Pannaway Technologies Adds New York-based Empire Telephone Corp. to Growing IOC Customer List; Empire Telephone Selects Pannaway for the Delivery of Highly Sought After Converged Broadband Services

Business Wire, August 22, 2005

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. -- Pannaway Technologies, Inc., designers and developers of converged broadband voice, video and data platforms, today announced that they have signed a deal with Empire Telephone Corp., in Plattsburgh, New York, for the delivery of next-generation broadband services. Empire Telephone, which supports 8,400 access lines and covers over 320 square miles of service territory in western New York, will be deploying IP video services, high-speed data and in early 2006, digitized voice with advanced calling features to their customer base via Pannaway's award-winning Service Convergence Network (SCN(TM)). Pannaway's SCN will enable Empire Telephone to provide affordable bundled broadband services that will rival packages offered by local cable and satellite providers.

After extensive trial deployments with several vendors, Empire Telephone selected Pannaway's access solution based on its ability to deliver a pure IP packet-based transport infrastructure. Another key criteria in the decision making process was Pannaway's support for Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), which will enable Empire to differentiate its voice offering with advanced calling features and Primary Line VoIP/Lifeline calling capabilities.

As the industry's only next-generation, end-to-end IP packet-based access system capable of supporting both SIP and Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP), Pannaway enables telecom service providers like Empire Telephone to quickly and cost-effectively improve the performance of legacy architectures while future proofing their investment with advanced SIP-based voice and video features.

"We looked very closely at a number of leading access providers and we determined that Pannaway had the most complete solution to help us build a next-generation network for our loyal subscribers," said Joseph Gottwald at Empire Telephone. "The Pannaway solution delivers a handful of unique capabilities that we believe will be crucial as we continue to support emerging applications like HDTV and VoD. These features include distributed routing, which will improve our IP video QOS and bandwidth utilization, and Ring Trip Resolution, which eliminates ring voltage from the ADSL2 line, yielding up to an 8db SNR improvement while increasing signal distance and the number of video streams that we can deliver to the home."

Pannaway's Service Convergence Network allows rural customers like Empire Telephone to optimize the existing "pipeline to the premise" to build out a network for a successful IP-based Triple Play delivery of converged broadband services.

"It's always an honor to be recognized as the partner of choice in the competitive field of broadband service providers, and we are thrilled to have been selected by Empire Telephone for this significant project," said David Meyer, executive vice president of sales at Pannaway. "We are 100% committed to providing our rural Independent Operating Carriers (IOCs) with the industry's most scaleable access solution along with a level of personalized support that is unprecedented in this industry."

About Pannaway Technologies

Pannaway provides true next-generation converged voice, video and data solutions to telecom service providers and emerging Triple Play services companies. Pannaway's multi-award winning and patent-pending IP technologies enable telecom providers worldwide to deliver profitable broadband services to homes and businesses at a fraction of their historical costs. Pannaway also delivers the industry's first end-to-end carrier-class VoIP solution with integrated Primary Line service for lifeline POTS support. The privately held company is headquartered in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and has been building solutions and service/support programs to fit the specific needs of rural telcos since 2002.

For more information, please visit www.pannaway.com.