Integrating voice onto DSL and other data connections gradually and more inexpensively were at the heart of many product announcements and corporate initiatives announced at SUPERCOMM last month in Atlanta.
Some equipment vendors announced they are cooperating to establish Channelized Voice over DSL (CVoDSL) standards. CVoDSL transports voice traffic over the copper loop within the DSL data stream by dedicating DSL bandwidth for each voice channel. CVoDSL-equipped chipsets reserve a dedicated channel of DSL bandwidth for up to eight simultaneous voice calls over a single phone line.
Included in the consortium are ADC (www.adc.com), Advanced Fibre Communications Inc. (www.afc.com), Analog Devices Inc. (www. analog.com), Aware Inc. (www.aware.com), Broadxent Inc. (www.broadxent.com), Centillium Communications Inc. (www.centillium.com), Infineon Technologies AG (www.infineon.com), Mindspeed Technologies (www.mindspeed.com), Occam Networks Inc. (www.occamnetworks.com), Paradyne Corp. (www.paradyne.com), Siemens Information and Communications Networks LLC (www.ic.siemens.com) and Texas Instruments Inc. (www.ti.com/sc/adsl).
On the new product front, Catena Networks Inc. (www.catena.com) unveiled the CN1000 Broadband Loop Carrier (BLC), which supports POTS and DSL on every line and offers line-by-line migration from circuit to packet-based networks.
"This is a totally new classification of product," says Gary Bolton, Catena's vice president of product marketing. The CN1000 BLC incorporates the functionality of a DSLAM, a media gateway and a digital loop carrier system, while it eliminates the need for network-side POTS splitters and residential IADs.
Bolton says DSL initially was deployed as what he refers to as an overlay service.
"To try to deploy DSL today is time consuming and expensive because DSL is like a special service," he says. "If you try to extend this to the remote terminal [to reach customers too far from the central office to get DSL service in standard configurations], it's complex because the service area doesn't make it economically viable."
So Catena put voice and DSL into a single piece of silicon, so every port has voice and DSL. This results in no stranded ports, as there are with competing products in which line cards are dedicated for either POTS or DSL. The CN1000 supports up to 2,112 integrated POTS/DSL ports per seven-foot rack. Service providers can send the POTS traffic on a line-by-line basis either to a circuit switch or a packet-based network. The CN1000 supports GR-303 and TR-08 interfaces to legacy TDM networks, and Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP) and MEGACO (H.248) interfaces to converged packet-based networks.
Customer lab evaluations and field trials of the CN1000 BLC, which can be provisioned remotely, are expected to begin this quarter.
Also focused on combining multiple functions in a single box is Gluon Networks Inc. (www.gluonnetworks.com). The company's CLX, which is targeted at rural and suburban CO applications, combines the functionality of a Class 5 voice switch with a DSLAM, an ATM switch and SONET transport.
"For under $50,000 [a service provider] can get started for a 4,000 line office," says Gary Quackenbush, Gluon's vice president, rather than spending $2 million on a traditional switch. The 24-inch by 12-inch rack-mounted device can be used in a CO or within a multitenant building. The company expects to be in betas with the product this summer and to ship to the first customers in the fourth quarter.
In, Out of the Box
Meanwhile, ANDA Networks (www. andanetworks.com) unveiled its software download and blades for its Universal Access Platform 2000 Architecture edge-networking device. Director of product marketing Mark Habberley explains the features allow the box to be used as a voice or DSL aggregator or a gateway device, depending on where it sits in the network. It can bring in voice or data on a DS3 or OC3; do GR-303 using ATM adaptation layer 2 (AAL2); or take data, concentrate it and feed it out to other ISPs using DS3s or OC3s.
"In the past, carriers had to split data and voice off with separate equipment," he adds. "We do all that grooming on one box."
Offering all that functionality in a single device results in capital cost and management savings, as well as a smaller footprint for the service provider, says Phillip Thomas, vice president of engineering. It also allows a service provider to offer incremental services from the same platform, like starting with voice and perhaps adding data in the future.
The product includes a 24-port POTS card and an ADSL/POTS/splitter card with 12 ports. On the voice side, the box terminates 10,000 DS0s concurrently without blocking. A controlled introduction of the device, which sells for $30,000 to $110,000, will begin shortly.
