Quick Hits
By Staff -- Multichannel News, 10/22/2006 8:00:00 PM
Level 3 to Buy Broadwing for $1.4B
Broomfield, Colo. — Internet-backbone provider Level 3 Communications announced plans to acquire Broadwing, an optical-networking-services provider, in a deal worth about $1.4 billion.
Austin, Texas-based Broadwing owns a 19,000-mile intercity fiber-optic network, over which it provides data, voice and media services to businesses and service providers. Level 3 owns approximately 23,000 miles of fiber-optic network around the world and offers Internet-protocol-networking services, colocation services and managed-modem and voice services.
Canada’s SaskTel Launches HD IPTV
Regina, Saskatchewan — SaskTel, a telecommunications company that provides service to the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, this month began offering the first high-definition television services over an Internet-protocol network in North America.
The company, owned by the government of Saskatchewan, is delivering the HD IPTV services using Alcatel’s IPTV middleware and Motorola’s VIP1200 HD/H.264 set-top box. The service, called Max HD Ultimate, includes 27 HD channels and will include HD movies from NBC Universal, Paramount, Sony Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox and Warner Bros. As of Oct. 16, new customers can sign up for Max HD Ultimate for $59 per month (Canadian) for four months.
UpdateLogic Signs CableLabs Pact
Southborough, Mass. — UpdateLogic, a developer of services that automatically update consumer electronics devices, said it will make its UpdateTV service compatible with CableLabs specifications.
UpdateTV distributes patches directly to televisions and other devices, requiring no intervention from a consumer.
The software updates are broadcast as data within PBS channels in the U.S. Under the agreement with CableLabs, the Southborough, Mass.-based company will make the service compatible with CableLabs’ OpenCable Common Download specification.
UpdateLogic also plans to conform to the Advanced Television Systems Committee’s A/97 Software Data Download Standard. UpdateLogic expects the UpdateTV service to be commercially available next year.
Conexant Powers Chinese Set-Tops
Newport Beach, Calif. — Huawei Technologies, a Chinese networking-equipment vendor, picked Conexant Systems’ CX2415X audio/video broadcast-decoder chip for its InfoLink C2510 set-top boxes.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Huawei said the InfoLink C2510 receivers will be deployed in several provinces in the People’s Republic of China, including Guangdong, Zhejiang and Guizhou.
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