C1 Communications has taken some of the first steps to offer voice-over-digital subscriber line (VoDSL) services to its business customers across the country, thanks to a little help from San Jose, Calif.-based Jetstream Communications.
Jetstream is providing C1 with its suite of JetPowered broadband voice services solutions. With the use of Jetstream’s broadband voice services platform, the carrier-class CPX-1000, Mississauga, Ont.-based C1 will be able to provide VoDSL.
According to Steve Shaw, the director of market development at Jetstream in San Jose, Calif., there are two component pieces required in order to provide these services.
“One is an integrated access device, which sits at the customer premise and converts both the voice and data traffic into ATM,” he explained. “Then there’s the box that Jetstream makes – the gateway platform which sits within the network, typically next to a class 5 switch, and converts the ATM voice traffic back into the language, if you like, of the public switched telephone network.”
That language, in North America, is termed GR-303, he added.
A.S. (Tony) Cassetta, the president and COO of C1, noted that the announcement will enable the company to use its DSL service to provide multiple local lines to its customers at a lower cost.
C1’s customers will be able to have a mix of voice and data services off of one local loop, he said. The company intends to target the services at “small business customers who would probably benefit from the economic profile of…(having) DSL and local lines all over one loop.”
That is one of the markets that C1 is considering, but Cassetta said it would also target businesses such as outbound telemarketing companies, which need to have a lot of local service access to conduct business.
“What we’re putting our efforts around is more vertical industry focus,” Cassetta explained. “We will put together packages for customers (that) this type of service offering would appeal to. We’re not going to market it as voice over DSL. We’re simply going to market it as an access solution that has this kind of an economic profile for a particular kind of business.”
He said C1 is looking at anywhere between four and eight lines being served off of one local loop using Jetstream’s product, but the range will be dependent on how close or how far away the customer is from the central office. And as the company moves more upmarket, it intends to add more services, relative to this type of service offering.
C1 is going through a testing phase right now with Jetstream, Cassetta said, and is focusing on things such as quality of service (QoS) to be precise as to what it will guarantee – for example, the number of local lines that will be available. The issue of reliability is also of concern, he said.
