Boston Globe. Acquisition a marriage of telecom convergence
boston.com
By Hiawatha Bray, Globe Staff, 08/04/98
Ascend Communications Inc.'s $843 million acquisition of Stratus
Computer Inc. might be called a marriage of convergence. At first
glance, the two companies seem to come from opposite sides of the
track. Ascend makes computer data switches, while Stratus makes
super-reliable computers for the telephone industry and others.
But throughout the world, telephone networks
and computer data networks are ceasing to be
separate systems. Instead, they're converging
into a powerful unified system that can transmit
any kind of information quickly and cheaply.
Phone companies and Internet service
providers are spending billions to make it
happen. Ascend could get a larger share of that
market with Stratus in its stable.
Stratus's key contribution to the partnership is
its expertise in a little-known but vital
communications network called Signaling System 7, or SS7.
A telephone is actually a simple computer terminal. Dialing a number
sends a set of commands to phone company computers, telling them how
to handle the call. These commands used to be carried over the same
wires that handle the calls themselves, but today, the commands are
routed over a set of wires that only carries information about how to
handle calls.
That's what SS7 does. When you pick up a phone and dial a number, the
telephone communicates with an SS7 computer that interprets the
numbers you dial and figures out who you're calling. This information is
sent over the SS7 network to a computer at the receiving end. These two
SS7 computers send the correct commands to the telephone company's
switches, and the call goes through.
''Telephone switches are getting dumber and dumber,'' said Annabel
Dodd, a telecommunications consultant and adjunct professor at
Northeastern University. ''The really complicated stuff is in the Signaling
System 7 part of it.''
For instance, the SS7 computers collect the billing information on
long-distance calls. They also run the popular ''value-added'' services that
generate big profits for phone companies, such as voice mail and
call-waiting service.
Telephone companies demand extremely high reliability, which is why so
many of them use Stratus computers to run their SS7 networks. Stratus
makes machines that are ''fault-tolerant,'' or able to keep going even if a
part fails. Each Stratus machine contains two of everything - processors,
disk drives, and so on. Each computer is actually two computers. Both
run constantly, doing the same tasks at the same times. If a part breaks, its
mirror-image component never misses a beat, so the system never stops
working.
These days, most of the growth in telecommunications traffic comes from
data transmissions, not voice calls. Traditional phone switches, designed
for short conversations, are being flooded by Internet users who stay
connected for hours at a time. Ascend is devising switching equipment that
will pick out calls to Internet providers and route them over a different
circuit, leaving the switch free for voice traffic.
But new systems are allowing data networks to handle voice calls as well,
by translating the sound into digital data. Major phone companies like the
long-distance carrier Sprint have announced plans to set up unified
networks that carry voice and data over the same lines, thus saving the
huge expense of maintaining separate networks.
Ascend makes the data relay switches that will be at the heart of such
networks. With Stratus, it now has access to the SS7 equipment needed
to provide high-quality phone service over advanced data networks.
''As the next generation network is built with more of a data backbone,
the key will be to provide the same kinds of services that make the voice
network so rich,'' said Stratus chief executive Bruce Sachs.
This story ran on page C01 of the Boston Globe on 08/04/98.
c Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company.
|
