ANPI Working with BroadSoft and Sonus on Unified Communications Solution for Rural Carriers and Service Providers

By Laura Stotler, TMCnet Contributing Editor

Delivering broadband coverage and associated services to the rural portions of the U.S. is no easy feat, even after decades of advances. And yet demand for connectivity and unified communications services is on the rise in rural regions. Service provider ANPI is aiming to meet the increasing demand, by giving small phone companies and services providers the resources to deliver solutions within their communities.

ANPI, which has been in the business of providing long-distance services for 18 years, knows all about rural local exchange carriers and service providers since the company is owned by a collective of 125 of those companies. Chief Marketing Office David Byrd attended ITEXPO (News - Alert) in Miami recently and spoke exclusively to TMC’s (News - Alert) Peter Bernstein about the company’s plans in the unified communications space.

With a customer base of nearly 800 carriers located throughout the U.S., ANPI collectively supports nearly six million individual access lines. Byrd says the rural community is clamoring for broadband connectivity and services, and the farming community is one example of an underserved but highly evolving vertical market.

“One of my staff is married to a farmer, and he actually goes online and he does his own trading of his products,” said Byrd. And the technological evolution toward the Internet of Things, along with M2M communications, opens up possibilities for automated soil temperature testing, crop management and inventory control, to name a few applications. But of course, all of these features require solid broadband connectivity and associated unified communications applications.

And ANPI is working on a solution, an entire unified communications package that they plan to roll out later this year. “We’re not talking about just a platform,” said Byrd. “We’re delivering all of the functionality of the BroadSoft (News - Alert) UC-1 as well as providing the marketing support, sales training, collateral, branded portals, everything that they need to go into the business.”

Available as a white label solution, the offering is the result of a partnership with BroadSoft as well as Sonus Networks (News - Alert), which is providing their Session Border Controllers (SBCs), gateways and network policy solution. These are being integrated with BroadSoft’s offering to deliver UC services from ANPI’s national network of switching centers.

The end result of the collaborative effort will be the availability of a go-to-market UC solution for rural LECs and services providers, which they can deliver at a relatively low cost while enjoying a high ROI.

(source: http://www.lyncvoiceuc.com/topics/lyncvoiceuc/articles/375170-anpi-working-with-broadsoft-sonus-unified-communications-solution.htm)