Auspice's TLX Operations Automation Platform Plays Key Role in Comcast's Telephone Provisioning System.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

FRAMINGHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 15, 2004

Leading Cable Telephone Service Provider Extends TLX Solutions From the Network Operations Center to Customer Care and Service Delivery

Auspice(R) Corporation, a leading provider of real-time operations automation software, today announced that it has teamed with Comcast Phone, the nation's leading cable telephone provider, to develop and deploy an advanced telephone provisioning system. The system will help to ensure timely and accurate provisioning of telephone services to Comcast Phone customers as well as cut operational support costs required to provision the services. Comcast Phone delivers competitive local phone service to more than 1.3 million residential subscribers.

New Provisioning System Developed and Deployed in Record Time

Comcast Phone has developed and deployed a new Enterprise Telephony System (ETS), which includes an Order Processing Module (for handling order management functions), a Third Party Provisioning Module (for handling the interface between Comcast Phone and incumbent local exchange carriers, or ILECs) and an Auspice TLX-based Network Provisioning System (for automating processes that deliver subscriber-ordered services).

Auspice TLX(R) is software (a.k.a., a "platform") for developing and executing real-time applications that automate the manual tasks involved in setting up, managing, monitoring and troubleshooting voice, video and data services over a network. Comcast Phone's IT staff built the entire ETS and used Auspice's TLX platform as the core automation engine for the network provisioning portion of the ETS system.

The new TLX-based provisioning solution automates processes between the ETS' Order Processing Module, multivendor telephone switches and host digital terminals (HDTs) to ensure that customers' telephone services are promptly and properly delivered. Communicating with multiple databases and systems in real time, the TLX solution automates a range of complex steps, such as:

-- Interpreting orders and sending them to network devices

(switches and HDTs) to deliver specified telephone services

-- Determining if the network devices are properly configured to

handle the specified telephone services

-- Auditing to determine if provisioning was successful (i.e., if

network devices actually delivered the services)

-- Alerting trouble-ticketing and customer care systems about

provisioning problems to ensure fast resolution.

The highly scalable TLX-based provisioning solution was developed by Comcast Phone with Auspice's solution architecture consulting services, required only a small Comcast Phone development staff and was rolled out in less than six months -- record time according to industry norms. The provisioning solution has enabled Comcast Phone to boost the efficiency of its network operations, customer care and field service organizations to better serve its customer base. Comcast Phone expects that the TLX-based Network Provisioning System, in conjunction with the other modules of the new ETS, will lower its telephone service operating costs.

"The agreement represents a major milestone in our companies' long-standing relationship, further strengthening our shared commitment to advance the state-of-the-art of broadband services and the systems that support them," said Rick Berthold, Auspice's CTO and Executive VP of Engineering. "We are pleased that Comcast Phone continues to use TLX as the enabling technology for automating their leadership vision of IT and operational best practices."

"The automated service provisioning system that we built with the help of TLX enables us to create end-to-end order flow-through - the smooth passage of the initial order for service from our business systems right to the network switch that delivers service in the customer's neighborhood. With this we can commit to a service delivery time right at the point of sale and be confident that we'll meet that commitment. Whether we're powering up a service for a new customer or responding to a customer's request for additional features, we can meet their expectations for prompt, reliable service," said Charlotte Field, Comcast Senior Vice President - Technical and Network Operations.

Auspice TLX -- Supporting Comcast Operations Since 2000 for Telephone and High Speed Data Services

Comcast Phone, formerly known as AT&T Broadband Phone, has been an Auspice customer since 2000 and has deployed more than a dozen operations support system (OSS) solutions based on the Auspice TLX Real-Time Systems Integration and Operations Automation Platform. The TLX-based solutions, deployed at Comcast Phone's Denver network operations center (NOC), enable Comcast Phone to proactively manage the health of the network, maintain peak network performance, solve customer-reported problems at a single point of contact and reduce mean-time-to-repair of network and customer equipment for telephone and high speed data services.

"Auspice solutions help make our network operations center, customer care and field technicians more productive by automating processes that are critical to our business," added Field. "This is industry leadership technology that enables our internal organizations to work as an efficient, integrated whole - and not unproductively in silos, the way industry grew up. All-in-all, we've deployed solutions that have enabled us to improve service reliability, enrich customer care, shorten mean-time-to-repair and reduce IT and operations costs."

About Auspice

Founded in 1997, Auspice, The Enterprise Control Software Company, is the first commercial developer of an enterprise control software platform that enables enterprises and service providers to manage disparate technology infrastructure in an orchestrated manner to dramatically improve operations reliability and efficiency. With its roots in the modern-day manned space program, Auspice's TLX platform was originally developed for mission-critical and complex operational environments, such as the International Space Station (for NASA), which are characterized by heterogeneous systems that demand absolute reliability. Auspice is also the developer of the TLX-based OpsLogic(TM) Broadband Solution Suite -- a set of integrated operations automation applications for broadband service providers. The OpsLogic Solution Suite was developed on and can be extended with the Auspice TLX platform to meet the specific needs of individual service providers. Auspice TLX and Auspice OpsLogic applications are currently deployed at leading North American service providers. Visit www.auspicecorp.com.

Auspice and TLX are registered trademarks and OpsLogic is a trademark of Auspice Corporation.