Quintum (News - Alert) Technologies announced that TOHO Cinemas, the movie entertainment division of Toho Co., Ltd, has deployed a VoIP network with Tenor VoIP MultiPath switches and gateways to more than 30 cinemas in Japan. This deployment integrates the Asterisk (News - Alert)-based phone system with the PBXs present already at each of the sites.

 

TOHO wanted to deploy an IP-based phone system with new IP phone extensions to all the cinema’s screening rooms using a cost-effective solution. TOHO also wanted to integrate it with the PBX (News - Alert) phone system in each of the cinemas, at the same time networking all of the theaters together.

 

A VoIP network was created with an Asterisk IP telephone server which connected all of the theaters together and integrated the new IP telephony network with all of the PBXs present in the theaters. Hence, TOHO succeeded in creating a single network which combines voice and data, including Internet access and mail on their VPN service.

 

Quintum’s Tenor helped TOHO to centralize their information line, making use of Asterisk’s interactive voice recognition (IVR) capability. This automated the routing of incoming calls to information operators who were available then. TOHO will be expanding this capability by adding a synthetic speech application for offering movie information for each branch.

 

TOHO and YCS, Quintum’s reseller in Japan worked together to develop the plan for integrating the new features in the TOHO network. YCS introduced Tenor VoIP MultiPath switches and gateways. These are capable of easy ‘drop in’ to a telephony network with legacy PBXs and require almost no reconfiguration or modifications to existing communications equipment.

 

Tenor VoIP gateway has been installed at all of the 30 cinema locations for providing VoIP connectivity between the theaters for integrating legacy PBXs with Asterisk IP phone system. Now all of the phone calls will be sent over the IP using the existing business phone system itself.

 

“We selected Quintum Tenors because they easily integrated our IP capabilities with our legacy telephones,” said Hisashi Kikuchi, engineer for TOHO Cinemas General Affairs Office information system. “Quintum’s product is extremely stable, and has the added benefit that it can easily be managed remotely. In fact, with its rich feature set, the Quintum VoIP gateway has become core to our network.”

 

TOHO Cinemas’ implementation is an excellent example of how companies are deploying VoIP in their networks to add new capabilities while leveraging the investment in their existing voice infrastructure, commented Chuck Rutledge (News - Alert), vice president of marketing for Quintum.

 

“TOHO was able to gain key benefits with added capabilities and lower costs at a fraction of the price of ‘fork-lifting’ out their existing PBXs for a complete IP telephony system replacement,” he concluded.

 

Quintum Technologies is a subsidiary of Network Equipment Technologies (News - Alert), Inc.  Quintum offers VoIP solutions designed for high reliability and optimum voice clarity. Its VoIP access solutions integrate easily into existing PBX and IP infrastructures, and is suitable for service providers and enterprises.