April 21, 2005
Niklas Zennstrom's PowerPoint from VON Canada 2005
Posted by anna at 05:13 PM | Comments (2)
Open Source a Driving Force for VoIP?
Internetnews.com, April 21, 2005
Posted by anna at 04:57 PM | Comments (2)
April 20, 2005
MetaSwitch unveils expansion plans for Canada
Posted by anna at 09:20 PM | Comments (4)
Internet telephony has its 'ipod'
Posted by anna at 10:41 AM | Comments (4)
As VoIP comes of age, Vonage sets up a call centre in Canada
The Globe and Mail, April 20, 2005
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MetaSwitch Establishes Canadian Presence and Immediate Market Leadership with 6 Customer Wins
Proven Softswitch Solution Rapidly Adopted by 15% of Canadian Independent Telcos
TORONTO, Ontario – April 20, 2005. MetaSwitch, the industry-leading vendor of carrier-class softswitch solutions, today announced at VON Canada that it has expanded its business focus into Canada, building on its market leadership position in the United States. Since the start of the year, MetaSwitch has already signed up 6 independent telephone companies – 15% of the 40 registered by the Canadian telecommunications regulator (CRTC) – with more expected over the coming months.
With full support for legacy Canadian telecom standards and next generation protocols, MetaSwitch’s Class 5 Softswitch solution is particularly suited to all Canadian service providers looking to introduce VoIP services, or migrate from legacy TDM-based networks. Those who have already selected MetaSwitch include Execulink and Nexicom, both based in Ontario. In addition, four other independent telephone companies in the same province have also signed contracts with installations due in the coming weeks.
“We are excited to be leading the wave of telephone companies moving to a next generation network,” said Ian Stevens, COO of Execulink and President of the Canadian Independent Telephone Association (CITA). “MetaSwitch was the clear choice for us, based on their ability to deliver the reliability and legacy features we required, while offering new, packet-based services to our subscribers that are essential to compete in today's telecommunications environment.”
John Downs, General Manager of Nexicom, stated that “MetaSwitch’s breadth of support for TDM and VoIP services is unique in the softswitch industry. It is allowing Nexicom to add web-based services to our existing analogue telephone users while providing a powerful platform to launch VoIP Telephony services to our DSL and Cable customers.”
“MetaSwitch has built a solid track record for Class 5 replacement in the U.S. independent operator market, and they have quickly established a leadership position in Canada,” said Jon Arnold, Principal of Toronto-based J Arnold Associates. “These operators understand the potential of IP, and recognize that Class 5 replacement is the best strategy to deliver new services and maintain growth in an increasingly competitive market.”
As part of its expansion strategy, MetaSwitch has appointed industry veteran Stephen Barnes as Regional Director heading up the Canadian Sales team. Stephen brings a wealth of experience to the MetaSwitch team from his previous roles with Santera Systems / Tekelec and Lucent Technologies.
“We are pleased with our recent success in Canada and committed to that market as part of our North American focus and growth strategy,” said Mike Ward, MetaSwitch Senior Vice President of Sales. “As our immediate success demonstrates, there is strong demand among Canadian telcos for a full-featured, next-generation switching solution that was previously not being met.”
About MetaSwitch
MetaSwitch is the industry’s leading vendor of packet-based Class 5 softswitch and enhanced applications solutions. Its widely deployed call agent, media/signaling gateway and application server platform supports over 100 Class 5 features including CLASS services, IP Centrex, Unified Messaging, E911, LNP, 1-800 and CALEA, and scales from a few hundred to half a million subscribers in both integrated and distributed configurations. Customers include incumbent and competitive local exchange carriers, as well as operators of broadband wireless, cable and fiber networks.
MetaSwitch is a division of established telecom technology provider Data Connection (DCL). The company is consistently profitable and privately held, with US locations in California, Virginia, Texas and Florida, and European headquarters in London, UK.
Contact:
Carol Daniels
510 748 8230
chd@metaswitch.com
Data Connection and MetaSwitch are trademarks of Data Connection Limited and Data Connection Corporation. Brands and products referenced herein are the trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Copyright © 2005 Data Connection Limited
Posted by anna at 06:09 AM | Comments (0)
April 19, 2005
Skype to hit mobile phones this year
Posted by anna at 09:32 PM | Comments (1)
Communications & Networking makes the circuit
IT Business Canada, April 19, 2005
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Skype reaches out to mobile users
IT Business Canada, April 19, 2005
Posted by anna at 08:52 PM | Comments (1)
Pulver to Canadian regulators: give VoIP time to evolve 9-1-1 solutions
Posted by anna at 08:14 PM | Comments (1)
Communications & Networking makes the circuit
Posted by anna at 01:18 PM | Comments (1)
Jeff Pulver VON Canada
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'Accidental' telephony guru started in ham radio; 'Fearless' Jeff Pulver
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VON Canada 2005
Wainhouse Research, April 19, 2005
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uReach Technologies and Brooktrout Showcase Video Messaging Solution at VON Canada
HOLMDEL New Jersey, and NEEDHAM, Mass., April 19, 2005—uReach Technologies, a leader in enhanced communications solutions to carriers, and Brooktrout Technology, a leading supplier of media processing and call control products, today announced the firms are jointly showcasing a new video messaging solution for use by wireless, wireline and cable carriers. The video messaging application, built on the uReach application platform and Brooktrout’s SnowShore IP Media Server™, demonstrates the true power of open standards, bringing together best-in-breed technology partners to deliver leading-edge IP-based video services. uReach and Brooktrout are showcasing the new video messaging solution in the uReach booth #101 at the VON Canada show in Toronto, Canada, April 19 – 21, 2005.
