picture was a bit more complicated. What actually happened was that the system that was supposed to warn about a failure of the cooling system did itself fail, but not all the AC to DC transformers went down at once. When the first ones did, the UPS attached to the Nokia-Siemens core switch did kick in, but shared the power-supplying load with the diminished flow of current from the failing transformers. What resulted was that at some point, both the supply of current from the transformers and the UPS (which is intended to work for a short time until reserve generators kick in) was degraded and finally the core switch and all the complex systems it sustained crashed. It was, indeed, a perfect storm kind of event. According to Kampāns, Tele2 has now added additional backup and security systems, so that a repetition of the highly unlikely July 14 event is even more unlikely.

Lattelecom to go all IMS by 2017

On July 20, Lattelecom and China's Huawei announced they had signed an agreement to convert the entire Lattelecom fixed line network to run on IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) standards by 2017, with the first pilot tests to take place in early 2012. Migrating to IMS would expand the services available to fixed-line subscribers as well as offering them a kind of global mobility. Lattelecom would be one of the first telcos in the region to go all-IMS (globally, as far as I can see, there aren't too many other operators who have made a conversion, although IMS is used by some for a limited range of services)

People would be able to take their fixed-line Lattelecom numbers (actually, IP addresses attached to their handsets) anywhere in the world where there was a fixed or WiFi internet connection. Lattelecom CEO Juris Gulbis also told this blogger that the telco operator would develop applications for smart phones that would make it possible to call on the IMS network. With most Lattelecom subscribers on flat-rate, “free” calling plans, calls between two Lattelecom numbers anywhere in the world would cost only what the respective internet connection costs.

Technically, the move to IMS would mean eliminating most, if not all local switches and replacing them with two redundant switches to run the whole network. Existing copper landlines would be turned into DSL connections, while optical internet customers are already on the internet and would simply have their voice services upgraded to IMS.

The deal with Lattelecom is also another achievement for Huawei, which has succesfully challenged traditional infrastructure suppliers in the region, such as Sweden's Ericsson and the Finnish-German Nokia-Siemens. The project will be handled from the Chinese company's Swedisj office, which is located about a kilometer from Ericsson's headquarters in the Stockholm suburb of Kista. 

Bite seeking bids for a major network upgrade -- sources

 NOTE: BITE COMMENT ADDED APRIL 12
Mobile operator Bite Latvija is seeking bids from several major telecoms equipment suppliers for an extensive upgrade of its network in Latvia, according to this blogger's sources.  Bite is seeking to replace most of its base stations and replace them with "4G ready" equipment that also consumes less electricity.
According to my source, Bite approached suppliers Ericsson, Nokia-Siemens, HuaWei and ZTE, (the latter two both Chinese companies) at the World Mobile Congress in Barcelona in February. Currently, the Bite network in Latvia runs on Ericsson equipment, and the Swedish-based telecoms systems builder has been given a chance at the upgrade.
A Bite spokesperson denied that there had been a formal tender request, noting only that the company has regular discussions with potential suppliers. 
The interesting challenger is HuaWei, which supplied equipment for Norway's Telenor when it launched its LTE (4G) network in December, 2009. The company has been moving aggressively into Europe and set up its Nordic/Baltic regional operation in the Stockholm suburb of Kista, where Ericsson had also moved its global headquarters.
I am heading for Stockholm at the end of next week and will try to arrange an interview/videoblog with HuaWei's regional honcho and post it here.

Ericsson sees 50 billion mobile broadband gadgets in 2020

Ericsson sees some 50 billion mobile broadband devices on the net by 2020. That's what Mikael Bäcksträm, President of Nordic & Baltics, said at a June 22 event in Stockholm when I wasn't filming him. In my videoblog, he talks about some other issues, plus we see some shots of the ocean yacht races in the confines of Stockholm harbor. It is to me, a non-sailor, a wonder that there were no collisions between the yachts and all kinds of watercraft following them around.
On my Latvian-language blog, some commentators expressed skepticism about the 50 billion figure, but I suppose that will include very large numbers of security, monitoring and surveillance devices embedded or attached to anything you can imagine. Ericsson didn't say this, but I could even see individual trees in a stand of several thousand "talking" to the nearest LTE base station and updating their individual status to a database. Never mind all the electricity and water meters...

Here is the video;

IZZI gets the jump on HDTV

IZZI, the multi-services provider (internet, cable TV, wireless internet and mobile) has indicated it will make an announcement about High Definition TV (HDTV) on March 1. This means that the (not by so much) underdog has gotten the jump on market leader Baltcom TV and Lattelecom, which has yet to launch its IPTV for ordinary TV receivers service.
Two questions come to mind. First, what technology will be used to deliver the HDTV signal and in what parts of the IZZI network. Second, what HDTV channels will be available? I may be wrong here, but there aren't too many HDTV channels in Europe. There is one that is more or less a demo channel showing fluffy animals (count the hairs on their fur) and tropical fish (check out the facets of their scales).
To deliver HDTV apparently requires quite a few megabits, possibly the maximum that IZZI can deliver over cable. Here, Baltcom with its optical network in parts of Riga is perhaps better positioned. We shall see what IZZI has to say on March 1 and wait for Baltcom's countermove. Maybe that will be to do nothing until there is substantially more than fuzzybears and fish to show. That would be a step away from quantity (100 + digital channels) in favor of packaged quality (an HDTV offering with a few good channels, not the Poodle Channel and 99 others).
Anyway, IPTV (HD or otherwise) is hot, witness the bidding war for Tandberg Television between Ericsson and Arris Group of the US.