Ericsson Introduces Packet Backbone Network - A Multiservice Foundation for The New Public Network
Business Wire - May 04, 2000 16:51
STOCKHOLM, Sweden--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 4, 2000--
(NASDAQ:ERICY) Ericsson's multiservice data backbone offers high bandwidth and availability for converged Internet, business-class, and real-time voice/multimedia services.
Ericsson today announced its Packet Backbone Network (PBN) - an architectural model and portfolio of carrier-class IP & ATM data infrastructure products.
Ericsson's circuit-to-packet wireline (ENGINE) and wireless (Mobile Internet and 3G) operator transition solutions are both supported by PBN. All elements of Ericsson's PBN are now commercially available, including the newly offered AXI 540 Edge Aggregation Router.
Ericsson's architecture for the New Public Network separates backbone elements, call control intelligence and subscriber applications, and deploys them on purpose-built platforms that are optimized for each component. This de-coupling allows network operators to offer ubiquitous portability and mobility of user services such as secure transaction services, location-based information services, personalized communications tools and unified messaging while tying together wireless and wireline access over an IP or ATM-based backbone. The Ericsson PBN provides the backbone elements of this next generation network.
"Increasingly, operators' success is coming from their ability to quickly roll out and manage new services and applications that encompass data, voice and video information streams," said Mike Thurk, President of Ericsson Datacom Inc. "PBN is the first packet-based backbone network designed to meet the needs of leading-edge operators. By combining the flexibility of today's Internet with the `5-nines' quality and reliability standards, Ericsson will offer the same carrier-grade network integrity it has delivered for decades to wireline and wireless voice customers."
Ericsson's PBN portfolio includes a collection of ultra-scalable hardware platforms (AXD 301, AXI 520, AXI 540) and a comprehensive suite of management applications (Multiservice Management Suite). With PBN, operators have a rich choice for configuring highly scalable end-to-end systems for graceful transition to multiservice networks that ensures telecommunications-grade resiliency and serviceability, powerful IP border routing for peering into other IP networks, advanced QoS (Quality of Service) and network engineering capabilities, and a comprehensive management solution.
"As wireline and wireless operators optimize their networks for high volumes of data and multimedia traffic, a common backbone infrastructure is essential," said Christin Flynn, Senior Analyst of Carrier Convergence Infrastructure for the Yankee Group. "By implementing PBN as the common IP-based backbone, operators have a scalable solution to tie all of their wireless and wireline access technologies together."
Many Ericsson customers, such as British Telecom, Vodafone Airtouch, Telefonica, Telia Denmark, Diveo (Diginet Americas) and eircom, have already adopted the ENGINE/Mobile Internet transition programs and have begun deployment of platforms from the Ericsson PBN.
In order to provide network operators with optimal support for Internet/IP-based services, the PBN is designed with open standards to support state-of-the-art Internet Routing Protocols such as IP Differentiated Services (DiffServ), Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) and Border Gateway Protocol (BGP4). The PBN solution also employs Ericsson's innovative range of DWDM optical networking products known as ERIcsson Optical Networking (ERION).
Ericsson's PBN portfolio currently includes the following:
- The AXD 301 High-Performance ATM Switch scales to 160
Gigabits/second with interfaces up to OC-48/STM-16. The AXD
301 is a multiservice switch that has been optimized to handle
both real-time voice traffic and IP data traffic.
- The AXI 520 IP Core Routers are used to build highly scalable
IP core networks and provide for high-end inter-operator
peering. Available in both 4 and 8-slot versions, the AXI 520
scales to more than 40 million packets/second and links up to
OC-48/STM-16.
- The AXI 540 Edge Aggregation Router offers wire-speed routing,
high-density traffic aggregation, and advanced traffic
management features such as service differentiation, VPN
provisioning, and traffic engineering. The AXI 540 is
extremely scalable, handling up to 400 routing peers and
40,000 subscribers. In addition, the router throughput scales
to over 20 Gbit/s and more than 20 million packets per second.
Over 2,500 T1s can be terminated into the unit and it can
easily interface with frame relay, cell-based (ATM), and
circuit-switched networks.
- The Multiservice Management Suite (MMS) is a comprehensive
portfolio of carrier-class IP and ATM management applications
that provides unified management of PBN. Ericsson's MMS
provides carriers transitioning to an IP-based environment,
with a flexible management system that designs and monitors
networks, handles provisioning and billing for services, and
guarantees the quality of a carrier's service offerings.
The architecture of the MMS is standards based including a combination of Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) and central database and directory services that may be shared between the management applications. This standards based approach combined with Ericsson's integration services allows operators to utilize existing legacy systems and augment them with new management applications. MMS incorporates both Ericsson developed applications, and those from leading third party vendors.
During Q3, Ericsson plans to introduce a larger-scale IP core router that has capabilities to link up to OC-192c/STM-64 (10 Gbps) circuits. |
