Light Reading Announces Its 2009 Top Picks

Light Reading (http://www.lightreading.com/), the leading integrated media company serving the worldwide communications industry, today reveals its Top Picks for communications technologies, services, and products. Light Reading's editors, after weeks of discussions with readers, analysts, and industry sources, have each come up with their picks of communications products and services from all over the world that could potentially shake up the industry.

  Light Reading's Top Picks in each category are as follows:

  Business Services (fixed or wireless)
  --  Verizon Communications Inc.'s Computing as a Service (CaaS)
  --  Comcast Corp.'s 100-Mbit/s Business Internet Service Bundle
  --  Telx Group Inc.'s Telx Video Exchange

  --  Equinix Inc.'s Carrier Ethernet Exchange

  Consumer Services (fixed or wireless)
  --  Sezmi Corp.'s Sezmi TV
  --  FLO TV Inc.'s Personal TV Service
  --  Safaricom Ltd.'s M-PESA International Money Transfer (IMT)

  --  E-Plus Mobilfunk GmbH's Gettings Mobile Ad Service

  Carrier Transport (optical networking, Ethernet, packet optical)
  --  Cyan Optics Inc.'s Z77 and Z33 multilayer cross-connects
  --  Intune Networks' Optical Burst Switching Technology

  --  Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.'s OSN8800 Version II

  Fixed Access (DSL, GPON, WDM-PON, and beyond)
  --  2Wire Inc.'s HomePortal GEM
  --  Iskratel's Gemini40F

  --  Oki Electric Industry Co. Ltd.'s 160-Gbit/s Asymmetric PON System

  IP Applications (VoIP, IMS)
  --  Cedar Point Communications Inc.'s SafariFusion
  --  XConnect Global Networks Ltd.'s Carrier ENUM Registry

  --  NTT DoCoMo Inc.'s IMS Apps

  Switching and Routing (IP/MPLS, Deep Packet Inspection)
  --  Arista Networks Inc.'s 7100 Series
  --  Alcatel-Lucent's 100-Gbit/s cards (7750 Service Router & 7450 Ethernet
      Service Switch)

  --  Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.'s NE40E Universal Service Router

  Telecom Software (OSS, BSS, SDPs, policy control)
  --  AppTrigger Inc.'s Ignite Service Broker
  --  iSMART Consortium's iSMART DSL L3

  --  Subex Ltd.'s Rocware 2.0

  Video Infrastructure (cable tech, IPTV)
  --  BigBand Networks Inc.'s Converged Video Exchange (CVEx)
  --  Wyplay's Wyplay Modular Solutions (WMS)

  --  Aksh Optifibre's iControl

  Wireless Infrastructure (access, backhaul, towers, radios, etc.)
  --  AT&T Inc.'s 3G MicroCell (Cisco-branded)
  --  Ericsson AB's RBS 6000 Software Basestation

  --  Vihaan Networks Ltd. (VNL)'s WorldGSM Solar-powered Basestation

"Congratulations to all the companies and individuals who helped us vet dozens of products and services to arrive at this year's Top Picks," says Phil Harvey, Light Reading's Editor-in-Chief. "I'm really proud that this unique industry recognition program garnered so much attention in its first year and I'm confident that each one of these Top Picks embodies a trend that points to where this industry is headed."

For all the areas except Services, Light Reading's editors chose one Top Pick per category from each of three regions: the Americas; Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA); and Asia/Pacific. For the Business Services and Consumer Services areas, the editor's selected several Top Picks in each category, and geography was not a consideration.

To see the discussions and nominations in each category leading up to our final selections, visit the Top Picks page on Light Reading at: http://www.lightreading.com/top-picks.

About Light Reading

Founded in 2000, Light Reading (www.lightreading.com) is the leading online media, research, and focused event company serving the $3 trillion worldwide communications market. Lightreading.com is the ultimate source for technology and financial analysis of the communications industry, leading the media sector in terms of traffic, content, and reputation. Light Reading's research arms, Heavy Reading and Pyramid Research, provide the most comprehensive communications research, market data, and technology analysis in close to 100 markets around the world. Light Reading produces nearly 20 targeted communications events including TelcoTV, Ethernet Expo New York and Ethernet Expo London, The Tower Summit @ CTIA, and Optical Expo, as well as focused one-day events tailored for cable, mobile, and wireline executives. Light Reading was acquired by United Business Media in August 2005 and operates as a unit of TechWeb.

About TechWeb

TechWeb (http://techweb.com/aboutus), the global leader in business technology media, is an innovative business focused on serving the needs of technology decision-makers and marketers worldwide. TechWeb produces the most respected and consumed media brands in the business technology market. Today, more than 13.3 million* business technology professionals actively engage in our communities created around our global face-to-face events, Interop, Web 2.0, Black Hat, and VoiceCon; online resources such as the TechWeb Network, Light Reading, Intelligent Enterprise, InformationWeek.com, bMighty.com, and The Financial Technology Network; and the market leading, award-winning InformationWeek, TechNet Magazine, MSDN Magazine, and Wall Street & Technology magazines. TechWeb also provides end-to-end services including next-generation performance marketing, integrated media, research, and analyst services. TechWeb is a division of United Business Media, a global provider of news distribution and specialist information services with a market capitalization of more than $2.5 billion.

*13.3 million business decision-makers: based on number of monthly connections

About United Business Media

UBM (UBM.L) focuses on two principal activities: worldwide information distribution, targeting and monitoring; and, the development and monetisation of B2B communities and markets. UBM's businesses inform markets and serve professional commercial communities - from doctors to game developers, from journalists to jewelry traders, from farmers to pharmacists - with integrated events, online, print and business information products. Our 6,500 staff in more than 30 countries are organised into specialist teams that serve these communities, bringing buyers and sellers together, helping them to do business and their markets to work effectively and efficiently. For more information, go to http://www.unitedbusinessmedia.com/.

  Contact
  Amy Averbook
  TechWeb's Light Reading
  212 600 3373
  averbook@lightreading.com

First Call Analyst:
FCMN Contact:

SOURCE: Light Reading

CONTACT: Amy Averbook of TechWeb's Light Reading, +1-212-600-3373,
averbook@lightreading.com

Web Site: http://www.lightreading.com/