SD-Scicon UK and technology group Cambridge Consultants Ltd have teamed up on the development of a digital switch aimed at the automatic call distribution, command and control, military and mobile networks market. The switch was developed three years ago for Wyatts, the voice communications division of Reuters Holdings Plc, but the companies have now decided to offer it as a basic switching system which can be tailored by companies for their particular product offering. Ian Hardman of SD-Scicon UK offered the example of an automatic call distribution company, as to what he hopes the appeal of the system will be, we can sell to companies offering call distribution to save them the burden of developing their own switch… there is also the advantage that unlike Ericsson or British Telecom, from whom they could buy switches, we will not also be selling ACDs in competition with them. As well as relieving capital investment the companies claim that the product offers a technological advance in digital switching. It features a distributed architecture, fault tolerance, non-blocking for up to 2,800 voice channels and unlimited voice conferencing. Called Digital RingSwitch, the system is composed of a dual contra-rotating copper for FDDI compatible fibre optic rings, carrying voice, data and signalling information at 200M-bits per second. Up to 31 nodes can be connected to each ring, capable of supporting 256 lines each. At the moment there are 30 installations of the switch in dealer rooms across Europe and the US, proving, says Hardman, that the technology and the partnership works. Both SD-Scicon and Cambridge Consultants will be marketing and developing the product, SD-Scicon responsible for software while Cambridge Consultants concentrates on hardware. The two compan ies say they are currently talking to NATO, the Ministry of Defence and several automatic call distribution, command and control and mobile network providers.
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