BellSouth announces Lucent, Nortel packet deployments

BellSouth today deployed IP Centrex services throughout its network using Lucent gear and announced its first deployment of packet switching gear into its network core using a tandem switch from Nortel.

BellSouth’s IP Centrex service is its first hosted voice-over-IP product. Until now BellSouth has supported customers’ on-site IP PBXs, but it is now bringing those enhanced features into its network, selling them to enterprises and large businesses that want to make gradual or partial transition from switched to IP services.

"We’re letting our customers take a building block approach," said Mark Kaish, vice president of next generation solutions for BellSouth. "A lot of our customers want the enhanced features that IP offers, but they don’t want to abandon Centrex entirely. They can use this solution to migrate to IP on their own pace."

The Lucent iMerge gateways sit directly in front of the Class 5 switch, splitting the Centrex traffic from the outbound data stream and redirecting it to the circuit switch while sending IP-enhanced feature traffic to Lucent’s EBS Communication Manager system. The set-up essentially gives customers to hosted-IP services without making the full transition to an end-to-end softswitched environment, Kaish said.

But that full IP deployment is in the offing, Kaish pointed out, hinting that BellSouth would be making an announcement about its full VoIP and network softswitching deployments in the next month or two. Following the building block approach, Kaish said, BellSouth wants to offer the capabilities enhanced feature set first and then offer the cost savings of VoIP next.

On the core side, however, BellSouth is looking for cost-savings and efficiencies in its own network. While it is commercially deploying the Nortel switch in a tandem office, it hasn’t committed to any mass Class 4 replacement, Kaish said. Also, while BellSouth will deploy Nortel’s full Succession 2000 softswitch, it won’t be using the enhanced feature sets. Instead the carrier wants to trial it as a switching workhorse, taking a much heavier load than any Class 4 circuit switch. BellSouth will deploy Nortel’s Succession TDM-to-packet gateways through central offices in the Memphis market, and let the softswitch handle the tandem transfer load. But Kaish cautioned that BellSouth has not yet committed to a full packet migration in its core.

"We’re going to see what we learn from this," Kaish said. "If this works out, then the next time we need another tandem switch, hopefully we’ll go with this technology."