Broadwing Communications, a wholly owned subsidiary of Broadwing, Inc. (NYSE: BRW), unveiled its intelligent, all-optical switched network, claimed by the company to be the first in the communications world. By switching light across the entire network backbone, without electrical regeneration, the 18,500 mile Broadwing network will operate at levels of capacity, speed, availability, and efficiency that dwarf the "legacy" networks operated by other providers.
During remarks delivered to the delegates of the World Economic Forum in Washington, DC, Broadwing president and CEO Rick Ellenberger described the revolutionary capabilities of the all-optical network and their impact for businesses, governments, and educational institutions, stating that the Broadwing network will be able to offer bandwidth that is so flexible that it can best be described as "liquid," meaning that customers will be able to use bandwidth in any amount and be billed only for what is used.
"One of the exceptional advantages of liquid bandwidth is that provisioning a circuit is a keyboard exercise rather than a labor intensive, hardware driven event," said Ellenberger.
The all-optical network can carry data, Internet, and voice traffic faster and more efficiently than most legacy networks, but it also enables customers to use multimedia and content-rich applications as vital business drivers. To put it into perspective, Broadwing's optical network has the capacity to enable:
* 4,000,000 music lovers to simultaneously download an MP3 music file
* 50,000 people to each download an eBook
* 5,000 medical facilities to share different medical images
* 4,000 virtual video streams create the largest virtual classroom in the world
...all in less than ONE minute.
About Broadwing:
Broadwing Communications, a wholly owned subsidiary of Broadwing Inc. (NYSE: BRW), is an optical network service provider that creates data and Internet solutions. For more information, visit www.broadwing.com.