NEWS BRIEFS

Austin, TEXAS — Broadwing Communications, a wholly owned subsidiary of Broadwing Inc., announced the opening of the industry’s first All-Optical Network Interoperability Lab in Austin, Texas.

Broadwing’s All-Optical Interoperability Lab enables selected optical equipment vendors to test and demonstrate cross-vendor interoperability of optical customer premise equipment (CPE), metro, edge, core, switching and routing equipment. The All-Optical Interoperability Lab ensures that Broadwing maintains its position as the leader in the optical networking arena and supports Broadwing’s proven “best-of-breed” approach.

As further evidence of the strength of this approach, five of the world’s leading optical infrastructure companies – CIENA, Cisco Systems, Corvis, Lucent Technologies and Nortel Networks – have agreed to participate in Broadwing’s state-of-the-art testing facility. These leading companies will supply gear to Broadwing for evaluation and potential certification.

The All-Optical Interoperability Lab will contain equipment currently in-use in Broadwing’s optical network. Additional equipment from participating vendors will continue to be added over time to ensure Broadwing maintains its position as the premier all-optical network provider.

According to Chris Rothlis, vice president of Engineering at Broadwing Communications, “Broadwing has caught the attention of the industry by demonstrating consistent leadership in the optical space. This All-Optical Interoperability Lab is another milestone toward our deployment of the world’s first end-to-end all optical network.” Rothlis added, “CIENA, Cisco, Corvis, Lucent and Nortel Networks are the premier providers of optical equipment. Their participation will help ensure that our business customers enjoy unsurpassed network speed and reliability for their high-bandwidth applications.”

Broadwing is designing its all-optical network to meet the rapidly growing need across the business spectrum for additional network capacity and to provide bandwidth on demand to fulfill the network speed, simplicity and flexibility requirements of New Economy businesses. The all-optical technology that Broadwing is implementing will ultimately cut the time and reduce the costs associated with adding more channels to existing optical fiber, because it minimizes the need for signal regeneration.

Broadwing’s Interoperability Lab is the next milestone in the company’s deployment of an end-to-end all-optical network. In July, Broadwing became the first provider to transmit 10-Gigabit signals over the longest terrestrial distance without signal regeneration – 4,000 kilometers or 2,685 miles.

Broadwing Communications is a wholly owned subsidiary of Broadwing Inc. Broadwing combines customer service with an advanced and flexible 18,000 mile next-generation fiber optic network and award-winning IP backbone to create data and Internet solutions that are innovative, reliable, and provide businesses a competitive advantage. Broadwing can be found on the Web at http://www.broadwing.com .

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