News in Brief: Orange, STMicro, GSA, Virgin Media

Orange has announced it will double the speed of its French HSDPA network from 7.2-Mbps to 14.4-Mbps, with work to commence in Paris this month.
 
Chipmaker STMicroelectronics narrowed its net loss to $70 million in Q4, from $366 million a year earlier. Revenue climbed 13% to $2.58 billion.
 
The EC has announced it will monitor the use of traffic monitoring software being used by Virgin Media to detect file-sharing in the UK, after complaints the software violates privacy.
 
To date, 2,137 different HSPA devices have been launched, with the growth rate of new products coming into the market rising to 67%, according to the GSA. 897 devices launched in 2009.
 
Nokia Siemens and LG Electronics have achieved an LTE downlink speed of 100 Mbps, the maximum speed for a Class 3 LTE terminal.
 
Alcatel-Lucent subsidiary LGS has been awarded a blanket purchase agreement to provide communications solutions to the US Army in Afghanistan.