GTS CE launches a unique regional MPLS network for retail customers

29.08.07

The leading central European fixed-line telecommunications group GTS Central European Holding B.V. (GTS CE) officially launches its unique regional MPLS network for retail customers. The MPLS network is a single robust and high-quality entity that covers five GTS CE countries (Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and the Czech Rep.) with a single Network Operation Center located in Prague. Using this network, companies operating throughout Europe can link their regional branch offices with fully sufficient and secure state-of-the-art data connection.

This is a ground breaking product launch as it provides a truly cross border MPLS network. Most international MPLS networks are simply a number of national networks linked together but now GTS CE offers customers a single Central-European wide MPLS network. As such, GTS CE customers can benefit from the following substantial technical and financial advantages:

• lower costs (a single network is cheaper to operate and run than several linked together)
• more robust networking (a single managed network run by GTS CE rather than several networks managed by different companies)
• higher network availability
• higher quality parameters
• quicker repair time
• centralized performance management and pro-active network maintenance

“This is a really significant product launch,” commented Stuart Evers, Chief Sales Officer of GTS CE. “To have a single, managed network covering the entire Central European region is unique. Our customers have been demanding a product like this from the market for some time and we are delighted to the ones to provide it. Even before the launch we seen phenomenal demand from large retail customers across the region and we now expect this to increase even further.”

Tamas Polgar, Chief Executive Officer of GTS CE, added: “This is a notable event as it sees GTS CE leverage our key competitive advantage – our regional network footprint. We are never the largest operator in the local markets in which we compete but once we move outside a single country and look at the market on a regional basis the situation changes and we see that GTS CE is a major player. The so called market leaders against whom we compete cannot boast of a product such as this…we have a unique position in the Central European market. Now the goal is to pass these benefits on to our customers.”

The company Palace Cinemas has used the new MPLS network within the pilot operations. The company interconnected its multiplexes and branches in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary through it. The new network provided for e.g. using the remote access function by mobile users or establishing a central booking and accounting system.

MPLS is the most powerful and secure IP technology available today. MPLS technology provides a unified network to assure data and voice communication among customer localities with QoS (Quality of Service), SLA (Service Level Agreement) - logically and securely separated customer VPN (Virtual Private Network) with various Value Added Features. All these features are now available from GTS CE on a single managed MPLS network across the entire Central European region.