Broadsoft, GenBand integrate to boost IP transition

BroadSoft and Genband today announced they are integrating BroadSoft’s hosted telephony and multimedia applications and servers with Genband’s gateway products to better enable telecom service providers to replace Class 4/Class 5 TDM switches with all IP infrastructure. The goal is to encourage service providers to replace TDM switches by providing a migration path that generates new revenues upfront as well as reduces churn.

The two companies have worked together in the past – Broadsoft also acquired Genband’s M6 product line in 2008, when it also acquired Sylantro – but have achieved new levels of integration with this partnership and can now support narrowband applications in addition to broadband apps to better enable a service provider transition to all-IP, said Scott Hoffpauir, Broadsoft’s co-founder and chief technology officer.  Service providers can use the integrated system to support legacy applications and VoIP over a single platform.

“We have had a lot of success providing VoIP solutions over broadband,” Hoffpauir said. “One thing that we did in putting our solution together with Genband is that we now have something we can provide to narrowband subscribers. I think a lot of our customers, especially CLECs, their focus is on broadband, but they have an established base of narrowband users, and this is a way of giving them an option of migrating those customers to a new network, which can save them money.”

“From a customer experience, this is a seamless solution that they are able to secure from two best-of-breed players that will work right out of the box,” said Bob Kersey, vice president of business development at Genband. “We have been doing this for quite some time. We have gone through a very rigorous analysis of the solution from end to end.”

The integrated solution will support  residential broadband services over multiple interfaces including GR-303, V5.2 and TR-08; business services including both IP-PBXs and traditional PBXs and key systems; hosted PBX services over any IP connection and IP peering and transport.  

In addition, the integrated BroadSoft-Genband approach can support a variety of switch sizes, enabling service providers to replace the full range of existing systems, Kersey said.

And while both companies continue to work with other partners, the tight integration they are achieving with the Genband gateways and BroadSoft applications makes this a unique offering, Kersey said.

“You need something to convert the legacy access to VoIP, and Genband has that,” Hoffpauir said. “You can take legacy analog lines and convert them, and then you need feature functionality, which BroadSoft provides, then a gateway to interconnect to the PSTN, which Genband also provides.”

“We provide a path for service providers to truly do a migration from what they have today, starting with broadband telephony, to increase revenues, and then a Class 5 overlay to reduce churn and finally a full Class 5 migration, to reduce expense and just run one network,” Kersey said. “One of the keys to our value proposition is that service providers now have the ability to do this at their own pace, supported by both companies who are there to enable a methodical migration.”