Redback thinks small

Redback Networks today announced the extension of its SmartEdge Service Gateway family with a new platform aimed specifically at the residential broadband market.

The SmartEdge 100 platform is a 2RU broadband aggregation platform that brings together IP routing and subscriber management capabilities. According to Marco Wanders, Redback's chief marketing officer, the new unit is hitting the market at a unique time in telecom history. "It's perhaps the first time in history that residential broadband is driving the market as opposed to business services," he said. "At the same time, the number of IP sessions is increasing."

With the SmartEdge 100, carriers can deliver the residential triple play by offering not just a large-bandwidth pipe but also provide differentiation among various data streams.

"Today the only IP session is Internet access," Wanders said. "It's relatively easy to control because it's low latency and relatively tolerant. Subscriber management and subcriber control wasn't important until now. Now, if someone turns on the TV [and it's being delivered over the same IP stream], it means you have to start managing right away."

The company, however, isn't excluding business service with the 100, noting that it can be used to deploy MPLS and VPLS-based VPNs.

One of the more compelling selling points of the new platform is the ability to shift any network resource to any part of the network. Because 95% of the DSLAMs in the field are based on ATM, managing new services like IPTV becomes more difficult as more subscribers sign up, Wanders said. Redback is pushing carriers toward individual subscriber management.

"By managing individual subs, it means you can support IPTV on ATM environments and IP environments," he said. "The average age of an ATM DSLAM in the network is only 18 months. There is no way they can just write that off so you have to manage around it."