SoVerNet picks FutureWei for network build

FutureWei is breaking into the U.S. wireline market, albeit not with the massive contracts it wants, but in a more traditional way.

The North American subsidiary of Chinese vendor Huawei today announced that it has signed a deal with SoVerNet, a competitive carrier and ISP based in Bellows Fall, Vt. Under a three-year contract, FutureWei will provide SoVerNet with its OptiX Metro M800 OC3/12 and OptiX Metro M1600 OC48/192 platforms and assist SoVerNet in building out two Sonet rings across the state.

SoVerNet, which has about 9000 access lines, targets mostly small businesses though it also counts about 2000 residential customers. Previously, the company was using a star network configuration to connect its collocation points within the central offices of Verizon and other CLECs, said Tom Lyons, president of SoVerNet.

“This has really given us a great deal more redundancy and more flexibility in terms of growth,” he said. “[FutureWei] offered the most robust solution for the best price. They really stepped up when it comes to the support contact. It could not have been more seamless.”

The deal also ups the capacity of what SoVerNet can offer, providing OC-3 or Gigabit Ethernet handoffs to the PSTN, he added.

The company will continue using Adtran’s Integrated Access Devices at the customer premises, delivering bundles of voice and data typically running over a leased DSL loop.

“We’re typically delivering speeds that will range up to 1.5 Mb/s,” Lyons said. “Sometimes we deliver just channelized T-1s and we’ll break that out into voice and data, but most of the time it’s a full bundle over DSL.”