Taqua Powers Femtos for Midwest RLEC

Taqua LLC’s TaquaWorks has won a big RLEC customer: The solution will replace an existing DMS-500 switching system for Nsight Telservices, to power its next-generation femtocell offering in parts of Wisconsin.

Former Cowboys quarterback Troy Aikman was on hand to bless the deal.

Femtocells, or mini wireless base stations that plug into home broadband modems to boost cellular coverage indoors, are part of the next-generation telecom landscape that will eventually converge wireline and wireless access to IP-based services. Rural LECs are ironically among the most nimble telcos when it comes to embracing next-gen technology, as this deal points out.

Established in 1910 as Pulaski Merchants and Farmers Telephone Co. in the Midwest, Nsight, parent company of Nsight Telservices, has grown to offer wireless, Internet, long distance, tower maintenance, and cable and landline telephone service under various branded subsidiaries, including: Nsight Telservices, Cellcom, St. Paul Tower, and Bayland Telephone.

While Nsight Telservices is using TaquaWorks to replace an existing DMS 500 and for enhanced IP applications, Cellcom, its wireless company, is using the T7000 as the MGCF/MG for its next-generation femto service offering.

“We have chosen Taqua because they are focused on converging wireline and wireless solutions,” said Rob Riordan, executive vice president and director of corporate development for Nsight. “Our focus is to provide the most advanced voice, data and multimedia services to our customers across wireline and wireless networks. The Taqua 7000 Switching System’s flexible architecture allows us to simplify our network architecture and enable true network convergence by simultaneously providing services that our current legacy wireline TDM and IP equipment cannot provide.”

The Taqua 7000 Switching System (T7000) is a Class 4/5 switch replacement and has successfully replaced virtually every brand and vintage of Class 5 switch in North America, the company says. The T7000 is based on a patented “switch-on-a-card” design, in which all the functions of a Class 4/5 switch, IP gateway or MGCF/MG are performed on a single circuit pack. The simplicity lowers deployment and operational costs for an end-office exchanges and the capability of controlling wireless and wireline switching simultaneously on the same platform.

TaquaWorks is an integrated solution that tightly combines products from Acme Packet, BroadSoft and Taqua. BroadSoft’s BroadWorks suite of advanced hosted Unified Communications, mobile PBX, business trunking and residential services are tightly coupled with the T7000 to deliver advanced subscriber services to carriers of all sizes. By integrating Acme Packet’s session border control (SBC), the TaquaWorks solution enhances network security for service providers by controlling the kinds of calls that can be placed through their IP networks.