LONDON -- Spirent Communications™ (NYSE: SPM; LSE: SPT), a worldwide provider of integrated performance analysis and service assurance systems for next-generation network technologies today announced a development effort to integrate Spirent’s remote test capabilities into Alcatel’s widely-deployed broadband access management system, the Alcatel 7300/7301 Advanced Services Access Manager (ASAM). The effort builds upon existing interoperability developments between the market leaders to help the world’s telecom service providers reduce the cost and accelerate the deployment of broadband services.

A remote test probe in combination with Operations Support System (OSS) software allows service providers to carry out remote tests to determine the nature and location of a customer’s service problem. This approach helps reduce the need for expensive field dispatches, speeds the repair of an affected circuit, and helps shrink the provider’s overall capital and operational expenses.

Spirent will integrate its remote test probe into the Alcatel ASAM, giving service providers a combined solution for broadband access management and remote testing. The benefits of this integration are significant and include:

“Our mission is to provide our customers with innovative solutions that save them time and money when deploying broadband services,” said Jim Schleckser, president of Spirent’s Service Assurance division. “By joining Spirent’s market-leading service assurance capabilities with Alcatel’s global leadership in broadband access, carriers can cut their mean time to repair by providing the advantages of remote testing to a full range of central offices and serving exchanges regardless of size, at a materially lower deployed cost.”

As part of the development, Alcatel is providing an interface to its 7300/7301 Advanced Services Access Manager (ASAM) Digital Subscriber Line access multiplexers (DSLAMs), while Spirent is producing test hardware that conducts the actual circuit testing. This hardware — in the form of a compact module — plugs into and is contained within the ASAM. To activate testing on circuits served by the ASAM, the service provider uses Spirent’s REACT™ remote test Operations Support System (OSS) software to select circuits, initiate tests and report results. Support for additional element types is currently under investigation.

“We are pleased to offer our service provider customers the added benefit of Spirent’s remote test technology expressly engineered for the Alcatel ASAM,” said Jurgen Lison, vice president of business development for Alcatel’s Wireline Broadband Access in North America. “This agreement is proof of Alcatel’s commitment to the service provider community to offer open-architecture solutions that provides high value, scalability, carrier-class performance and versatility, with the reliability of a world market leader.”

Spirent CommunicationsAlcatel SA