uReach has teamed up with Brooktrout to integrate the SnowShore IP Media Server as part of its enhanced messaging platform. With support for important standards such as SIP, VoiceXML and H.263 video compression and experience in real world video deployments, Brooktrout Technology’s SnowShore IP Media Server is an excellent choice for 3G wireless and broadband video messaging. uReach’s open, scalable architecture has been proven rock-solid in both laboratory and production environments at many of the world’s top carriers including Bell Canada, SaskTel, Verizon, Cox Communications, Telifonica, Entel Movil (TIM), and SunRocket. Backed by Brooktrout’s powerful media processing capabilities, uReach’s platform can deliver fully-featured video messaging from within a proven, extensible platform -- a platform from which they can deliver a variety of enhanced communications services such as PC-based voicemail screening, unified messaging, find me-follow me services, basic voice messaging, prepaid wireless and calling card, and more.
“We’re delighted to work with Brooktrout to demonstrate how easily carriers can expand their suite of advanced communications services with uReach’s platform,” said David Ittner, Chief Technology Officer of uReach. “As carriers grapple with the real pain of implementing next-generation IP-based services, we are well-positioned to help them take full advantage of these enhanced capabilities at the application level. Together with Brooktrout, uReach can harness their next-generation networks to deliver today’s most sought-after services while retaining the same reliability and extensibility that carriers have come to expect from their existing TDM networks.”
Brooktrout’s SnowShore IP Media Server is an open carrier-class media processing resource that can support a broad range of applications, from voice and video messaging and multiparty conferencing to prepaid services and network announcements. Because it is an open software architecture and utilizes industry-standard server platforms and standards-based IP protocols such as SIP and VoiceXML, the SnowShore IP Media Server can leverage the ongoing evolution of network architectures and processor technology to deliver a flexible media processing solution for next-generation IP applications.
Also at VON Canada, Brooktrout’s VP and CTO of Next Generation Communications, Eric Burger will present a session on “Media Servers” on April 21, from 3:30-4:45pm. For more information on VON Canada, visit www.voncanada.com
About uReach Technologies
uReach Technologies, Inc. is a leading provider of enhanced communications applications to wireless, wireline, and broadband carriers. Deploying services on open systems hardware via its carrier-class standards-based framework, uReach makes it possible for users to access and manage calls, messages, notifications, and personal information using a variety of popular access methods and devices. With the recent acquisition of Priority Call Management, uReach provides an expanded application suite for additional innovative services designed to enable application portability and convergence for any network and make it possible for service providers to offer customers a seamless migration to new features while maintaining familiar revenue-generating services. With solutions ranging from basic voice messaging to unified communications, prepaid wireless and calling card and beyond, uReach enables service providers to expand their customer bases while growing ARPU through complementary value-added services. uReach is a privately held company headquartered in Holmdel NJ with offices in Wilmington MA. For more information, visit www.uReachCorp.com.
About Brooktrout Technology
Brooktrout Technology is a leading supplier of media processing, network interface, call control and signal processing products that enable the development of applications, systems and services for both the New Network™ (packet-based) and the traditional telephone (TDM) network. The company’s strategy is to partner with our customers and collaborate closely with them to help accelerate their delivery of new applications and services, increase their existing business, and expand into new markets. For more information, visit http://www.brooktrout.com. Brooktrout Technology is a subsidiary of Brooktrout, Inc. (NASDAQ: BRKT).
# # #
Brooktrout, Brooktrout Technology, New Network, and SnowShore Media Server are trademarks or registered trademarks of Brooktrout, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
Contact:
For Brooktrout:
Michelle Liro
Brooktrout Technology
mliro@brooktrout.com
781-433-9525
For uReach Technologies:
Marguerite J Moore
uReach Technologies
mmoore@ureach.com
978-694-2551
Mary Kae Marinac
MKM Corporate Communications
mkmarinac@comcast.net
978-685-3136
Posted by anna at 09:58 AM | Comments (1)
SaskTel Deploys uReach Technologies’ Platform for Next-Generation Messaging
uReach’s Open, Extensible Solution Helps Carrier Lay Foundation for Expanded Services across VoIP, Wireless, Wireline Offerings
Holmdel, NJ (April 19, 2005) – uReach Technologies, a leading provider of enhanced communications solutions to carriers, today announced that SaskTel, the leading full service communications company in Saskatchewan, is deploying uReach’s enhanced messaging platform as the cornerstone of a new messaging architecture. Using uReach’s open, extensible platform, SaskTel can fully leverage its existing TDM network and sizable hardware investment, while laying the foundation to remain out in front of its competition with the most in-demand messaging services across IP networks as well as its existing base.
