CENX Gives Voice to Ethernet Exchange

In starting what it says is the first Carrier Ethernet exchange for voice services CENX Inc. intends to replace traditional long-distance tandem switches and TDM direct connections with a flat-rate option that it says combines the best aspects of both.

The company announced the CENX Voice Exchange yesterday. (See CENX Opens Ethernet Voice Exchange.)

Tandem switches enable a service provider to interconnect to multiple other service providers but come with per-minute costs, says Nan Chen, a founder of CENX and its CEO. (See Nan Chen Takes CENX Route.) TDM direction connections are flat-rate but are done on a carrier-by-carrier basis, which is less efficient.

CENX will offer a flat-rate voice exchange service, charging for bandwidth and not per-minute, along with an introductory offer of the equivalent of 1 million call minutes per day, for life, to service providers who sign up now. Chen said that amounts to about 50 Megabits of free bandwidth per day.

CENX already has customers running live traffic via its CENX Voice Exchange, but isn’t announcing customer names. Verizon Enterprise Solutions and Level 3 Communications Inc. (NYSE: LVLT) have announced their use of the CENX exchange on the data side. (See Verizon Boosts Biz With CENX Connection and Level 3 Teams With CENX.)

"We think per-minute charges of today’s tandem switches are out-of-step with the current pricing, which tends to be flat-rate," Chen said in an interview. "That approach is squeezing profits. We are projecting savings of 50 percent over per-minute charges."

— Carol Wilson, Chief Editor, Events, Light Reading