Charter Expands ARRIS Deal in Move to Add VoIP Markets

ARRIS says it has received new orders from Charter Communications for its Cadant C4 Cable Modem Termination System (CMTS), Touchstone Telephony Modems and G2 IMS Management Platform.

As discussed in this month’s XCHANGE cover story, Charter Communications is offering primary line VoIP service in Wausau, Wisc., to approximately 2,000 residential customers. (That’s in addition to the approximately 23,500 TDM customers representing 31,000 lines on a Class 5 switch in metropolitan St Louis.)

ARRIS had the initial contract through which it provided Charter with CMTS and network interface unit gear. (Nortel supplied the gateways and switches for the Wausau VoIP deployment.)

The XCHANGE story mentioned that Charter plans to expand VoIP to several other Wisconsin communities and launch two additional VoIP markets in 2004, as well as having VoIP in its top eight to 10 markets within the next several years. The new shipments of ARRIS VoIP equipment are scheduled to be deployed in those two other Charter franchises, which have not been publicly disclosed. These deployments are expected to result in the addition of tens of thousands of carrier-grade VoIP lines during 2004, according to ARRIS.

Charter says its package of VoIP-based local and long-distance services are about 15 percent less expensive than what the ILEC offers. Charter also told XCHANGE that it currently manages several outsource relationships for some VoIP back office/support services, but would not specify for what or from whom.

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