We live in an age when awards and honors are no longer rare. Yet, there remain unsung heroes and innovators out there whose efforts deserve some sort of recognition. This is particularly true of those who help bring forth emerging technologies of enormous importance, such as IMS.

To remedy this situation, TMC (News - Alert) is pleased to announce the debut of a new award, the IMS Leadership Award, established “to recognize outstanding achievement in the IP Communications community and their superlative products, services and technologies relating to IP Multimedia Subsystem (News - Alert) .”

The companies and their products or services listed in this issue are recognized by the IMS Leadership Award for being both innovative to an outstanding degree and for being successful from a market perspective. The products or services must have made a major contribution to the success of both the company developing/deploying them and the IMS industry as a whole.

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Engage Communications has chosen GENBAND's G6 Universal Media Gateway (News - Alert) and C2 Signaling Controller to provide telephony services in Key West, Florida. Engage provides security/fire alarm systems, video surveillance, access control systems and telephone systems to residential and business customers throughout the Florida Keys. The company chose GENBAND (News - Alert) in conjunction with Sylantro Systems to enable VoIP services for a new triple play service offering being rolled out in Key West. Targeted for the residential and hospitality market, the new converged service offering will provide a more cost-effective combination of voice, video, and
Internet service.
www.genband.com

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Cedar Point Communications (News - Alert) announced a new trial of its SAFARI C3 Multimedia Switching System with Plymouth State University in Plymouth, NH. As part of a comprehensive evaluation of VoIP technologies, Plymouth State will deploy SAFARI C3 to a pilot group of faculty, administration and students. The University will use the SAFARI C3's unique architecture to support SIP-based residential devices in dormitories and TDM and VoIP applications for its offices.
www.cedarpointcom.com

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Telecom giants IBM (News - Alert) and Nortel announced that, together, they've reached a new network convergence landmark. As a consequence of their partnership, customers of both companies now have access to a wide range of devices which can be accessed from any network - be it wireline, wireless or DSL/cable broadband. The agreement also enables the inclusion of Nortel  (News - Alert) fixed/mobile convergence (FMC) and VoIP applications in IBM's carrier solutions.
www.ibm.com
www.nortel.com

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CounterPath Solutions announced that its eyeBeam 1.5 softphone is now interoperable with NeuStar's (News - Alert) Presence Platform (PSP). That means operators deploying the PSP have the ability to deliver personalized presence-enabled communications - including smart-call routing based on presence information and VoIP-to-video calling - to customers using the eyeBeam 1.5 softphone on their PCs.
www.counterpath.com
www.neustar.biz

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According to Siemens (News - Alert) Communications' vice president of product planning Luc Roy, the real benefit - and the feature that four out of five enterprises truly covet - is single number and single mailbox functionality, which is a key part of Siemens' newly announced FMC solution. The idea of being able to have but one number on a business card, and having only one voice mailbox to check, offers benefits above and beyond seamless mobility. "While the 'sexiest' part of the solution is the seamless roaming, the most popular feature is the single number/single voicemail capability," expressed Roy. "That's actually the meat behind this solution."
www.siemens.com

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VoIP infrastructure solution supplier Sonus Networks (News - Alert) has announced that the latest release of its IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS)-ready solution now includes IMS standards-based support for billing between different service providers' IP voice networks. The latest release includes support for a standards-based feature, as outlined by the 3GPP, that enables operators to track individual calls throughout their own network and when the call is handed off to other network operators. Sonus claims to be one of the first telecommunications vendors supporting this IMS-required billing feature.
www.sonusnet.com

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NexTone announced it has been selected by Avaya for Platinum membership in the Avaya DeveloperConnection (News - Alert) program. Platinum is the highest level of membership available. The NexTone IntelliConnect System interoperates with Avaya's (News - Alert) suite of enterprise Internet telephony products, including Avaya Communication Manager, the Avaya SIP Enablement Server, and Avaya Meeting Exchange, to deliver high-quality, secure, and cost-effective business SIP trunking services that replace costly ISDN trunks.
www.nextone.com
www.avaya.com

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Polycom (News - Alert) announced the availability of its new real-time media conferencing platform, Polycom RMX 2000. The platform is designed to simplify delivery and management multipoint video and unified conferencing, both within enterprises and through service provider IP networks. Polycom based its new platform on AdvancedTCA (News - Alert) technology, optimizing the system for use on IP networks. The solution, which is based on open architecture and industry standards (SIP, H.232, IMS, Linux, XML, etc.), was designed from the ground up to be at the core of a unified communications network.
www.polycom.com

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MetaSwitch (News - Alert) and Calix announced the successful completion of joint H.248 interoperability testing, providing carriers a compelling combined solution for advanced IP-based services on copper and fiber networks, and a smooth and cost effective migration to converged packet-based access networks based on IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) standards. The integrated solution has been welcomed by joint Calix and MetaSwitch customers, such
as innovative service providers PCS1
and MNSi.
www.metaswitch.com

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MetaSwitch also announced the availability of a new component in its industry-leading UC9000 Unified Communications application suite. The UC9000 Conference Server combines standards-based SIP conferencing control with a reservation-less "meet-me" conference application and an easy-to-use web-based management interface. Capable of supporting conference calls of up to 500 participants, the MetaSwitch UC9000 Conference Server offers the industry's most flexible, realtime conference capabilities for service providers and their enterprise customers. Delivering a full-featured, SIP-based conference solution UC9000 Conference Server enables moderators to easily set up conferences via an intuitive web interface, and control participant interaction and call flow via the phone interface or through the web. www.metaswitch.com