The deployment will offer the foundation for voicemail offerings to SaskTel’s wireline and wireless customers, and, by later this year, will support expanded messaging offerings for IP customers as well as wireless/wireline convergent customers. uReach Technologies will showcase its communications solution at today’s Voice on the Net (VON) Canada 2005 show at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, booth 101.
Like most carriers, SaskTel has a massive investment in existing hardware and network assets that deliver multiple revenues streams across a fiber-optic, fully-digital network. SaskTel’s network supports a sizable high-speed Internet business with Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) service available to over 75 percent of Saskatchewan’s population. It supports the most extensive analog and digital wireless service in the Province and offers security alarm and other related monitoring services. By 2004, however, SaskTel needed a growth path from its legacy voice messaging application to a platform with expanded messaging features and support for IP that its present messaging infrastructure did not offer. The carrier looked to uReach to allow it to offer the next generation of messaging services.
The uReach platform is an open, scalable architecture that supports next-generation messaging and enhancing calling capabilities. It is proven to operate in both TDM and IP environments simultaneously, providing SaskTel with the flexibility to add advanced services while leveraging existing hardware and network assets. SaskTel completed rigorous trials and interoperability testing with uReach’s platform prior to deployment - trials that demonstrated uReach’s rock-solid performance as well as its support for the ready addition of expanded communications features. Using uReach’s platform, residential and business customers of SaskTel can get a full suite of features for accessing and managing calls, messages and personal information, with the promise of new media support and added notification options to personalize subscriber services. SaskTel can “future-proof” its networks, and assure their business can evolve as market demands change and grow.
Extensibility for The Next Generation of Services
“uReach made it very easy to transition from our existing voicemail application to a rich, extensible platform that could let us offer new features and capabilities we never could have considered in our old environment,” said Diana Milenkovic, senior vice president, Marketing and Mobility, at SaskTel. “We chose uReach’s platform as the foundation of our new messaging architecture so we have the flexibility to keep the best of what we own today, and evolve our services and revenues with IP support and added best-in-class messaging services across a diverse and growing network base.”
"We are delighted to be chosen to power SaskTel’s messaging architecture of the future,” said Krishnamurty Kambhampati, CEO and co-founder of uReach Technologies. “Our platform offers an extremely robust set of building-blocks that have taken into account legacy investments and yet support the launch of converged services that require the flexibility to adapt to evolving networks and devices.”
About uReach Technologies
uReach Technologies, Inc. is a leading provider of enhanced communications applications to wireless, wireline, and broadband carriers. Deploying services on open systems hardware via its carrier-class standards-based framework, uReach makes it possible for users to access and manage calls, messages, notifications, and personal information using a variety of popular payments, access methods and devices. uReach provides an expanded application suite for additional innovative services designed to enable application portability and convergence for any network and make it possible for service providers to offer customers a seamless migration to new features while maintaining familiar revenue-generating services. With solutions ranging from basic voice messaging to unified communications, prepaid wireless and calling card and beyond, uReach enables service providers to expand their customer bases while growing ARPU through complementary value-added services. uReach is a privately held company headquartered in Holmdel NJ with offices in Wilmington, MA. For more information, visit www.uReachCorp.com.
About SaskTel
SaskTel is the leading full service communications company in Saskatchewan, offering complete wireline, wireless, Internet and e-business solutions over a state-of-the-art, digital network. SaskTel maintains investments in companies that provide a variety of products and services. Visit SaskTel at www.sasktel.com.
Contact for Press:
Margie Moore, uReach Technologies; Tel: +1 978-694-2551, mmoore@ureach.com
Mary Kae Marinac, MKM Corporate Communications, +1 978-685-3136, mkmarinac@comcast.net
Posted by anna at 09:50 AM | Comments (0)
TalkSwitch® IP/PBX Phone Systems Deliver the Best of Both Worlds to Customers
TalkSwitch customers can benefit from using both Voice over IP and traditional telephone connections
VON Canada – April 19, 2005 – Centrepoint Technologies, a leading designer and manufacturer of innovative telephone systems for small and multi-location businesses, today confirmed its commitment to meeting its customers needs through the development of the TalkSwitch® telephone system which offers both Voice over IP and traditional telephone connections.
Centrepoint’s TalkSwitch is available in configurations as small as 2 incoming lines with 4 extensions, up to systems that include 16 incoming lines, 16 VoIP trunks, 32 local and 32 remote extensions. Up to four TalkSwitch units can be networked together at a location ensuring the system is able to grow with a customers business.
