The agreement will lead to reduced management costs for service providers and property owners because IPORT's advanced service provisioning features will enable hotel guests and apartment residents to choose the Internet access and billing process they require without intervention. Ascend's family of products provide service providers with maximum flexibility in building solutions for their customers because they support all major variants of DSL including IDSL, ADSL and SDSL.
"DSL is clearly going to be a winner in Internet access," said Ashok Dhawan, general manager, High Speed Access for Ascend. "Integrating our DSL MAX 20 and DSL TNT access concentrator products with ATCOM's software gives us one of the most complete broadband access solutions available for the MDU market, and will further encourage the adoption of DSL by making it much easier for service providers to sell differentiated services into hotels, apartment blocks and offices."
"Ascend is one of the major players building the Internet infrastructure, and this agreement gives us access to their technology and worldwide customer base," said Steve Nye, ATCOM/INFO's CEO. "The solution will succeed because it gives service providers what we call the 4Ps of high-speed Internet access: plug and play; provisioning; policy management; and portal."
The joint solution from ATCOM/INFO and Ascend will be easy to install - it is plug and play at both the end user's PC and for the DSL modem. The solution will be able to provision grades of service without intervention from the service provider or building manager, reducing maintenance costs and improve service to customers. To give service providers and property owners flexibility, it will be able to manage price, billing method and web provisioning policies on a port-by-port basis. For example, executive hotel rooms can have free Internet access while other rooms charge for use. Finally, it will enable properties to build their brands and offer extra services to its guests or tenants by providing a portal that users must pass through to reach the Internet.
Two of Ascend's access products are tailored to the needs of MDUs: the DSL MAX™ 20, for small and medium-sized installations; and the DSL TNT™, for large installations. Ascend's DSL MAX 20 WAN access switch is a compact and cost-effective Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) access concentrator that enables service providers to offer tiered services based on speed and application requirements of their users. The DSL TNT™ is a carrier-class access concentrator with integrated routing that gives large corporations and network service providers a high-capacity, multiservice platform for building high-speed access networks.
About ATCOM/INFO
Based in San Diego, ATCOM/INFO is the leading provider of services and software for public high-speed Internet access. ATCOM/INFO Internet systems are targeted for use in public facilities and the hospitality market segment throughout the United States and the world, including airports, hotels, convention centers and other public areas. ATCOM/INFO's mission is to provide superior software products and services for information delivery to users in public places. This includes pay-per-use public Internet ports (IPORT Internet Access System), kiosk management software and custom software solutions designed to meet specific customer needs. For more information on ATCOM/INFO, please call 619-699-4003, fax at 619-699-4040, or visit their Web site at http:/www.atcominfo.com.