Also in the edge-networking arena, Copper Mountain Networks Inc. (www. coppermountain.com) introduced its VicinityVoice 100 Local Trunk Gateway, which interoperates with the CopperEdge and VantEdge platforms and next-generation packet-voice solutions to send broadband customers' local calls directly to PSTN destinations served from the same wiring centers.
By allowing broadband providers to send local PSTN calls directly to their destinations through the wiring centers' Class 5 switches, the VicinityVoice 100 LTG enables providers to avoid the trunking costs associated with sending these calls through more distant Class 4 tandem switches.
A typical wiring-center Class 5 switch serves between 20,000 and 30,000 standard phones. Between 20 percent and 25 percent of all voice calls are purely local, placed to recipients served from the wiring centers where the calls originate.
Here's how it works: The VantEdge Broadband Services Concentrators and the company's existing CopperEdge DSL Concentrators are equipped with IP IQ--Copper Mountain's Internet Protocol (IP) service intelligence--which allows them to support softswitch solutions by sending calls to the collocated VicinityVoice 100 LTG or to the wider voice transport network as appropriate. IP IQ enables VantEdge Broadband Services Concentrators and CopperEdge DSL Concentrators to see IP voice packets, which contain information indicating whether a call is destined for a PSTN recipient served by the Class 5 switch in the same wiring center or a recipient elsewhere. The VicinityVoice 100 LTG converts IP voice packets to the pulse code modulation signals that are processed by Class 5 switches.
"For VicinityVoice, you will see comparable price per port as with larger gateways," says Mark Tiedeman, Copper Mountain's director of product management. And carriers can realize operational savings because they won't be needlessly eating up backbone network resources. The VicinityVoice 100 LTG will be generally available in the fourth quarter at a list price of $24,995.
To ATM or Not to ATM?
Also at the show, Copper Mountain came out with The VantEdge 3000 Broadband Services Concentrator, which addresses the problem of ATM-based DSL networks that today have to provision a virtual circuit (VC) for each subscriber connection by instead aggregating multiple subscribers on single VCs. The VantEdge will be available in limited quantities in January 2002 and generally available in April 2002. List pricing for the VantEdge starts at $29,995.
But for carriers with ATM backbone networks, ADTRAN Inc. (www.adtran.com) rolled out the Total Access Packet DLC, which will be available this month. The Total Access Packet DLC uses a voice cell processor to enable carriers to use their ATM backbones for traditional voice and data traffic. According to Kevin Morgan, Adtran's Carrier Networks Division's director of product management, the product is the industry's first packet DLC. "It allows the service providers that have built out their ATM infrastructure to use the TDM access part of their infrastructure."
Adtran also announced its Total Access Outside Plant Access Terminal, which is available now and enables carriers to deliver POTS over copper that is used for hi-cap applications.
"It's a span-powered device that enables deployment of POTS in targeted applications," says Keith Atwell, director of business development. "It's unique in that you don't need a battery system or local power at the device in the field. It's span powered from CO or RT and allows for quick deployment."
In the MTU
ADTRAN also announced general availability of its Total Access DSLAM, a hardened product designed for remote terminal and MTU/MDU applications.
Also targeting the MTU space was Integral Access Inc. (www.integralaccess. com), which took the wraps off a service aggregator that is designed specifically for multitenant applications.
According to Guy Chenard, vice president of marketing and business development, 60 percent of small businesses are located in some form of multitenant unit. To enable carriers to reach these companies, the PurePacketCompact aggregator scales well from eight to 20 or 30 tenants, Chenard says, adding that it can go as high as 60 tenants.
"This unit can fit into any type of network and offer pretty much any voice and tiered data services," Chenard adds.
A smaller version of the company's previously announced PurePacketNode product, the IP/MPLS-based PurePacket Compact, supports up to 96 POTS and 72 xDSL lines in a single chassis. Using a single PurePacketCompact, and customer- located PurePacket OUTburst IADs, carriers can provide such integrated services as analog and digital PBX; converged voice and data; POTS; LAN extension; tiered data services; ISDN; SDSL, G.SHDSL and ADSL; and Centrex. WAN interfaces on the box include OC-3, fast Ethernet, DS-3, 4 x DS-1, and E1. Gigabit Ethernet and OC-12 interfaces will be available in future releases. The product is slated for availability this summer starting at $8,000.