“Customers care about having reliable telephone service and features that enhance their business,” said Jan Scheeren, President and CEO, Centrepoint Technologies. “As long as it meets those needs, it doesn’t matter whether that service is delivered over IP or the traditional telephone network. Both networks have unique strengths and asking customers to choose between the two is unnecessarily constraining.”
By using TalkSwitch, small and multi-locations businesses can for the first time, realistically take advantage of the benefits of VoIP telephony. Many of those businesses though are reluctant to completely give up their published telephone numbers and lines. They understand that they can save money and access advanced network services using VoIP, but they like the reliability they have from their public switched telephone network (PSTN) lines.
With a VoIP-equipped TalkSwitch system, customers don’t have to choose. They can experience VoIP for themselves while at the same time retaining at least one of their traditional connections to the PSTN.
“Telephone service is evolutionary,” said Scheeren. “The move to VoIP isn’t going to happen over night, it’s a progression. People still need the PSTN. There are a host of issues including the ability to access emergency services like 911, availability when there is a power failure, quality of service and universal connectivity that today can only be effectively addressed by the traditional telephone network. TalkSwitch users get a fully featured telephone system that improves the way they do business, but also positions them to take advantage of next generation services like VoIP.”
TalkSwitch is the ideal telephone solution for small, multi-location and home-based businesses with up to 32 phone users per location. The VoIP-equipped TalkSwitch 48-CVA sells for $1795 US, and is available from Centrepoint Authorized Resellers or online at www.talkswitch.com TalkSwitch systems without VoIP start as low as $695.
Centrepoint’s Vice President of Sales, Tim Welch, will be taking part in a panel discussion entitled “VoIP Solutions for Small and Medium Businesses” to be held at VON Canada on Tuesday April 19th at 3:15 pm. The company is exhibiting and demonstrating the TalkSwitch system in booth 208.
About Centrepoint
Centrepoint Technologies has set the standard for innovative telephone systems that provide small and multi-location businesses with affordable, yet powerful communications solutions. Designed to be installed and configured by the end user, the TalkSwitch is a hybrid PSTN/VoIP PBX that gives customers unparalleled flexibility and value. Built on a SIP-based architecture and uniquely scalable, the TalkSwitch is a good investment both today and tomorrow. Established in 1990, Centrepoint is focused on the global telecommunications market, and is headquartered in Ottawa, Canada. For more information call (888) 332-9322 or visit the Centrepoint website at www.talkswitch.com.
For more information, please contact:
Chris Brennan
Public Relations Manager,
Centrepoint Technologies
613.725.2980 x 136
888.332.9322 x 136
cbrennan@talkswitch.com
Posted by anna at 09:45 AM | Comments (1)
April 18, 2005
SaskTel to deploy uReach's platform for next-generation messaging
Posted by anna at 08:34 PM | Comments (0)
IP Unity Unveils BCS Case Study
Executive Summary
BCS Global is leveraging its unique lead in Hosted IP Video service delivery into a compelling portfolio of wholesale IP Communication Services. Together with IP Unity, this North American service provider is preparing to deliver a value proposition and expertise unlike any other, to carriers, ISPs and integrators worldwide.
Background
In 2000, BCS Global started operations as a next generation service provider with a decidedly different focus than any other ‘next-gen’ in North America: the delivery of a real-time video application over IP networks to enterprises and the carriers who serve them. At the time, this was a radical notion. Today, it is clear that the company demonstrated great foresight.
Since then, BCS Global has served carriers, marketing companies and audio/visual integrators with a unique hosted Virtual Presence‘ service for simple-to-use, maintenance free, flat rate, real-time videoconferencing and collaboration service, thereby building a loyal subscriber base of small and medium-sized enterprise users. BCS Global has also built a well-respected team of expert provisioning and management technicians who design, activate, monitor and support its IP services from its Network Operations Center in Toronto. Its five years of very successful operation -- no small feat during the telecom meltdown -- enabled the company to vault into new services and geographic expansion during 2004 – 2005.
In mid-2004, BCS Global expanded its portfolio through the acquisition of IPConvergence, a wholesale hosted Voice over IP company with the same wholesale approach and business model as BCS Global. President and CEO Piero Romani launched BCSTone managed VoIP services, thus expanding offerings into a growing service suite. While VoIP is often the first service that IP-centric providers offer to the market, this set of services gave BCS Global the opportunity to bundle both voice and video in a carrier-by-carrier customized fashion. Hosted VoIP also demonstrated BCS Global’s ability to quickly add new feature sets, scale to meet rapidly growing demand, and integrate voice into the provisioning, support and billing paradigm it had built for its Virtual Presence‘ service.
