Siemens Puts G6 Gateway in Portfolio, Invests More in General Bandwidth

Siemens Communications Inc. and General Bandwidth said today they are expanding the scope of their work together. Siemens Venture Capital, an arm of Siemens, originally put money into General Bandwidth in early 2001, and now is boosting its equity investment in the VoIP equipment and applications manufacturer.

The deal calls for Siemens to use General Bandwidth’s G6 Universal Media Gateway in its Siemens Next Generation Exchange (NGE) portfolio, which helps U.S. service providers introduce new VoIP services over legacy networks.

Siemens says incorporating General Bandwidth’s G6 Universal Media Gateway means it can provide line and trunk media gateway functions on one platform. The G6 technology also features enhanced emergency standalone capabilities, meaning the remote G6 gateway maintains emergency and local community calling if connectivity to the central softswitch is lost.

Siemens’ NGE portfolio includes the Siemens SURPASS softswitch, integration services and the G6 Universal Media Gateway. The entire solution scales up to 100,000 lines. The G6 product uses standard industry protocols including GR-303, TR-08, SS7 IMT, CAS, PRI and E911. It also can perform as a trunking media gateway supporting IP protocols such as SIP, MGCP and H.248.

“Service providers who want to displace legacy Class 5 networks want assurance that investments in IP will scale as they migrate for full VoIP and IMS architectures,” says Charles Vogt, General Bandwidth’s president and CEO. “The Siemens SURPASS hiQ softswitch and the General Bandwidth G6 Universal Media Gateway are …creating a compelling offering for service providers who want to make a circuit-to-packet transition without disrupting existing service offerings.”