Retail Channels
In an effort to drive voice over DSL to the masses, Jetstream Communications Inc. (www.jetstream.com) partnered with consumer electronics giant Panasonic (www.panasonic.co.jp) of Japan to bring to market a customer premises device called the Broadband Telephone. The product was demonstrated live at SUPERCOMM and is expected to be in commercial carrier deployments by the fourth quarter.
According to Manish Gupta, vice president of corporate development at Jetstream, Panasonic provides credibility to VoDSL in the residential space and can deliver CPE economies of scale needed to address the consumer market, in the short term. In the long term, Panasonic offers retail distribution channels through which DSL modems and IADs eventually can be sold.
Today, the least expensive IADs supporting VoDSL sell for about $750, according to Gupta, who adds that Broadband Telephone, which includes IAD and phone functionality, will be available to service providers for less than $500. Consumers likely will pay less than that for the device since service providers probably will subsidize the box to sell the service.
The Panasonic-branded Broadband Tele- phone is a souped-up version of the company's existing TG4000 standard phone with 2.4ghz cordless technology that can take four phone lines and eight cordless handsets. But unlike TG4000, Broadband Telephone will have IAD functionality for data or LAN services via DSL. Jetstream helped define the hardware and software for Broadband Telephone, which uses Jetstream's VoiceBand protocol to enable it to work with the Jetstream gateway and allows the carrier to manage services for the solution.
Longer Reach
Some other DSL vendors showed boxes at SUPERCOMM that will extend the reach of the copper technology.
For example, Actelis Networks Inc. (www.actelis.com) unleashed a new technology to enable carriers to exploit multiple existing copper pairs to deliver high-capacity access to businesses. Spatial division multiplexing is a point-to-point, fully symmetrical service delivering 10mbps to 100mbps rates at reaches of 18 kilofeet or further. It's based on Actelis patents that enable high immunity to noise that is characteristic of copper loop plant, allowing the technology to keep a bit error rate ceiling at 10 to the -10 or better.
The first Actelis products, to be announced later this year, will deliver DS-3 rates using 24 copper pairs at 12 kilofeet.
Meanwhile, GoDigital Networks Corp. (www.godigital.com) highlighted its line-powered technology for long-distance ADSL, which enables carriers to deploy ADSL service up to 35,000 feet from the CO for as little as $900 per line. With the use of additional repeaters, it can extend ADSL reach almost indefinitely, the company says.
And Lucent Technologies Inc. (www. lucent.com) extended its Stinger DSL remote terminal/access concentrator product line with the new 36-port ADSL line Stinger MRT model for outside plant and MTU/MDU applications.
Nortel Networks Ltd. (www.nortelnetworks.com) unveiled its first tunable lasers for its WDM metro optical products during this year's SUPERCOMM show in Atlanta. The lasers can isolate routes and manage individual wavelengths, which alleviates inventory management associated with single wavelength lasers.
Lucent Technologies Inc. (www.lucent.com) introduced Metropolis, a group of products targeted at "cleaning up the huge metro mess" of multiple overlay networks for voice and data services, says Brian Dunlap, vice president of metro networks at Lucent. Metropolis includes three categories of products--SONET/ synchronous digital hierarchy (SDH), multiservice and wave division multiplexing (WDM). Metropolis products are deployed and in trials with 18 customers, including Bay Spring Telephone Company Inc., Choice One Communications (www.choiceonecom.com) and Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom (www.wcvt.com).
Also at the show, Lucent announced its NX64000TM IP Core Router has been enhanced to include a 10gbps optical card. In addition, Lucent announced a new 2.5gbps optical line card with four connections per card. Each Lucent NX64000 now can accommodate up to 64 streams of 2.5gbps traffic. The NX64000 supports IP, frame relay, MPLS and ATM termination.
ONI Systems Corp. (www.oni.com) announced the general availability of OPTX Software Suite release 4.0. Featured in the new release is the evolution of the OPTX Element Management System (EMS) to the OPTX Network Manager, a software- management system that delivers augmented capabilities for end-to-end management including single-step, networkwide wavelength provisioning and SONET add/drop multiplexer (ADM) path management. ONI customers can now provision layered SONET-over-DWDM and Gigabit Ethernet-over-DWDM services from a single platform.
