Pannaway pushes into back office

Pannaway Technologies, which has been most known as an access vendor for the independent telco market, is launching a new version of its element management system that puts the company more into the provisioning and management market.

The next-generation Broadband Access Manager (BAM) Server allows carriers to provision, test, trouble shoot and manage broadband access networks from either the central office or a remote terminal DSLAM to the customer premises. The company designed the new server in part because its existing customers were finding that managing voice, high-speed and video was becoming more intricate.

“Provisioning is a lot more complex than when you providing just dialtone,” said Mike Skubisz, chief technology officer of Pannaway.

The BAM, which also is targeted at the IOC market, comes with a graphical user interface and is being marketed as an integrated, turn-key management system in a 1RU appliance. The unit also is designed with a client/server architecture that allows operators to access it from any browser-equipped computer.

Like some other operational support system, the BAM comes with a variety of features such as auto network discovery and automated subscriber management. However, recognizing that many independents also are the cusp of deploying VoIP services, Pannaway also included a SIP Call Control Manager (CCM) Configuration that remotely provisions SIP and PSTN services.

Additionally, the server lets carriers dynamically schedule firmware and site wide updates and via pre-defined templates. In the case of upgrades and other operational changes, the vendor has configured software to allow carriers to program in changes once and then multicast those upgrades to CPE.

“We like to think that this has made things a lot easier,” Skubisz said. “The bonding between the network and server becomes automatic. We’re trying to be more than just an element management system.”