AFC, Cable & Wireless, Ericsson and Nortel Networks Join Multiservice Switching Forum; 2004-2005 Board of Directors Announced

Business Wire, April 29, 2004

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 29, 2004

The Multiservice Switching Forum (MSF) announced at its quarterly Technical Committee meeting today that telecom industry giants Advanced Fibre Communications (AFC), Cable & Wireless, Ericsson and Nortel Networks have joined the Forum. With the inclusion of Ohio-based Applied Innovation, a network management solutions company and Holland's Teledata Networks, a wireline access platform maker, six new members have joined the MSF in 2004.

"The MSF is proud to welcome these new members," said Roger Ward, MSF president. "It's especially gratifying when so many industry luminaries join at the same time. I'm confident that each of these new members will make significant contributions to the MSF's ongoing technical and interoperability programs."

"The new membership of six industry powerhouses is a clear sign that the MSF has assumed a leadership role in the VoIP and packet communications arena," said Graham Beniston, analyst at Heavy Reading.

In other news from the Toronto quarterly meeting, the MSF's board of directors for 2004 - 2005 held its first meeting. New directors include Byung-Sun Lee, Core Technology Group director at ETRI, James McEachern, Succession Standards Strategy director at Nortel Networks and Tatsuro Murakami, executive research engineer at NTT. Avri Doria, visiting researcher at ETRI was elected chairperson of the Technical Committee. Juliet Bates, systems architect in the Fixed Solutions Division at Alcatel was elected as vice chair of the Technical Committee. Neil Anderson, senior director of services at Spirent Communications, was reelected chairperson of the Marketing Awareness and Education Committee. Jason Grooms, vice president of sales at Leapstone Systems was reelected vice chairperson of the Marketing Awareness and Education Committee. Paul Drew, product manager at MetaSwitch was elected chairperson of the Architecture Working Group. Brian Down, director of network transformation at Marconi was elected chairperson of the MSF Management Advisory Group.

About Multiservice Switching System Technology

Multiservice Switching Systems of the future will be based on a distributed, open architecture which incorporates a variety of switching methods -- frame, cell or packet-based -- designed to support voice, video, private line and data such as ATM, Frame Relay and Internet Protocol (IP) services. Such technology may use a broad range of access technologies, including traditional Time Division Multiplexing (TDM), Digital Subscriber Line (xDSL), wireless data, and cable modems. MSF Implementation Agreements define the requirements of the interfaces between key functional and physical components found in practical deployments of such systems.

About the Multiservice Switching Forum

The Multiservice Switching Forum (MSF) is a global association of service providers and system suppliers committed to developing and promoting open-architecture, multiservice switching systems. Founded in 1998, the MSF is an open-membership organization comprised of the world's leading telecommunications companies. The MSF's activities include developing implementation agreements, promoting worldwide compatibility and interoperability, and encouraging input to appropriate national and international standards bodies. For more information about the MSF and its members, visit the MSF web site at http://www.msforum.org/.>

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