Shifting the Paradigm
Fast-forward to the first quarter of 2005: BCS Global is again moving ahead of the crowd, taking the next step into a full-featured and customizable multimedia messaging, video streaming, and conferencing portfolio. Company leadership envisions a strategic capability for all messaging, collaboration to be provisioned via one unified IP infrastructure. For this, BCS Global requires a modular, highly scalable and carrier-class applications platform, already field-proven through many large and successful carrier deployments and seamlessly integrated with the Cisco BTS10200 softswitch core. BCS Global also undertakes new market expansion by launching offices and network facilities in the United Kingdom.
To power its newest service expansion, BCS Global has turned to IP Unity, a leader in carrier–grade media servers, application servers and real-time multimedia applications over IP and TDM networks. IP Unity’s HMS6000‘ platform has proven to be the only enhanced services system to scale to over 30,000 ports, works seamlessly with Cisco’s IP telephony architecture, provides rapid payback through the delivery of many messaging, conferencing and communications features over one platform, and offers a future path to many innovative business applications over any transport network a carrier prospect operates or needs to traverse.
“We are continually enhancing and advancing our feature sets, our flexibility in bundling and customization, and our in-house knowledge base in customer applications,” states BCS Global Chief Technology Officer Dan Tanel. “IP Unity has been a great partner in all respects. Its platform enables us to add and innovate within the messaging and auto attendant features. We can mix and match, customize and partition services from one unified platform. And the team has been extraordinarily supportive in terms of knowledge transfer in its applications. We are ramping very fast in our own expertise for these new services, and this is essential to our value in the marketplace.”
Making the Case for New Services
BCS Global set specific performance hurdles for its newest services and its unified service architecture, to meet and beat the expectations of both carrier and integrator clients. Since BCS Global’s model is wholesale in nature, its customer base is savvy carriers and integrators whose core business is communications, with very low tolerance exists for learning on the job, do-overs or missed expectations in new service delivery.
BCS Global requirements include
- Streamlined service activation process;
- Highly modular first cost, low incremental cost to scale and very rapid payback (less than nine months) on IP service delivery infrastructure;
- Easy integration of new services into the BCS Global technical support model;
- Feature transparency across any geographic market (viable for any language, any end-user interface, any branding, any end device); and
- Ownership of vendor-partners in addressing unforeseen technical challenges and issues.
IP Unity ensured that each of these performance parameters was met as the HMS6000 was deployed, because the media server/application server platform was designed to deliver
- Service activation within hours,
- Payback between three and seven months,
- A single unified OSS, NMS and OAM&P for all services,
- Multi-language support and network agnostic operation,
- Device/display adaptability and user-interface transparency, and
- Continuous in-field and remote technical support as well as tight engineering coordination with Cisco technical support.
Drilling Down into the Solution
At a granular level within the BCS Global infrastructure, IP Unity’s system works with the Cisco BTS 10200 softswitch to direct incoming calls and broker connections for messaging, auto attendant or other feature functions within the IP Unity application server and media server. The media server also works with the Cisco media gateway to exchange TDM and IP signals to and from traditional circuit-switched networks.
The media server retrieves voicemails, announcements, and other content from a Network File Store, while the application server authorizes the media server to play announcements or message content for approved users. As needed, the media server also transcodes stored data into audible form or wav files before the announcement or message is played or forwarded, to a multitude of devices.
Instructions between these network elements are passed via the open SIP protocol. The IP Unity HMS6000 platform is fully SIP compliant, easing its interoperability with virtually any new network element and facilitating BGS Global’s processing of virtually any message or media type, over any network type.
BCS Global plans to add a session border controller and SIP feature server to enhance its infrastructure and communicate with the IP Unity messaging platform.
Value to the Enterprise
One of BCS Global’s most successful enterprise end-users has been the Norshield Financial Group, a well-established national financial services, funds management and advisory services firm with nearly $1 billion in assets under management.
Norshield had been a satisfied customer of BCS Global’s Virtual Presence services for several years, and came to BCS Global and its transport partner Cogent in 2004 to consolidate voice, video and data collaboration services over IP, thus eliminating the purchase of a new phone system in Norshield’s relocated Chicago and Toronto offices. The company also wanted to plan for the future convergence of all telecommunications services over IP for four major offices in three countries.
By implementing BCSTone services, Norshield was able to bypass traditional long-distance charges, work with a single source for all services and greatly simplify its intra-firm communications with four-digit dialing, voicemail and auto-attendant features between offices in Chicago, Toronto and Bridgeport, Barbados.
The IP Unity enabled feature expansions are key to meeting Norshield’s long term requirements as Norshield plans to subscribe to BCS Global’s newest BCSTone Integrated Messaging package.
“We look forward to further innovations in voice, video, messaging and multimedia, to expand our opportunity and value for key users like Norshield Financial,” emphasized BCS Global CEO Piero Romani. “IP Unity is our strategic partner in these applications, as its systems help us bundle the best features, achieve the best cost economies, and compress time-to-market in a way that clearly keeps us ahead of the competition.”
