Deals & contracts

Hargray Telephone Company of Hilton Head, S.C., has selected ETI Software Solutions to provision subscriber services and set-top boxes using ETI's CableBridge software. Hargray is licensing the CableBridge provisioning application. Additionally, the telco, which serves parts of South Carolina and Georgia, bought two interface licenses from ETI to support both its digital RF and IP video controllers. The purchase will eliminate the manual steps involved with activating set-tops as they are installed in customers' homes.

Tekelec announced a contract to provide its 9000 Distributed Switching Solution to Thacker-Grigsby Telephone, an 8100 access line telco in Hindman, Ky., which will use the switch to cap its legacy equipment and migrate to IP. Also, the vendor said it has signed a deal to provide its 6000 application server to One Connect IP, a New Mexico-based IP service provider serving mostly rural areas. One Connect IP will use the service to support direct- and wholesale-hosted VoIP and is expanding its coverage area to include the Rocky Mountain area and portions of California and Texas.

Zhone Technologies said Consolidated Communications is using its single line multi-service architecture for a triple-play offering of bundled voice, data and video services. Consolidated is the 15th largest telephone company in the U.S. and the largest independent telephone operator based in Illinois. As part of the service, Consolidated has deployed Zhones' multi-access line concentrator packet loop carrier.

CopperCom signed equipment contracts with Chillicothe Telephone, Sancom and Great Plains Communications. Chillicothe, the largest independent in Ohio with 37,000 access lines and a member of the Horizon Family of companies, is deploying CopperCom's converged switching eXchange switch. Sancom, a subsidiary of Santel Communications Cooperative, has selected the CSX as its switching platform for triple-play services in Mitchell, S.D. Great Plains is replacing its Class 5 switches, which service 31,000-lines with CSXs over the next five years.