CenturyLink And Sonus Networks Achieve Successful Major New Deployment of Voice Over IP Network

WESTFORD, Mass. and MONROE, La., May 4. Sonus Networks Inc., providing network transformation through IP communications technology, and CenturyLink today announced the successful completion of phase one implementation of CenturyLink's IP voice infrastructure. This migration brings traffic from CenturyLink's voice network into one secure, cost-effective, easy to manage IP network.

"We are bringing together significant volumes of TDM (Time-Division Multiplexing) or traditionally switched and IP traffic from two large networks," said Matt Beal, chief technology officer at CenturyLink. "We had to accomplish this with no service disruption to the seven million voice lines we support. I am extremely pleased with the quality, reliability and speed of this deployment. We expect to achieve cost savings and efficiency gains from our new IP core network as well as from the ability to centrally manage our voice traffic across our fiber backbone. It will also enable us to provide more advanced services to meet our customers' future needs."

The network, built in fewer than four months, includes the deployment of Sonus Networks media gateways, policy management and session border control solutions in 22 cities across the United States. It enables CenturyLink to leverage its extensive fiber backbone to incorporate both legacy TDM and IP voice traffic on the same infrastructure. This allows for significant cost saving and provides centralized management of the IP voice traffic. A key part of the new network is the addition of a Sonus Network Border Switch for secure IP-peering, session control and media management. The Sonus Network Border Switch provides CenturyLink with a more secure and cost effective means of interconnecting with other service providers. The platform also offers CenturyLink the opportunity to add future services including media transcoding (translating varied media assets to varied delivery platforms such as digital cinema, broadcast, web or mobile).

"Having supported the core of some of the world's busiest VoIP networks for many years, Sonus is a logical supplier of infrastructure equipment for CenturyLink's ambitious network integration project," commented Joe McGarvey, at Current Analysis. "The requirement for carriers to manage a mix of TDM and IP voice traffic, interconnections with adjacent networks and a variety of protocols and codecs, will persist for years to come and points to a need for media gateways fortified with session border control capabilities."

"CenturyLink has very demanding standards for its voice network. I am pleased that the Sonus Global Services team worked seamlessly with the team at CenturyLink to meet the aggressive deployment schedule successfully," commented Mohammed Shanableh, vice president, worldwide sales for Sonus Networks. "This Sonus deployment will enable CenturyLink to grow their network to meet the needs of its expanding customer base." In this project CenturyLink, working with Sonus Global Services has deployed the Sonus GSX9000(TM) Media Gateway, the Sonus PSX(TM) Call Routing and Policy Server, the Sonus Insight(TM) Element Management System and the Sonus Network Border Switch (NBS-9000) for enhanced border security and advanced IP peering capabilities.