[Satellite TODAY 09-01-10] France Telecom has partnered with Newtec to expand Orange’s IP-over-satellite broadband services in Africa to sub-Saharan countries, Newtec announced Aug. 31.
Orange has initiated a program of infrastructure upgrades to improve quality of service and provide greater bandwidth to customers, installing Newtec Elevation EL470 and EL478 modems and migrating from DVB-S to DVB-S2, which aims to reduce capital and operational costs while increasing bandwidth efficiency. Orange also is implementing Newtec’s DVB-S2 FlexACM technology, allowing Orange to maximize the throughput of the existing satellite link at any time.
    “With this new infrastructure implementation, Orange can continue to increase the quality of service and extend the footprint of our operations in the region. Newtec’s Elevation and FlexACM provide a highly efficient and robust platform from which we can deliver state-of-the-art Internet access to our customers in Africa,” Orange Vice President of Network Architecture and Design Alain Maloberti said in a statement.
    “This selection by Orange is a clear proof that our Elevation FlexACM technology is really providing the best solution on the market enabling our customers to optimise bandwidth usage and enabling them to provide a 100 percent link availability,” Serge Van Herck, Newtec CEO, told Satellite TODAY. Van Herck thinks Newtec can gain even more traction in the telco market. “The telco market is an important growth market for Newtec as we have developed several technologies that perfectly fit the requirements of this market. Elevation FlexACM is a perfect solution for the IP trunking market while our Sat3Play solution is a perfect solution for helping to close the digital divide for consumers. In cooperation with SES Astra we have shipped over 80,000 Sat3Play consumer terminals to various ISPs and telcos in Europe over the past two years. Telcos around the world like Deutsche Telekom, TP (Poland), Belgacom, BT, Embratel and many others are relying on Newtec technologies for their critical satellite transmissions,” he said.
    For Newtec, the partnership with France Telecom follows another technology deal in the Africa and Middle East region. On Aug. 30, Iraqi satellite broadcaster Alsumaria announced it would continue its migration toward tapeless news production by using Newtec’s DualFlow and FlexACM technologie. Alsumaria’s fleet can now deliver live transmission of MPEG4 over IP, with the dual capability of switching to ASI when required. Alsumaria staff can also achieve file transfers and downloads between the DSNG units and the production center, increasing speed of response to unfolding events.

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