Posted by anna at 08:03 PM | Comments (0)
Savytel Communications Inc. – Launch Of Broadband Telephony
SavyTel Communications Inc.(Montreal, Quebec), is proud to announce the launch of our Broadband Telephony Services to the world! Sign up to one of our Residential or Business plans and enjoy superior voice quality and great mobility, all at a very low price! Save on your long distance costs, take your phone with you wherever you travel. All you need is a DSL, Cable modem or Office LAN high speed Internet connection, combined with a pre-configured telephone adapter offered free of charge (upon signup) by SavyTel, and you are ready to benefit from our extraordinary and revolutionary services! You will also receive many great features, free of charge! Don’t miss out on our lowest prices! Hurry and benefit from outstanding quality at a very small price.
Posted by anna at 01:23 PM | Comments (1)
Skype Journal at VON Canada
Posted by anna at 12:45 PM | Comments (0)
Sigma Announces New 30-Days To Market Solution For VoIP Service Providers
Single Billing And Customer Care Platform for VoIP as well as Traditional Voice and Internet Services Key to Rapid Market Entry
Toronto, ON / April 18, 2005 — Sigma Software Solutions www.sigmasoft.ca today announced its carrier-class billing and customer care solution now enables VoIP service providers to begin offering residential or business services within 30 days. The company is exhibiting in booth 411 at VON Canada to be held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Toronto, Ontario, April 19-21, 2005.
Based on the Sigma OmniCare platform for customer, order and revenue management, this new managed services solution is specifically designed for VoIP service providers to deliver robust hosted business operations and optional call centre and data centre capabilities. The Sigma solution is a comprehensive customer care and billing platform with a rich and sophisticated functionality set. The platform consists of three modules: Customer Management, Order Management, and Revenue Management that are pre-integrated to provide an excellent customer experience from the initial Web order through to service delivery and customer support either via the Web or call centre. Sigma’s more than 10 years experience delivering award-winning solutions to convergent telecom carriers ensures the best quality design.
As a result of Sigma’s deployment experience, the platform empowers VoIP providers in several ways:
- Quick to market: Sigma’s solution enables service providers to become operational while the lucrative VoIP market is still hot. Not only can VoIP providers offer new services, but more importantly, begin accurately billing for them within 30 days.
- Industry Proven: Since 1994, the telecom industry’s most successful and innovative service providers have put their trust in Sigma’s technology to support their customer bases across North America. Sigma’s longevity and expanding customer base are testaments to the platform’s value to both VoIP service providers as well as traditional telephony providers.
- Trusted: Sigma understands that not only is it deploying an advanced platform at its customers - it is deploying a solution delivering reliability.
- Turnkey: By utilizing Sigma’s solution and leveraging Sigma’s strategic partnerships with Canadian and US wholesale service providers, call centre and related third-party suppliers, today’s service provider can reduce costs for delivering traditional telephony while generating new revenue streams from their developing VoIP customer base.
Sigma’s customers are able to easily outsource their operations to Sigma that may include the customer care and billing function, as well as the data/call center operations.
The platform delivers numerous organizational benefits: call centre CSRs (customer service representatives) access the system to create customer accounts and enter orders for service; marketing and product managers use it to release new products, services, features and rate plans; and information technology and operations personnel run bill cycles, release invoices and process payments.
“For over a decade, the industry’s top carriers and most innovative resellers have relied on our solutions to process and bill their high-volume customer orders,” said Craig Denson, President, Sigma Software Solutions. “And as new telecom services are introduced and deployed, we provide the easily-adapted customer care and billing applications to capture early demand and unlock new revenue streams. The value we provide our customers is further underscored in a recent report from McKinsey in which they state that some telecom companies will need to cut as much as 20 or 30 percent of their current operating costs over the next four years.”
In recognition of carriers’ differing needs, Sigma also offers a hosted configuration of its platform. This allows service providers who prefer not to build an IT infrastructure, to use Sigma’s carrier-grade data centre to maintain the platform for use by its staff. A hosted OmniCare solution significantly reduces the burden of up-front capital investment and therefore improved ROI. It also frees providers to focus on their core business. A hosted solution is also faster to set up, as are future enhancements for new services.
Irrespective of configuration, key benefits of the platform are:
- Fully convergent customer care and billing solution for traditional phone companies, resellers, and next-generation telecom service providers offering traditional telephony and VoIP
- Proven, cost-effective solution is tested and deployed
- Carrier-grade functionality, performance and scalability
- Modular platform ensures maximum flexibility in adapting system to specific customer needs
- Can be purchased as licensed software or as a hosted configuration to eliminate up-front hardware and software costs
- Outsourcing options support higher return on investment and lower total cost of ownership
- Can augment or replace existing customer care and billing system
- Web-based self-service capabilities support greater customer satisfaction
About Sigma Software Solutions
Sigma Software is a leading provider of high-performance customer, order and revenue management software for the telecommunications and finance industries, and related vertical markets. The company’s value proposition is to support profitability and customer satisfaction via reduced operating costs, enhanced call centre productivity, maximized revenue, and reduced churn. Sigma’s international client base covers traditional and next-generation service providers, resellers and utilities, including Bell Canada, Sears Canada, Primus, Bullseye Telecom, ACN US, Portugal Telecom, Zamtel and many others. Sigma has been delivering on its vision to reliably and efficiently automate high-volume business process transactions for the best performance/price ratio in its markets since 1994.
