Intermedia Touts Bundled Services
- 21 September, 2000 12:01
Intermedia Communications Inc. just launched IntermediaOne, a service bundle that includes voice, data, Internet access and unified messaging.
IntermediaOne also can add frame relay, Web hosting, firewall service and voice features such as direct inward dialing and hunt groups to the new service. Customers get to pick and choose which features they want, and all are delivered over a T-1 circuit.
Intermedia already had a bundled offering called unifiedvoice.net that included just voice and Internet access over a single link between customer sites and Intermedia's network.
Because all the services are provisioned via a single customer-site box, Intermedia can turn services on and off quickly. Unfortunately, the single box also presents a single point of failure; if the box goes down, the site is left without communication unless it has a backup. Intermedia supports customer sites with gear supplied by either Vina Technologies Inc. or Carrier Access Corp., depending on the requirements of each customer.
Because the voice services include network-based features such as call forwarding, three-way conferencing and call waiting, customer sites do not require PBXs.
IntermediaOne includes local and long-distance voice services. The unified messaging provides text-to-speech translation so e-mails can be picked up over the phone. Voice mails are e-mailed as audio files, and faxes are also e-mailed so customers can pick up any message either as e-mail or voice mail.
Intermedia says the multiple services allow customers to deal with just one service provider for virtually all WAN services.
IntermediaOne is available in Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Minneapolis, New York, Pittsburgh and Raleigh. The service will roll out in 50 other cities over the next few months, the company says.