Optisphere Networks Inc. (www.optisphere.com), a subsidiary of Siemens Information and Communication Networks Inc. (www.siemenscom.com) demonstrated its 40gbps long-haul DWDM product at SUPERCOMM. The latest release of the product can transmit up to 160 wavelengths at 10gbps. The next release of Optisphere's long-haul system will transport 80 wavelengths at 40gbps.
SnowShore Networks (www.snowshore.com) made its debut at SUPERCOMM. The company focuses on building "IP enhanced communications infrastructure products that will help service providers deliver profitable services to their customers," says company co-founder and CEO Joel Hughes. The company currently is building its media server and has its "alpha" product in the labs with prospective customers. Hughes says beta tests should begin by the end of this year, with general availability slated for early 2002.
Fujitsu Network Communications Inc. (www.fnc. fujitsu.com) announced an OC-192 interface for the company's FLASHWAVE OADX platform. The 40gbps interface will be available in 18 months to two years. Spokesman John Stewart says announcing the product so early is an indication of a "culture change" at Fujitsu, which has traditionally been more conservative.
NexTone Communications Inc. (www.nextone.com) introduced the NexTone Multiprotocol Signaling Switch, which provides the H.323 and SIP signaling interoperability and interworking needed to deploy applications. The product, which is deployed on the Sun Netra platform, is scheduled for general release in September 2001. It will come in three models--the MP050, MP100 and MP250--and will be upgradable via software to support the advanced features of the NexTone Application Switch.
Lightchip Inc. (www.lightchip.com) and ANTEC Corp. (www.antec.com) are bringing DWDM's bandwidth-boosting capabilities and wavelength management to MSO networks. Antec's LIGHTPLEX product platform is built upon Lightchip's passive optical wavelength router (OWR) and optical wavelength manager (OWM). The OWR muxes/demuxes up to 40 bidirectional optical channels. The solution allows cable system operators to proactively monitor and manage all channels in a DWDM system, a comprehensive perspective that includes the status of wavelengths, optical power and optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR).
Axerra Networks Inc. (www.axerra.com) says it has defined a new class of products with its AXN Multiservice Over IP Concentrators, which it showed at SUPERCOMM. The first AXN models allow carriers to put legacy services such as frame relay, leased line and ATM over their expanding IP network. AXNs perform aggregation, concentration, and service adaptation at the multiservice network edge for traffic carried over next-generation IP and IP/MPLS networks. AXNs offer fully channelized DS1/E1 and DS3/E3 line interfaces, with Gigabit Ethernet and PoS/ OC-3c/OC-12c network uplinks. Chassis types include the AXN1600N (16 slots NEBS compliant), the AXN1600E (16 slots ETSI compliant) and the AXN600 (a compact 6-slot chassis for remote locations and smaller PoPs).
Telco Systems Inc. (www.telco.com) launched a new carrier-class Packet over SONET IP platform switch, EdgeLinkT5Pro, and the EdgeLinkT5 Routing Gigabit Ethernet switch.
CIENA Corp. (www.ciena.com) announced that AT&T (www.att.com) has begun deployment of CIENA's MultiWave Metrointelligent optical transport system. AT&T plans to deploy CIENA's MultiWave Metro platform in a number of those networks to provide up to 24 wavelengths of protected OC-48 or OC-192 capacity per fiber. AT&T already is carrying "live" customer traffic using CIENA systems in its Los Angeles metro network.
Alidian Networks Inc. (www.alidian.com) came out with a new metro optical networking platform that supports flexible connectivity for up to 10gbps of voice and data traffic-- allowing carriers to designate any of four protected OC-48 wavelengths as either SONET or multiservice IP. The Optical Service Node (OSN) 4400 rounds out Alidian's family of metro aggregation and transport systems, which already includes the OSN 4200 and OSN 4800, supporting two and eight protected wavelengths, respectively. The new OSN 4400 addresses the needs of carriers for a highly reliable yet cost-effective platform that can start small but grow to 10gbps of protected bandwidth.
