Hypercom Minimizes Investment and Quality Risks of Internet Telephony in the Enterprise
November 3, 1998
PHOENIX--(BUSINESS WIRE) via NewsEdge Corporation
-- New IP Telephony Gateways Work With Existing
Router Networks; Enable
"Voice World" Traffic Prioritization; Circuit-Switching
Module Adds Automatic Back-Up
To make Internet Protocol (IP)-based voice and fax
applications reliable and economical enough for
corporate enterprises, Hypercom Network Systems is
introducing four pre-configured IP Telephony gateways
that let companies effectively prioritize voice and data
traffic across their branch networks, with virtually no
reconfiguration or upgrade to their existing router
networks. Additionally, a new module, IEN
VoiceSwitch, lets companies use existing voice
networks to back-up the Internet.
The latest additions to Hypercom's IP telephony, or
IP.tel(TM), family of gateway products, the new IP.tel
Gateways overcome the two biggest obstacles and
concerns of corporations considering migrating voice
traffic to the corporations' IP networks: the
end-to-end delay inherent in multiservice IP networks
and the cost of removing out and replacing existing
branch router hardware. The new models also
significantly reduce the capital cost of an IP telephony
gateway to below $300 per port.
The new gateways, the IP.tel 2022, 2023, 2044 and
2045, are easily expanded or "stacked" via high-speed
bus connection, allowing up to four devices to be
managed as a single node. The gateways represent a
key part of Hypercom's twofold strategy for bringing
IP-based telephony and convergence to the
enterprise. While the gateways address the issues of
private IP-based networks, Hypercom today issued a
second announcement of new IP technology that will
enable managed IP-based convergence services for
VPNs through service providers.
Minimizing Packet Delay
The new gateways effectively consolidate voice and
data traffic, giving voice the same level of service as
traditional voice networks. Connecting to " legacy"
branch office PBX voice systems and router-based
LANs, the new IP.tel Gateways act as the traffic cop
to prioritize the flow of voice and data traffic onto the
wide area network (WAN). The gateways raise the
benchmark on voice traffic prioritization available in
IP-based WANs, bringing the quality and reliability to a
par with well established services such as frame relay
and traditional "toll-quality" telephony networks.
The gateways support the leading current standards
for IP-telephony, such as H.323 and G.723.1 voice
compression, but go beyond them by adding switching
and prioritization capabilities that let administrators
define predictable, deterministic delay in the network.
The WAN-centric switching abilities of the gateways
help companies leverage the service level agreements
(SLAs) that can be obtained from carriers to guarantee
minimal delay and assign priorities to certain circuits.
Extending Existing Investments
Unlike the forklift upgrade solution proposed by
competitive router vendors, Hypercom's IP.tel Gateway
approach protects corporate investments in existing
branch router infrastructures, including those from
other leading suppliers. By simply adding WAN
switching to existing branch equipment, the gateways
let companies sharply reduce costs associated with
long distance services by using low-cost IP transport
to converge traffic and build Virtual Private Networks
(VPNs). The gateways also let companies route calls
between voice-over-IP (VoIP) and
voice-over-frame-relay (VoFR) subnetworks.
The VoiceSwitch Module leverages existing
circuit-switched telephony networks and adds
reliability to the IP voice network. The module
integrates an interface to the circuit-switched network
into IEN gateways so that, should the performance of
the IP voice network falter, IEN automatically shifts to
a traditional network for seamless performance.
Least-Cost Routing Options Increase Savings Potential
The new 2023 and 2045 gateways let companies
define, on a per-office or per-network basis, whether
the wide area service will be frame relay or IP. This
increases the ability to negotiate rates, control service
level agreements, prioritize traffic, and opt for the
lowest cost service on a call-by-call basis. The
VoiceSwitch Module includes Least-Cost Routing
capabilities that let the network automatically choose
the lowest rate service as it varies by time of day,
availability and other parameters.
According to Hypercom Network Systems President
Paul Wallner, the new products and Hypercom's
disclosure of its convergence strategy for the
enterprise are a half step ahead of demand.
"Obviously, a compelling business case for a new
technology has to include more than savings. Three
years ago, we made early strides in convergence by
solving the voice quality problems with frame relay. For
the past year we've helped carriers address these
issues with IP, and we're now seeing great interest in
IP telephony among enterprises," Wallner says. "These
new gateways make it easy for customers to combine
voice and data reliably with IP, and also to migrate
integrated networks from frame relay to IP for even
greater savings."
Cost and Availability
All four gateways will be available by December.
Model Number Voice Interface Interfaces Price
2022 Analog LAN, Ethernet $2995
2023 Analog WAN, Frame Relay or IP $2995
2044 Digital (T1 or E1) LAN, Ethernet $6995
2045 Digital (T1 or E1) WAN, Frame Relay or IP $6995
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