For more information:
Sales
Roy Bradshaw
Vice President, Sales and Business Development
Sigma Software Solutions
416.368.2000 ext 2227
Royb@sigmasoft.ca
Media
John Sacke
Sacke & Associates Inc
416.493.5723 ext. 201
johns@sackepr.com
Posted by anna at 12:37 PM | Comments (0)
April 15, 2005
Internap, HyperTec Join Forces to Serve Canadian Business
Alliance to Deliver Highly Reliable, Redundant Internet-Based Solutions
ATLANTA – April 15, 2005 – Internap Network Services Corporation (AMEX: IIP), the leading provider of performance-based routing services over IP networks, announced today it has entered into an alliance with Quebec-based HyperTec Systems, Inc., one of Canada’s top systems integrators and value added resellers, to bring Internap’s unique intelligent route management solutions to companies throughout Canada.
In particular, the alliance will support HyperTec’s Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) strategy, which focuses on ensuring the high availability and rapid restoration of vital business functions in the event of an interruption to customers’ computers, telecommunication resources, user work areas and warehouses. The two companies will participate in a variety of joint sales and marketing efforts, including: sales training; technical sales; engineering and support training; sales support and on-going relationship management.
“Teaming with HyperTec is a key opportunity for Internap to continue to offer our portfolio of advanced Internet and route optimization services to a broader set of customers,” said Gregory A. Peters, President and Chief Executive Officer of Internap. “This move positions us to demonstrate the value of our technologies in enabling critical application functionality over IP networks.”
“HyperTec’s IT solutions focus on providing our customers with the highest level of redundancy, failover protection, and availability at the transport layer of these applications/solutions,” said David Ahdoot, President, HyperTec Group. “That’s why we believe this partnership with Internap will bring an unmatched level of Internet performance to our customers and enhance our business continuity services.”
With a population of 32 million and a gross domestic product of U.S.$1.01 trillion in 2004, Canada is the world’s ninth largest market. HyperTec serves a variety of markets across Canada, including federal, provincial and municipal governments; school boards, healthcare, financial, legal and professional institutions.
The Internap multi-carrier intelligent routing technology, which uses the Internap Flow Control Platform (FCP) and Private Network Access Points (P-NAPs) to speed Internet traffic from one location to another, allows customer traffic to avoid the congestion and bottlenecks of traditional single-carrier networks. The Internap P-NAPs connect directly to the Internet backbones of multiple carriers in major cities throughout North America, the Asia-Pacific Rim and the UK, while FCP devices extend route control solutions to the customer’s premise.
Internap offers a broad portfolio of advanced, multi-network solutions for IP connectivity, data services, content distribution, managed security, and managed virtual private networks (VPNs). In addition, Internap also offers award-winning customer-premise equipment for enterprises that wish to manage their own multi-carrier network. Through its products and services, Internap has the technologies and expertise to meet customers’ IP networking needs.
About HyperTec Systems
Located in Saint-Laurent, Quebec, HyperTec Systems, Inc. is part of a privately held group of vertically integrated companies with over 240 employees and regional offices in Ottawa, Quebec City, Chicoutimi, Mississauga, and Calgary. The company offers design, development, distribution of brand-name computer products, after-sales service, technical support, integration and the development of solutions. HyperTec serves public and private sector clients across the country, delivering products and services to a variety of industry sectors including federal, provincial and municipal governments, school boards, health care, financial, legal and professional institutions, and export. For more information, visit the company’s website at www.hypertec-group.com.
About Internap
Internap is the market leader of intelligent route-control solutions that bring reliability, performance and security to the Internet. The company’s patented and patent-pending technology address the inherent weaknesses of the Internet, enabling enterprises to take full advantage of the benefits of deploying business-critical applications such as e-commerce, Voice over IP (VoIP), video-conferencing, and streaming audio/video across the Internet. Through a portfolio of high-performance IP solutions, customers can bypass congestion points, overcome routing inefficiencies and optimize performance of their applications. Internap solutions are backed by an industry-leading performance guarantee that covers the entire Internet as opposed to just one network. These offerings include: network- and premise-based route optimization solutions, colocation, VPN, content distribution, managed security and managed storage services.
Internap currently serves more than 1,900 customers including Fortune 1000 and mid-tier enterprises in the financial services, government; travel/hospitality, manufacturing, media/entertainment, technology and retail industries. The company provides services throughout the United States, United Kingdom and Japan with service expansion to Sydney, Singapore, and Hong Kong this spring. For more information, please visit the company website at www.internap.com.
