Alcatel-Lucent has expanded its portfolio of broadband access products with the FX-12, a fiber-based platform for cable operators that can deliver up to 10 Gbps.

The FX-12, now part the vendor’s 7360 ISAM FX product family, targets high-capacity, large-scale broadband deployments for residential and business-class services, the company said.

FX-12 is a 19 inch-wide high-capacity shelf with 12 line card slots that’s optimized for EPON (both 10G and 1G) in cable networks, and supports DOCSIS provisioning of EPON. DPoE is a CableLabs interop spec that enables MSOs to extend their DOCSIS-style provisioning and other backoffice systems to EPON-based networks.

 “Alcatel-Lucent sees a growing opportunity to address the needs of cable MSOs as they move to embrace fiber-based ultra-broadband access, IP and cloud networking technologies,  Federico Guillén, president of Alcatel-Lucent’s Fixed Access Business Line, said in a statement.

The day after confirming that M&A talks were underway, Nokia said Wednesday that it has struck a deal to acquire Alcatel-Lucent in a stock deal valued at €15.6 billion (US$16.6 billion), an agreement that should put the companied company on squarer competitive footing against Ericsson and Chinese telecom giant Huawei.

The boards of both sides have approved the terms of the proposed deal, which they expect to close by the first half of 2016. Under those terms, Alcatel-Lucent shareholders will own 33.5% of the fully diluted share capital of the combined company, with Nokia shareholders owning 66.5%.

The combined company will be called Nokia Corporation and be headquartered in Finland, while maintaining a large presence in France. Risto Siilasmaa is planned to serve as chairman, and Rajeev Suri as CEO.

The aim is to generate a complementary portfolio of fixed and mobile broadband gear, IP routing and core networks products and cloud applications and services, and to target a wide geography with “particular strength” in the U.S., China, Europe and Asia-Pacific.

They expect the combined company, which will  have about 114,000 employees, to generate operating cost synergies of about €900 million (US$953 million) annually by 2019. They anticipate combined net sales of €25.9 billion (US$27.4 billion)

The companies talked up the innovation-facing components of the deal, claiming they’ll be able to take combined advantage of Alcatel-Lucent's Bell Labs and Nokia's FutureWorks, as well as Nokia Technologies, which will stay as a separate entity focused on licensing and the incubation of new technologies. 

“We have hugely complementary technologies and the comprehensive portfolio necessary to enable the internet of things and transition to the cloud,” Suri said, in a statement. “Together, we expect to have the scale to lead in every area in which we choose to compete, drive profitable growth, meet the needs of global customers, develop new technologies, build on our successful intellectual property licensing, and create value for our shareholders.

“The global scale and footprint of the new company will reinforce its presence in the United States and China,” added Alcatel-Lucent CEO Michel Combes.

Analysts said there are pros and cons to the proposed marriage.

“When you consider the strengths and weaknesses of Alcatel-Lucent and Nokia and their product portfolios, a merger of the two businesses seems logical,” Ovum said in a statement issued Tuesday about the prospect of a Nokia/Alcatel-Lucent combo. “Nokia is a mobile-only equipment vendor, while Alcatel-Lucent’s strengths are in the fixed network business (especially core network and IP routing). It has long-struggled in the wireless business, and its attempts to become a leading player in LTE have failed. Alcatel-Lucent has also been active in SDN/NFV with CloudBand and Nuage and aggressive with small cells – areas where Nokia is perceived to be lagging behind competition.”

But Ovum said a merger is also rife with risks, as it could “plunge both businesses back into a period of introspection and restructuring” and create “significant duplication in areas such as mobile broadband and small cells.”

On the mobile end, the new company will have a global market share of 35%, behind market-leader Ericsson (40%), but ahead of Huawei's 20%, Reuters said, citing Bernstein Research. Ovum estimates that Nokia and Alcatel Lucent’s combined share of total LTE contracts was at 26% at the end of 2014, behind Huawei (36%) and Ericsson (33%).

J.P. Morgan served as financial advisor to Nokia and delivered a fairness opinion to the Board of Directors of Nokia in connection with the transaction. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and Roschier, Attorneys Ltd served as legal advisors. Zaoui & Co is acting as lead M&A advisor to Alcatel-Lucent and delivered a fairness opinion to the Board of Directors of Alcatel-Lucent in connection with the transaction. Sullivan & Cromwell LLP served as legal advisor.

The announcements are arriving at a fast and furious rate as the IBC show (September 11-16) gets underway in Amsterdam. Here’s a roundup of news snippets from the video and tech confab:

-You.i and Pace will show a new user interface that’s running on 4K-capable Media Servers and “IP Pucks” that are pre-integrated with Pace Elements middleware for both Reference Design Kit (RDK) and non-RDK deployments. You.i, by the way, is underpinning the interface for “shomi,” the new OTT subscription video offering from Canadian operators Rogers Communications and Shaw Communications.

-Off the floor, RDK LLC, the joint venture of Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Liberty Global, plans to host a private, closed door meeting with suppliers and operators on Sept. 16, according to people familiar with it. For an expanded look at the RDK’s global ambitions and a sampling of RDK demos that will be shown at IBC, please see this story (subscription required) from the Sept. 8 issue of Multichannel News.

-IBM’s Aspera division -- in tandem with broadcast production systems vendor EVS and multiscreen video specialist Elemental Technologies – has introduced a large-scale system for the delivery of live high-res video streaming from the proverbial cloud. The system is particularly tailored for the delivery of live sporting events, they said.

