Aculab's GroomerII provides signalling for Cincinnati Bell Telephone's Next Generation 9-1-1 network

Date: 04 June 2010

Aculab, a leading provider of enabling technologies for the communications market today announced that Cincinnati Bell Telephone Company (CBT) has selected Aculab’s GroomerII signalling and media gateway to provide connectivity between legacy SS7 networks and its Next Generation 9-1-1 (NG9-1-1) IP-based emergency call centres in Ohio and Kentucky. The deployment of GroomerII gateways is part of a comprehensive emergency services communications solution provided by microDATA, a leading supplier of IP-based emergency communications technologies.

Headquartered in Cincinnati, CBT provides telecommunications services to numerous municipalities within its service area, many of which maintain independent PSAP (Public Safety Answering Point) emergency services communications centres.   By implementing microDATA’s robust SIP-based NG9-1-1 system - facilitated by GroomerII - Cincinnati Bell can deliver more robust and efficient IP-based communications capabilities to emergency services providers within the framework of CBT’s reliable and resilient SS7 network. This enables emergency communications providers to improve efficiencies and manage costs.

Supporting up to 40 T1 or E1 physical connections, GroomerII has field-proven protocol stacks for SS7, SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) and many other protocols.  Within the Cincinnati Bell Telephone network, GroomerII performs SIP-to-SS7 protocol conversion to ensure all emergency calls are routed accurately.

“We serve six emergency services contact centres that are currently utilising the NG9-1-1 platform,” said Rick Powers of CBT.  “The largest of these is the City of Cincinnati, which handles about 50,000 calls per month through two operations centres.  Clearly, reliability and robust operations are essential to provide the highest standard of emergency communications. The public and the municipalities we serve expect nothing less. Aculab and microDATA intuitively understand the demands placed on emergency services contact centres, and have delivered solutions that exceed these exacting requirements.”

“We are pleased that Cincinnati Bell has chosen to integrate GroomerII into their NG9-1-1 system,” said Chris Gravett, Aculab’s Sales and Marketing Director.  “GroomerII is a robust platform designed for the type of connectivity and reliable operation a network of this import demands.  Emergency services communications require the highest possible performance and reliability levels. Aculab continues to serve the needs of this specialised market by delivering rock-solid performance and reliability time and again.”

“We are in the process of adding full physical network redundancy to the NG9-1-1 network by deploying additional GroomerII platforms,” continued Powers.  “These systems will have physically separate connections to different Signal Transfer Point (STP) switches, allowing us to ensure network resiliency and survivability in a disaster scenario.” 

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