Tekelec Finishes First Install of Full Suite of Next-Gen Products

Enabling a service provider to bridge its existing TDM network and new VoIP offerings, Tekelec has completed the first installation of the full suite of its next-generation switching products.

Canadian service provider FCI Broadband, a CLEC, will deploy the Tekelec T9000 (which combines the functionality of the T8000 media gateway and T3000 softswitch), the T6000 application server and the Eagle 5 Signaling Application System for signaling for network-based applications such as messaging, and for protocol conversions.

Paul Miller, vice president of switching product line management at Tekelec, says the new infrastructure “allows TDM switches to access new services on a SIP network, plus it allows SIP networks to access legacy features. The services from the T6000 can be delivered to both VoIP and TDM customers, and the Eagle 5 can invoke AIN-type services and make them available to IP users. Carriers have already invested in that infrastructure, and they don’t want to pay again for it.”

Miller says the Tekelec infrastructure brings distributed switching into a TDM environment. “The T9000 is distributed switching, call control separated from line and trunk interfaces.” TDM service providers can use distributed switching to go into new territories with familiar services. “It is a fully capable Class 5 and Class 4 switch. Some ‘next-gen’ switches put everything in one physical platform, but this can be in one location or distributed,” Miller says.

FCI is using the new infrastructure to support a cap-and-grow migration strategy. “They are capping their investment in TDM switches and doing all the growth on the T9000,” Miller says. “To that they are adding VoIP applications with the T6000, such as simultaneous ring, Web portals, and combined messaging such as voice mail to email.”

The Tekelec customer base for the T9000 and related products includes CLECs, independent operating companies, IXCs and some cable operators. “We are finding that [cable operators] tend to go to other [service providers] to help them become phone companies, and that is who we are selling to,” says Miller.

Tekelec has also added some key technologies to the T6000 to ease interoperability with the wide, and growing, range of SIP endpoints on the market. Although these endpoints are basically interoperable with typical VoIP infrastructure, there are many small inconsistencies in how certain features are implemented.

“We have developed a new architecture so service providers can plug in a profile for those devices. They don’t have to change code,” says Miller. “We broke down the capabilities of end devices into a series of parameters and a data set, basically a data model, that will allow us to map the idiosyncracies of each SIP device into a common profile. One example is lighting message light and how it is implemented. It is not always the same.”

The T6000 is now fully interoperable with more devices, such as the new Sipura Technology Inc. phone, an economically priced SIP device. In addition, the product now incorporates a database by TimesTen Inc. (acquired this week by Oracle) “which allowed us to improve capacity and performance,” says Miller.

Further, Tekelec has added a SOAP API, for greater ease in adding Web services, and the company has polished up the design of the Web portal. “It has a sleek new appearance and some improvements to the log-in, call logs and directories,” Miller notes.