-Arris has introduced a suite of advanced compression products, including the HEVC-capable DSR-7400 Transcoder Integrated Receiver/Decoder; the SE-7400 HEVC UHD/4K Encoder (a single-channel HEVC/UHD encoder for live linear encoding up to 4Kp60; and the ME-7000 Converged Compression Platform (for multiscreen delivery of IPTV, cable and satellite applications).  

-Alcatel-Lucent has introduced virtualization features to its Velocix Content Delivery Network (CDN) platform that decouples the software that controls and routes traffic on a network from the physical infrastructure that provides compute and storage resources. That combo reduces the time required to install or expand the CDN, the company said, noting that the product set joins the company’s network functions virtualization (NFV) portfolio announced earlier this year.

-Ooyala, the online video publisher being acquired by Australian telco Telstra, said it has won a deal to support Sky Sports’ free VOD content slate offered on its website, including analytics that tell Sky now users are engaging with that content and discovery features that help visitors find content. Ooyala also announced that it is powering premium content for Presto on Google Chromecast  devices. Presto is a premium movie streaming service based in Australia.

Please check back for additional items and updates throughout the day.

Demonstrating fiber-like speeds without the need to pull glass all the way to the home, Alcatel-Lucent said its Bell Labs research unit has eclipsed speeds of 10 Gbps over copper using a prototype technology called XG-FAST.

The technology that was tested is years away from becoming a commercial reality, but Alcatel-Lucent said the test demonstrates that DSL has the technical capability to deliver fiber-like speeds, and to deliver them to areas where fiber can’t be deployed all the way to the premises.

“It will enable operators to provide Internet connection speeds that are indistinguishable from fiber-to-the-home services, a major business benefit in locations where it is not physically, economically or aesthetically viable to lay new fiber cables all the way into residences,” the vendor claimed.

Instead, XG-FAST, an extension of the G.fast standard that’s currently being finalized by the International Telecommunications Union and expected to be commercially available sometime next year, could enable operators to pull fiber to the curb, wall or basement or a building, and use the existing copper network for the “final few meters,” Alcatel-Lucent said.

While the “phase 1” version of G.fast will use a frequency range for data transmission of 106 MHz, enabling speeds up to 700 Mbps over a maximum distance of 100 meters, XG-FAST is being designed to bump the frequency range up to 500 MHz while also increasing speeds over shorter distances.

For the demo, which was run on “standard copper cable” provided by an unnamed European operator, Bell Labs said it achieved symmetrical speeds of 1 Gbps symmetrical over 70 meters on a single copper pair, and hit 10 Gbps over 30 meters by bonding two copper pairs.

“[B]y pushing broadband technology to its limits, operators can determine how they could deliver gigabit services over their existing networks, ensuring the availability of ultra-broadband access as widely and as economically as possible,” said Bell Labs president Marcus Weldon, in a statement.

Alcatel-Lucent isn’t offering an precise predictions on when XG-FAST would become a commercial reality, but a spokesman acknowledged that it would “probably be a minimum of 3 years,” factoring in issues such as required cost reductions and the standardization process.

The cable industry is further ahead with DOCSIS 3.1, an emerging CableLabs specification that will enable download capacities of up to 10 Gbps down and at least 1 Gbps upstream over an MSO’s hybrid fiber/coax network.

Estimates vary, but DOCSIS 3.1 isn’t expected to reach scale deployments until 2016 or 2017.

Alcatel-Lucent is the latest to join a growing group of vendors that have achieved CableLabs qualification for EPON network equipment that uses DOCSIS-style provisioning.

According to the results of test wave 106, Alcatel-Lucent achieved qualification for DOCSIS Provisioning of EPON 1.0 for the 7360 ISAM platform, which can support either EPON or GPON. The supplier's MSO-focused EPON product family comes in three different shelf sizes, supporting four, eight or 16 slots.  

Qualification means Alcatel-Lucent’s product is interoperable with other equipment that has gained DPoE 1.0 status from CableLabs.

These cable-tailored EPON systems are made up of the DPoE System, which includes the product Alcatel-Lucent received qualification on, and the DPoE Optical Network Unit. In deployment scenarios, the DPoE System is analogous to the cable modem termination system (CMTS) in the DOCSIS world, while the Optical Network Unit (ONU) behaves as the modem at the customer premises.

CableLabs has awarded similar stamps to Aurora Networks, CommScope, Huawei, Sumitomo Electric, and ZTE for their respective DPoE systems. CableLabs has also qualified DPoE ONUs from Aurora Networks, CTDI, Finisar, Huawei and Sumitomo.

They are entering the fray as U.S. cable operators such as Bright House Networks and Time Warner Cable gravitate to EPON to deliver services over fiber to mid-sized and larger business customers. Bright House is also using EPON for some targeted, new residential environments.

DPoE allows MSOs to offer EPON using the auto-provisioning and backoffice management systems they have in place for DOCSIS modems. The 2.0 version of the specs add more depth and breadth by latching on elements such as IPv6 and more advanced Metro Ethernet Forum services.

But EPON isn’t CableLabs’ only focus.

CableLabs has also sparked an effort that seeks to bring unity to the PON standards governed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). That CableLabs effort, called “OnePON,” aims to bridge some of the technical differences separating EPON and GPON as the standards bodies move ahead on new generations of those platforms.

The idea for OnePON was spawned after it became increasingly clear that EPON and GPON are naturally coming together through the common use of Ethernet transport, Curtis Knittle, director of optical technologies at CableLabs, said.

“At some point, we can come together and have a single solution; there’s tremendous benefit for service providers and vendors,” Curtis Knittle, director of optical technologies at CableLabs said, in a recent interview, noting that he sees the cable R&D org playing the role of facilitator.

See this CableLabs blog post or this story (subscription required) for more detail on the OnePON initiative.