Internap and P-NAP are registered trademarks and Flow Control Platform is a trademark of Internap. All other trademarks and brands are the property of their respective owners.
Contacts:
Internap Media Contact
David Sutton
404.302.9721
dsutton@internap.com
Internap Investor Contact
Andrew Albrecht
404.302.9841
aalbrecht@internap.com
HyperTec Media Contact
Fadi Joseph
514.297.0785
Fjoseph@hypertec.ca
Posted by anna at 08:45 PM | Comments (0)
April 14, 2005
Gentek to launch ISP VoIP Highway at VON Canada conference
Posted by anna at 08:31 PM | Comments (0)
Gentek showcases new VoIP 'highway'
Globeandmail.com, April 14, 2005
Posted by anna at 12:50 PM | Comments (0)
April 13, 2005
Gentek Introduces the World’s First ISP VoIP Highway at the VON Canada Event
Toronto, Canada, April 13, 2005 – GENTEK Marketing Inc., manufacturer and technology leaders in VoIP, Network Security and Broadband related solutions, will be showcasing the world’s first ISP VoIP Highway at the VON Canada event April 19-21, 2005.
The ISP VoIP Highway is a global platform that allows Internet Telephony Service Providers (ITSPs) to exchange IP to IP VoIP calls with other ITSPs that are part of the VoIP highway. This innovative concept enables localized ITSPs to compete in the VoIP market at the same level as larger providers (like Vonage and Skype) by becoming part of the global VoIP Highway through an affordable investment in leading edge technology. ITSPs can now expand their service offering to their customers. Features include worldwide connectivity with no dependence on the PSTN network, access to the Locator Database – a centralized IP telephony directory, low cost long distance calls, Call Transfer, Call Forward, Call Pick Up, Caller Line Identification, Call Waiting, Message Waiting Indicator, Call Hold, integrated voice mail, auto attendant and many other features. It supports NAT transversal and any combination of SIP and MGCP end points and can support an unlimited amount of users. By adding T1 links to the local CO, ITSPs have the option of offering inexpensive flat fee local phone service.
“Gentek has been moving aggressively into the VoIP equipment market and the VON Canada event is the perfect vehicle to launch our revolutionary ISP VoIP Highway,” said John D. Herrington, Gentek’s General Manager. “As the leader in channel broadband technology in Canada, the choice supplier to Bell Wholesale group, Radiant, Allstream, Magma and Execulink, this announcement is another step forward in our commitment to the development, deployment and advancement of global access to technology. We have also recently partnered with such VoIP leaders as Sipura and AudioCodes in our continuing mission to be leaders in VoIP technology provision.”
“Gentek offers proven, cost-effective VoIP solutions for the Home, SOHO, SMB/SME and Enterprise markets, including complete turnkey solutions for up to 20,000 users. We are a single source company with a comprehensive product offering including IP PBX’s, digital media gateways, VoIP phones, IADs, soft switches, T1/E1 communication boards, VoIP ADSL modems, VoIP phone adapters and the ISP VoIP Highway. Our product offering enables rapid deployment of revenue generating VoIP networks and services for Service Providers, VARs and businesses seeking to take advantage of VoIP technology benefits,” added Herrington.
In addition to the ISP VoIP Highway, Gentek will be exhibiting VoIP and Network security solutions at the VON show. Even with increasing awareness of the scope of network security threats, the security risks associated with converged voice and data network often gets overlooked. Security is a growing field that offers an additional revenue stream for Service Providers and VARS. On display will be solutions from Gentek’s award winning network security partners including SonicWALL stand alone security appliances, LucidLink wireless security, KoolSpan smart card authentication and Emergis managed services.
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About Gentek:
Gentek Marketing Inc. is a global provider and manufacturer of reliable VoIP, Broadband and Network Security solutions headquartered in Toronto, Canada. Gentek provides innovative high tech products and solutions with unsurpassed technical support and superior service for leading companies around the world. Gentek is proud to be celebrating over 20 years of successful growth in Canada and abroad. For more information, please visit the Gentek web site at www.gentek.com.
Company Contact:
Brian Mintz
VP Marketing
Gentek Marketing Inc.
Tel: (905) 738-9300
Fax: (905) 738-5563
bmintz@gentek.com
www.gentek.com
Posted by anna at 02:49 PM | Comments (1)
April 07, 2005
iBasis CEO to Discuss Drivers of VoIP Growth at Conferences in So. Africa, Canada, United Kingdom
Posted by anna at 01:19 PM | Comments (0)
April 06, 2005
Voice On the Net Canada features senior executives from companies making VoIP headlines
Silicon Valley North, April 6, 2005
Posted by anna at 01:17 PM | Comments (0)
April 01, 2005
Voice on the Net Comes of Age
Cable Digital News, April 1, 2005
Posted by anna at 09:04 PM | Comments (1)