Toshiba Teams With MCK to Deliver Cost-Effective PBX Extension to Small Branch Offices - MCK Communications' Branch Office EXTender 6000 will work with Toshiba's Strata DK digital business telephone systems - Company Business and Marketing - Product Announcement

Edge: Work-Group Computing Report, Nov 22, 1999

Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc. Telecommunication Systems Division (TAIS TSD), a leading provider of communication solutions to small and mid-sized businesses, and MCK Communications, a leading provider of remote access products that enable corporations to seamlessly extend the features and applications of business telephone systems from the corporate office to remote branch offices over wide area networks, Thursday announced a technology and marketing agreement. Under the agreement, MCK will develop a Branch Office EXTender 6000 product that is compatible with Toshiba's Strata DK digital business telephone systems. The combined solution will provide mid-sized and small companies alike with a cost-effective way to seamlessly extend telephony capabilities, including interoffice dialing, one numbering plan, voice mail, unified messaging, ACD and call accounting programs from a corporate location to small remote offices.

"The combination of MCK's Branch Office EXTender and our Strata DK family of business telephone systems provides Toshiba's customers with a total solution for interoffice telephony," said Dave Mandeville, vice president, marketing, TAIS TSD. "Our customers will be able to enhance their current hardware investment and more easily manage one business telephone system, one set of telephones, and one set of applications throughout their organization."

With Toshiba's solution, combining the Branch Office EXTender 6000 and Strata DK telephone system, companies will have the benefit of leveraging their existing voice and data infrastructure, while delivering consistent telephone service throughout the enterprise. Toshiba's business telephone system customers can extend their corporate voice system over any current or next-generation Wide Area Network (WAN) infrastructure, including T-1, frame relay, ISDN, Digital Data Service (DDS), virtual private network (VPN) or a managed broadband IP network such as DSL. The Branch Office EXTender 6000 offers a switch unit that sits at the corporate PBX location and remote units housed at the branch offices, each connecting up to 12 digital telephone sets. Therefore, all system administration and management is easily performed from the corporate site.

This eliminates the need to maintain disparate phone systems and separate voice and data networks, while improving overall business operations and delivering a substantial cost savings.

"We are pleased to align with Toshiba, a company with a reputation for quality telecommunications systems," said Joan Lockhart, vice president marketing, MCK Communications Inc. "As the branch office market explodes, companies are looking for ways to leverage their investments in voice and data networks. MCK's Branch Office EXTender 6000 will provide Toshiba customers with an excellent solution for building a unified voice network across locations. MCK remote voice solutions make voice and data convergence a reality, by allowing Toshiba customers to extend their existing Strata DK telephone systems over their existing data networks."

The MCK Branch Office EXTender 6000 is expected to be available through Toshiba's dealer network in Q1, 2000. The product will be available in 8-port and 12-port configurations, for a suggested retail price of $3,895 and $4,895 per unit, respectively.

Headquartered in Irvine, California, with annual sales of approximately $2.5 billion, TAIS is comprised of six divisions, organized into two business groups, which manufacture, market and service a wide range of business and information-oriented products in the United States and Latin America. Products include portable and desktop computers; voice mail systems; digital business telephone systems; interactive voice response systems; network systems and digital cameras. TAIS is an independent operating company owned by Toshiba America, Inc., a subsidiary of the $42 billion Toshiba Corp., the seventh largest computer and electronics company and the world's 26th largest industrial corporation in terms of sales. Toshiba Corporation is a world leader in high-technology products with over 300 major subsidiaries and affiliates worldwide.

The TAIS Telecommunication Systems Division markets the Strata DK family of digital business telephone systems, Toshiba Stratagy voice processing systems and Interactive Voice Response.

MCK Communications, Inc. develops and markets a comprehensive family of solutions that provide remote voice solutions for branch offices and telecommuters. The company, which is ISO 9001-certified, has earned a reputation for excellence and innovation by building leading-edge communications products that enhance customers' networked voice systems. Headquartered in Newton, Mass., MCK Communications has an R&D facility in Calgary, Alberta. For more information, visit the company's Web site at www.mck.com.