Showing just how independent of IBM it now is – IBM holds 16% of its equity, but the junior partner wants to buy it back – MCI Communications Corp, Washington, has introduced its own family of network management tools to enable its big business customers to manage their portion of the network. Called Integrated Network Management Services – INMS – the products are to to be phased in over the next 18 months, and will provide selected access to MCI’s network intelligence through six network management applications – operations management, trouble management, performance and planning management, configuration management, billing and cost management, and order entry and tracking management.
MCI is promising that all its network management capability for voice, data and international services will eventually be included in INMS, and claims that it is the only US carrier to offer this service. The new family of services opens the MCI network to our customers enabling customers to monitor, analyse and control their portion of the MCI network cost effectively, says the company’s president, Bert Roberts. The new network management services provide customers with a versatile computer interface that provides access to the various network management applications. Through this interface, customers can manage all their MCI services using a common set of applications, easy-to use menu selections and specialised function keys. MCI is supplying users with graphics in order to visually display its worldwide telecommunications network and pinpoint trouble spots. But they’ll have to wait a bit: MCI customers will have the option of subscribing to the new features from the beginning of next year.
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