Tuesday, February 6, 2007

Cisco inks key rural IPTV deal

Ed Gubbins (2.5.07)

http://telephonyonline.com/independent/news/telecom_cisco_inks_key/


Cisco Systems is vying to become a one-stop shop for rural telcos planning to offer IPTV.

The vendor announced a partnership this week with SES Americom, the satellite video provider that will supply rural telcos with prepackaged video content through a unique deal with the National Rural Telephone Cooperative. Cisco will act as a chief infrastructure supplier and integrator for customers of that offering.

In recent months, Cisco has also voiced an interest in becoming a more intimate strategic partner to carriers, convincing them to standardize their networks on Cisco architecture.

Cisco says it's willing to use other vendors' gear in some cases if individual customers want it. And it will offer two choices of middleware providers: NDS and Siemens. Although VOD is not yet a part of the IP-Prime offering, Cisco expressed an interest in adding its own VOD offerings to the mix in time.



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