Simi Valley, California company Micom Communications Corp has extended the capability of its proprietary NetRunner Integration Routers and Marathon Integration Multiplexers so that they are now able to consolidate speech, facsimile and data traffic to public Frame Relay networks. Previously, the Micom products offered communication across leased line backbones. Micom is pitching the new facility – which is said to operate on all networks, regardless of whose equipment they use – at small- to medium-sized companies. To be able to do this, it operates on public networks at up to T1 – 1.544Mbps – speeds only. Speech traffic is given priority over other traffic and is transmitted at or below the Committed Information Rate, said Micom, and any speech frames that are discarded by the Frame Relay network are automatically retransmitted. Micom is not charging a price premium for the Frame Relay capability, which is available now, and said that existing users can upgrade for free. The company has also revealed a new T1 concentrator for users wanting to build larger Frame Relay networks. The FrameRunner supports either four or eight T1 connections to public Frame Relay services, connecting up to 250 nodes with inter-switched speech, facsimile, and data traffic, according to the company. The four-port model is priced at $6,500, with the eight-port model at $8,500; both are shipping now. Immediately after the Micom announcement, Camarillo, California-based ACT Networks Inc chipped in with its two penn’orth to point out that it announced a speech over Frame Relay offering way back in 1992. The fact that Micom has now introduced a product similar to ACT’s is a testament to our foresight in the growing Frame Relay network arena, said president and chief executive Martin Shum. Taking a swipe at the fact that Micom’s is a proprietary system, he added that standards are critical, which is why ACT has worked with the Frame Relay Forum to drive the development of a Voice Over Frame Relay standard. While ACT chairs this effort, Micom has yet to participate.
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