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UTStarcom and Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT), a leading telecoms provider in the Philippines, have just announced the deployment of 150,000 lines of UTStarcom's mSwitch IP-based softswitch platform and iAN-8000 Multiservice Access Node (MSAN) to PLDT for a new Next-Generation Network (NGN) in the Philippines. The first phase of the deployment targets unserved and underserved areas, key business locations and areas that need a capacity upgrade in Cavite, Batangas, Laguna, Bulacan and metro Manila. Additional phases of the deployment will follow in the coming months.
"PLDT is among the first operators in the world to successfully migrate its Class 5 legacy TDM-based switches to a single, all-IP softswitch platform," said David King, Senior Vice-President of International Sales and Marketing at UTStarcom: "By utilising our mSwitch, PLDT dramatically improves the operational efficiency of its network while expanding both the array of broadband and wireless services it can offer as well as the subscribers that it can reach. With more than 200 billion minutes of IP usage on an annual basis in deployments around the world, our mSwitch serves as the IP core enabler for a multitude of integrated applications and services that will drive customer revenue and increase subscriber loyalty."
Class 4 and 5 switch replacement is increasingly becoming a trend across the industry as operators around the world are currently considering their options when replacing TDM-based equipment reaching its end of life point. For all the parties involved, the deployment of UTStarcom's mSwitch next-generation technology at PLDT is a validation of UTStarcom's leading position in the Class 5 replacement market. Last year one estimate put UTStarcom at supporting 191 billion minutes of Class 5 traffic over its mSwitch NGN softswitch.
The deal represents UTStarcom's first contract in the Philippine market and demonstrates its ongoing efforts to develop the Asia-Pacific region, one of the fastest growing markets for IT and telecommunication services. "We see increasing market demand for next-generation services and applications like IPTV and VoIP in the Asia Pacific region," David King continued. "We will continue to develop the Asia-Pacific market and address the growing demand for next-generation technologies."
* Founded in 1991 and headquartered in Alameda, California, UTStarcom conducts research and design operations in the United States, China, Korea and India. It is a Fortune 1000 company.
** PLDT has three principal business groups, fixed line, wireless and information communications technology. It offers a wide range of telecommunications services across the Philippines' most extensive fibre optic backbone and fixed line, cellular and satellite network.
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