NEWS BRIEFS

Posted: 1/2004

NEWS BRIEFS

Progress Telecom and EPIK Communications say they plan to merge, creating a larger wholesale carrier in the Southeast. Progress Energy, the parent company of Progress Telecom, will own 55 percent of the merged entity, the companies say. Telecom investment firm Odyssey Telecorp Inc., EPIKs parent company, will own the remaining interest. Odyssey Telecorp will oversee operations and lead integration of the companies.

Progress Telecom sells bandwidth to local phone companies, Internet providers, wireless operators and other telecommunications providers over an 8,230-route-mile network spanning 60 cities from New York to south Florida. EPIK also sells wholesale services to telecom companies over a southeastern regional network.

Qwest Communications International Inc. announced an amended agreement to buy assets from bankrupt Touch America Holdings Inc. and 360networks Corp. to extend its high-speed data network and support hundreds of medium-sized and large business customers buying frame relay and ATM services. Qwest has agreed to purchase switches and other network gear for $1 million, an IRU on Touch Americas network for $8 million and billing credits valued at $3 million, says Qwest spokeswoman Claire Maledon. Qwest has received government authority to provide long-distance services within its 14-state local phone territory stretching from Minnesota to Washington.

Equinix Inc. has announced the expansion of its GigE Exchange service facilitating ISP and content peering to its Singapore Internet Business Exchange center. Microsoft Corp. is the first customer to use the service for Southeast Asia.

SAVVIS Communications Corp. will use the New Edge Networks Inc. backbone to extend the national reach of the SAVVIS Intelligent IP Network. Initially, New Edge will provide SAVVIS broadband DSL reach into about 1,600 new central offices  in metropolitan areas and 360-plus small cities and towns. SAVVIS also will make use of New Edges multiservice network and New Edges existing intercarrier agreements with other broadband providers.

Level 3 Communications Inc. is supplying network services to BT Americas Inc., a U.S. subsidiary of BT plc, one of Europes providers of information and communications technology services.

The agreement stipulates BT will use Level 3s new (3)Hub Private Line and (3)Center Colocation services to expand its MPLS backbone in the Americas. BT will roll out new MPLS nodes in 15 new cities. (3) Hub Private Line is a self-service private line that lets users provision, upgrade and manage their metropolitan and long-haul circuits on an as-needed, pay-asyou- go basis.

T-Systems International plans to increase the capacity of the North American element of its international network, Telekom Global Net, with the LambdaUnite MultiService Switch (MSS), from Lucent Technologies. By upgrading the current 2.5gbps network with the LambdaUnite MSS, TSystems says it will be able to quadruple the capacity of its North American network to a full-coverage 10gbps network.