Time Warner Telecom to add classes of service for VPN

Time Warner Telecom expects to roll out class-of-service support for its Managed MPLS VPN service.

The alternative service provider plans to introduce four classes of service that will allow customers to tag packets for prioritization over their VPN later this quarter or early in the third quarter, says Michael Rouleau, senior vice president of business development and strategy at Time Warner Telecom, in an interview at Interop 2006 Las Vegas Tuesday.

Today Time Warner Telecom only offers “best effort” traffic delivery for its VPN customers, Rouleau says.

The four classes of service are expedited forwarding, assured forwarding, enhanced delivery and best effort.

It’s up to customers how they want to prioritize their traffic, but the service provider says expedited forward would typically be used for voice, signaling and surveillance traffic. The second class, assured forwarding, can be used for mirroring and video traffic. The third class, enhanced delivery, can be used for other business applications that are not time-critical. And the fourth class, best effort, can be used for Internet access and e-mail.