27 July 2006
BT has announced that the trial of its next generation network, which will deliver home phone services over an IP-based system, is progressing well, with 23 million successful phone calls made.
BT will begin to migrate customers to the new 21CN phone network once the trial has been completed in November of this year.
The new network which will be used to provide home phone services for BT customers will see calls carried by IP packet technology, as opposed to the circuit switched technology used on the current analogue telephone network.
Across south east London, Kent and East Anglia BT is installing equipment upgrades so that voice services on the trial customer lines can be carried on to the core network.
At the moment 625,000 customer phone calls are being carried across the 21CN network each day.
The managing director of BT Wholesale Networks, Deb Covey said: "21CN is gathering momentum as we head towards the start of customer lines being switched to the new network in South Wales in November.
"We are working with the rest of the industry to finalise the UK rollout plan. It's full steam ahead as we prepare sites across the country for equipment to be installed this summer."
At BT's annual general meeting this year the company's chairman Sir Christopher Bland outlined that BT wanted to be seen as a modern communication services provider rather than an old fashioned Telco.
The chairman revealed at the meeting that BT would aim to provide "what millions of customers want – using the internet to make cheap international phone calls, or using the broadband network to deliver the BT Vision TV service later this year."
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