NET2PHONE LAUNCHES VoIP WITH PUERTO RICAN CARRIER

Liberty Cablevision in Puerto Rico last week launched a limited cable telephony trial with voice-over-IP provider Net2Phone with hopes of expanding the service throughout the island within the next 18 months. The move would make Puerto Rico the first to host a large-scale cable-based VoIP system.

VoIP service is now in a three-month, 100-subscriber pilot. That will be followed by a 5000-subscriber proof-of-scale trial and a commercial launch to the franchise's 125,000 subscribers, who only recently started receiving high-speed data and interactive cable TV services.

Liberty Cablevision is owned by Liberty Media, which also is a majority shareholder for Net2Phone.

“We are only utilizing three nodes; we're not doing it throughout the system,” said Jose Alegria, Liberty Cablevision's general manager.

The gradual rollout gives Liberty time to finish upgrading its two-way plant. It also lets Net2Phone work the kinks out of an end-to-end VoIP system that initially will target high-speed data subscribers using Motorola cable modems, said Michael Pastor, broadband technologies vice president of Net2Phone.

“In the long run, to achieve the penetration levels you want to achieve, you need to sell this to subscribers who are not also opting for high-speed data,” he said.

The cable system will bundle voice, video and data services. Liberty will handle provisioning, installation and customer service, and Net2Phone will deliver the technical platform, including the soft switches and billing.

VoIP will bring features not available from incumbent provider Puerto Rico Telephone — which is owned by Verizon Communications — at lower prices, Pastor said. The test will determine the exact pricing program — cellular or incumbent-like, he said.

“We want it to be 30% less expensive than what they get today.” Pastor. “Liberty [Media] has a desire to roll out telephony services to their 20 million owned or majority-owned cable subscribers around the world.”

Puerto Rico makes a great test base, he added, because as a U.S. territory it has the same electrical standards and telephony infrastructure as mainland U.S. systems.

“Assuming the information that we gather during the first couple phases of the pilot is near what we are estimating and forecasting in our budgets, then we'll be here forever,” Pastor said.