@FierceTelecom RT @TNconnection - FairPoint (Other OTC: FRCMQ.PK) executives can now breathe a sigh of relief as Vermont regulators finally approved its restructuring plan last week. Vermont was the lone holdout in its New England region, while Maine and New Hampshire utility commissions previously approved the plan. Story | Follow @FierceTelecom
> Japan's main wireline incumbent service provider NTT (NYSE: NTT) plans to give wholesale customers a 40 percent discount on buying its fiber-based broadband services. According to a Telecompaper report, NTT East will announce the new prices sometime in April while NTT West is expected to announce similar changes later in the year. Story.
> It looks like China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) wants to keep VoIP competition at bay. The regulator ruled that any other VoIP service provided besides China Telecom's and China Unicom are now illegal. Story.
> Confident that much of the global economic downturn is behind us, core routing vendors Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) and Juniper Networks (NYSE: JNPR) believe a host of new products will facilitate a much-needed boost for what had been a slumping market segment. Story.
> The year 2010 was a busy one for PAETEC (Nasdaq: PAET). Not only did it purchase the former privately-owned Cavalier Telephone, which expanded its fiber and service footprint, but it also just completed its purchase of FTS RevChain Solutions, a new division of PAETEC Software Corp. Story.
> Broadcom (Nasdaq: BRCM) has added another piece to its broadband home networking puzzle by completing its $75 million acquisition of Gigle Networks, a developer of powerline systems-on-a-chip (SoC) solutions. Story.
> Frontier (NYSE: FTR) continues to strike back at copper theft, an issue that's continued to rise after it completed its acquisition of Verizon's rural lines in 14 states. The ILEC has implemented a toll-free hotline that customers are using to report any copper theft they see in their respective neighborhoods. Story.
And finally ... Lew Tucker, Cisco's (Nasdaq: CSCO) new vice-president and chief technical officer for cloud computing systems, is helping to shape the router giant's move into the potentially lucrative cloud services space. Story.