Nortel this week unveiled enhancements to its multiservice switch line for wireless operators, and government and enterprise customers.
For wireless operators transitioning to 3G networks, Nortel’s 7400 multiservice switch line converges and compresses voice and data traffic from wireless base stations and transports it back to a central switching point, resulting in T-/E-1 leased line backhaul cost savings.
Nortel’s wireless multiservice switch customers include Mobistar, Vodafone, T-Mobile, Cingular, Western Wireless and Telstra.
For government and enterprise users, Nortel has added the MSS 7460 to the 7400 lineup. The MSS 7460 supports the same services and interfaces as the existing 16-slot MSS 7480, but in an eight-slot chassis designed for space-constrained deployments.
Nortel has also introduced a set of higher density interface cards that effectively double the port capacity of the MSS 7400 line. The new interface cards and hardware upgrades include:
An enhanced “any-service-any-port” interface card, called the Multiservice Access (MSA) module, which sports 32 ports on a single slot card, doubling the port density of the previous version. Nortel’s MSA card enables the service provider to remotely configure ATM/circuit emulation services, frame relay, or IP/IP VPN services on the MSS 7400 on a port-by-port basis.
Higher density10/100M bit/sec Ethernet cards that enable users to offer virtual private LAN services.
Processing enhancements to the MSS 15000 to support heavier IP traffic loads from VPNs. These enhancements are designed for optical connectivity up to OC-48.
Nortel this week also teamed with IBM and other vendors to offer multimedia applications and services over wireline, wireless and cable networks.
Nortel’s Converged Multimedia Services (CMS) bundle will allow end-users to initiate multiple services within a single communications session, Nortel says. For example, users will be able to launch a video conference during a voice conversation, or access a personalized video-on-demand service subscription from their home TV, online from a laptop or from a mobile phone.
CMS will also help position service providers to create differentiated multimedia services to attract subscribers and revenue.
IBM will contribute a Service Delivery Platform with a suite of applications and client software. IBM will also provide professional services capabilities to enable service provider billing and operations systems integration into CMS.
Nortel will contribute its Media Gateway and Multimedia Communications Server 5200 platforms, among others.
