Progress Telecom Selects Ciena for Next Generation Network
Major regional service provider using CN 4200 and CN 3600 to upgrade and expand network for delivery of advanced SONET/SDH, Ethernet and wavelength services
St. Petersburg, Fla., and Linthicum, Md. — 01/20/2006Progress Telecom, a leading broadband and wireless services provider, today named Ciena® Corporation (Nasdaq: CIEN), the network specialist, as a key supplier in the evolution and expansion of its existing network for next-generation services. In a competitive review, Progress Telecom selected Ciena’s CN 4200™ FlexSelect™ Advanced Services Platform for 10G DWDM metro and regional transport and CN 3600™ Intelligent Optical Multiservice Switch for international gateway and SONET/SDH applications.
Progress Telecom operates one of the largest regional networks in the United States spanning 8,254 route-miles of fiber, 29 metro networks and 10 states from Florida to New York. The service provider delivers a variety of broadband services to its carrier, ISP and large enterprise customers, including SONET/SDH conversion, private line, wavelength, Ethernet and Internet Protocol (IP) services. Progress Telecom’s nearly 200 points of presence range from carrier hotels and undersea cable landing stations to wireless network towers and end-user locations, putting a wide variety of operating requirements on its network equipment.
“As part of our next-generation network strategy, we want to evolve our network to one that maximizes service opportunities, reduces overall costs and quickly adapts to changing customer requirements given that a key differentiator for us is fast customer response time,” said Elizabeth Walker, senior vice president of Network Engineering and Operations, Progress Telecom. “Ciena is able to deliver compact platforms with the tunable optical innovations and converged services flexibility we need to evolve and expand our network. The solutions enable us to deliver a mix of services from a variety of locations to quickly support our customers’ changing service needs without changing the network.”
In the initial deployments, Ciena’s CN 4200 is creating a 10G DWDM backbone for aggregating and transporting Ethernet, IP and other services between metro networks, such as New York to Washington, D.C., while the CN 3600 is providing a single platform that supports next-generation translation, transport and switching of both SONET and SDH for its international gateway locations and metro SONET/SDH services.
“This is a key win for Ciena, not only because we are replacing competing equipment, but also because it highlights that buying decision criteria are changing,” said Mike Aquino, vice president, Americas, at Ciena. “No longer is it simply about getting a wavelength from point A to point B. Now, equipment is being evaluated for how it can converge services, take costs out of the business or improve service quality. In response, Ciena’s CN 4200 offers software-programmable ports, low power consumption and compact size to deliver tangible business benefits to our customers and reinforce our focus on delivering specialized solutions.”
About Ciena’s CN 4200 and CN 3600
Ciena’s CN 4200 is the flagship product of Ciena’s FlexSelect Architecture, a standards-based, service-oriented approach to building next-generation network infrastructures. The CN 4200 is a multiservice transport and aggregation platform capable of on-demand support for any transport protocol—including SONET/SDH, Ethernet, storage (Fibre Channel, FICON, ESCON) or video—at any speed on any available port using the industry's first universal line card with individual user-programmable ports. Ciena’s CN 3600 is a next-generation multiservice provisioning platform designed to seamlessly integrate next-generation DCS (digital cross-connect), SONET/SDH ADM (add-drop multiplexer), international gateway and Ethernet switching functions in a single carrier-class shelf to provide a global converged platform.
As part of its strategy to partner with companies for products and technologies that complement its own solutions, Ciena offers the CN 3600 through an OEM agreement with Turin Networks.
Ciena specializes in practical network transition. We offer leading network infrastructure solutions, intelligent software and a comprehensive services practice to help our customers use their networks to fundamentally change the way they compete. With a growing global presence, Ciena leverages its heritage of practical innovation to deliver maximum performance and economic value in communications networks worldwide. For more information, visit www.ciena.com.
Progress Telecom is a leading provider of wireless and wireline broadband network services for carrier and business customers. Through its fully redundant, facilities-based OC-192 network, Progress delivers high-quality bandwidth, flexible solutions and superior customer care to meet the needs of carriers, ISPs, and enterprise customers. Progress Telecom connects to all major regional, national and global carriers to offer services such as SONET (T1 and E1 to OC-192), SDH, private line, wavelength, metro and longhaul Ethernet transport services, wireless last mile, and IP services optimized for VoIP and other related services. Progress Telecom is jointly owned by Progress Energy (NYSE:PGN), a fortune 250 energy company headquartered in Raleigh, N.C., and Odyssey Telecorp, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based telecommunications investment firm. For more information about Progress Telecom, please visit www.progresstelecom.com.
This press release contains certain forward-looking statements based on current expectations, forecasts and assumptions that involve risks and uncertainties. These statements are based on information available to the Company as of the date hereof; and Ciena’s actual results could differ materially from those stated or implied, due to risks and uncertainties associated with its business, which include the risk factors disclosed in its Report on Form 10-K, which Ciena filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on January 12, 2006. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding Ciena’s expectations, beliefs, intentions or strategies regarding the future and can be identified by forward-looking words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “intend,” “may,” “should,” “will,” and “would” or similar words. Ciena assumes no obligation to update the information included in this press release, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
Nicole Anderson
Ciena Corporation
(877) 857 -7377
pr@ciena.com
