Nortel to let carriers put VoIP on a VPN

SAN FRANCISCO -- Nortel Networks plans to enhance its network gear so carriers can offer VPNs (virtual private networks) for voice calls over data networks, which can save enterprises money and management hassles, the company announced Tuesday.

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With a VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol) VPN service, enterprises could have all their voice calls from office to office carried as packet data. Internal company extensions could be used in any corporate location around the world. Employees could even use a PC at home with all the features they have on their office phones, according to John Egli, senior manager of Succession services marketing at Nortel, based in Brampton, Ontario .

Companies also could turn over to a single carrier their interoffice and long-distance voice service and leave it up to that carrier to update their network equipment when changes take place on the network. Outsourcing network management and sending voice calls over a data network can combine to cut a company's ongoing operational phone expenses by as much as 25 percent, according to Nortel.

The VoIP VPN is designed to link together four kinds of phone services platforms an enterprise may use: PBXes (private branch exchanges) and IP PBXes at corporate sites, and Centrex and IP Centrex systems at a carrier facility, Egli said. Those platforms and all the enterprise's phones can be linked over a data network. The VPN can connect to traditional PBXes and Centrex systems, as well as to the public switched telephone network, through gateway devices. Carriers can choose what package of capabilities to offer enterprises with a VoIP VPN service.

Employees working at home could use a PC just like an office phone by dialing into the VPN over a data connection. That includes receiving calls that come into the office phone, dialing with internal extensions, and being notified that a phone message is waiting. Although it is possible to use the VPN through dial-up Internet access, call quality may be poor because the call needs to travel via the open Internet until it reaches the nearest link to the VPN, so broadband is recommended, Egli said. In addition, using an authentication code, users on the road could make calls over the VPN via a traditional fixed-line or mobile phone.

At the center of VoIP VPN technology is new software and hardware for Nortel's Succession Communication Server 2000 and Succession Communication Server 2000-Compact softswitches. The new capability was unveiled along with a number of other product enhancements designed to help service providers create new services.

In the third quarter of this year, Nortel will add H.323 protocol interfaces to the Succession softswitches so they can work more directly with IP PBXes in enterprises, many of which use H.323.

Early next year, the company also will expand support for SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) in the softswitches by taking advantage of additional options in the standard. The softswitches now use SIP only to communicate among themselves. The expanded support will help the softswitches work directly with a new breed of enterprise IP PBXes that will use SIP, Egli said. It also will help to open up the softswitches to capabilities offered on third-party application servers, according to Nortel. Interoperability with a specific application server still will require some work because of issues the SIP standards don't cover, Egli added. That work will be done to meet carrier demand for certain services, he said.

Carriers should be able to start trials of VoIP VPN services in July, Egli said. Pricing of the infrastructure and of services will vary based on carrier deployment, he said.