May 23, 2006 Portsmouth, NH, and Plano, TX -- Pannaway Technologies, developer of converged IP broadband systems, and GENBAND, telecommunications infrastructure products provider, today announced that Arkansas-based Ritter Communications is the 12th telecommunications company to deploy a joint solution using GENBAND's G6 Universal Media Gateway and Pannaway's Service Convergence Network (SCN).
Ritter, a 100-year old telco, is delivering high-bandwidth broadband services over copper and fiber to local businesses in the banking, healthcare, city government, real estate, and insurance market sectors. Ritter also is the principal broadband services provider to The Mall at Turtle Creek, located in Jonesboro, AR. The Mall at Turtle Creek is a recently completed 750,000-square-foot retail complex and is home to more than 70 popular retailers, all of which now have access to next-generation voice and high-speed data services.
Ritter is one of a growing number of both IOC and CLEC service providers that have chosen the combined G6 Universal Media Gateway and SCN offering, claim GENBAND and Pannaway representatives. In less than one year, eleven other service providers, including Nsight Telservices of Wisconsin, Polar Communications of North Dakota, Waitsfield and Champlain Valley Telecom of Vermont, KM Telecom of Minnesota, ETEX Telephone Cooperative of Texas, and Warwick Valley Telecommunications of New York also have chosen the combined product.
"Our goal was to deploy a flexible high-performance network capable of supporting the growing converged broadband needs of our business customers," explains K. Rex Mayfield, vice president of core networks at Ritter Communications. "To accomplish this, we selected best-in-class products from GENBAND and Pannaway Technologies. This partnered solution provides us with the cutting-edge technology that we will need for the long-term, and because their products are guaranteed interoperable, our network integration process was simplified and accelerated," he adds.
Ritter Communications next-generation network consists of Pannaway's Broadband Aggregation Routers (BAR), which deliver Gigabit Ethernet (GbE)-based transport with the capacity to scale to 10 Gbits/sec, along with Pannaway's ADSL2+ and Active Ethernet fiber Broadband Access Switches (BAS) and Residential Gateway NIDs (RGN). Pannaway's SCN system, in concert with GENBAND's G6 Universal Media Gateway, enables the service provider to deliver traditional telephony, voice-over-IP (VoIP), high-speed data, and other multi-media services, including video conferencing and medical imaging--all in one low-cost, fully integrated package that leverages the simplest and most scalable technologies available, IP and Ethernet, say representatives for both companies.
"The ability to deliver highly reliable broadband networks that deploy quickly and interoperate with leading products from other manufacturers is paramount," explains Kevin Brown, vice president of marketing at Pannaway. "We're pleased that our extensive interoperability efforts with GENBAND have proven to lessen the network integration burden for telcos like Ritter Communications while allowing them to deliver truly converged voice, video, and data services to their valued business customers."
Pannaway's Broadband Access Manager (BAM) also is being used by Ritter to simplify the deployment, provisioning, and ongoing management of its new IP and Ethernet-based copper and active fiber-based broadband equipment and services.
GENBAND claims its G6 Universal Media Gateway is the industry's first universal media gateway serving ILEC/PTT, CLEC, and MSO networks, while providing simultaneous support for all access, reverse, and trunking media gateway applications on a single G6 chassis. The product delivers seamless, risk-free migration to next-generation services to address evolving broadband and voice service needs, say GENBAND representatives.
"Truly interoperable IP technologies significantly expedite the network integration process for telcos, which in turn allows them to introduce new revenue-generating multi-media services ahead of their competitors," notes Jody Bennett, vice president of marketing at GENBAND. "Pannaway Technologies and GENBAND have proven across multiple IP Ethernet service networks that a converged triple-play solution can be accomplished."