21 January 2003 -- Marconi has signed a new, five-year contract with Cologne-based city communications operator, NetCologne. During the newly extended period, Marconi will be responsible for the management of NetCologne's entire network from the operations centre Marconi established when it first took over responsibility for the network.
In parallel, the companies have agreed another five-year contract for the supply of Marconi's Distributed Multiservice Platform technology and ServiceOn Access network management software. Implementation of the software updates is expected to be completed by March 2003.
NetCologne is a regional network carrier providing communications services to residential and business customers in and around the city of Cologne. Its product portfolio includes telephone and Internet services, cable television and data communications, as well as corporate networks and tailor-made solutions for media businesses.
Marconi's Deep Fiber DMP is a comprehensive, tailor-made network solution for regional carriers. It includes a Central Distribution Node and Optical Network Units (ONU), as well as Network Terminators (NT) on the customer's premises. This allows carriers to use fibre-optic technology across the entire network. Deep Fiber DMP fully integrates asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) and Internet protocol (IP) based services, as well as time division multiplexing (TDM) carrier-class voice and leased-line capabilities. As with all Marconi products, network management is conducted by the ServiceOn Access software.
"The new contract with Netcologne strengthens the very good relationship we have built with this customer since they started their network operations", says Jürgen Beer, managing director of Marconi Communications Germany.