TollBridge Technologies Establishes Sales and Marketing Operations in the Asia-Pacific Region.

Business Editors

HONG KONG--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 4, 2000

Expanded Presence Supports Growing Base

of Asia-Pacific Customers, Delivers First V5.2 Voice

Gateway Solutions to Service Providers in Region

U.S.-based TollBridge Technologies, the leading North American vendor of carrier-class Voice-over-DSL (VoDSL) solutions for broadband networks, announced today that it has established regional Asia-Pacific headquarters in Hong Kong. Operations out of this facility will handle burgeoning sales and marketing activity in this region. "The markets of Asia represent the best growth opportunity for voice-over-broadband networks," said James Grady, vice president, international, for TollBridge Technologies. "Broadband networks based on DSL and cable TV technology are being rapidly deployed in this region. The future of communications lies in packet-based bundled services over broadband infrastructures, and TollBridge is in a unique position to enable carriers to address the needs of consumers and businesses alike."

TollBridge Technologies is the leading developer of high-quality voice-over-broadband solutions for a new generation of broadband networks. According to the most recent Synergy Research report, TollBridge has successfully deployed carrier-class solutions to maintain its market-share leadership in this industry, despite the recent entry of several competitors into this market.

As part of its Asia-Pacific launch, TollBridge is partnering with key network operators in Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore to deliver the first-ever carrier-class voice gateway in the region, using the V5.2 protocol for interfacing with Class 5 switches. TollBridge's industry-leading platform, the TB200, delivers telephony services over different broadband technologies, including cable TV, DSL, and wireless access networks. Until now, leading vendors have offered voice gateway platforms based on the GR-303 standard, which is used mainly in North America. The rest of the world relies primarily on the V5.2 specification for the subscriber line interface on a Class 5 voice switch. TollBridge is the first vendor in the industry to demonstrate a carrier-class solution in Asia.

To further support the needs of its customers in the Asia-Pacific region, TollBridge has established regional sales and marketing operations with the appointment of Sherriff Choi, who will lead initiatives with carriers such as I-Cable, Hong Kong Telecom, SingTel, Korea Telecom, Hanaro Telecom, and others. "The appointment of Mr. Choi is our first major step towards establishing our presence in the Asia-Pacific region," said Grady. "Mr. Choi has had extensive industry experience with Ascend Communications and Lucent Technologies, where he was director of technical operations, overseeing the Greater China region. In addition to this, he has worked with the major carriers in Asia through his previous activities in the deployment of carrier-class technology in China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong." The market for voice services over broadband infrastructures has expanded rapidly in North America since the passing of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, with competitive carriers using the resulting new technology to resolve the challenges of scarce local access resources in the "last mile." Providers of cable TV services are benefiting from this technology, since with it they can offer multiple services to subscribers-including multi-line voice, video, and data over a single coaxial cable.

In Europe and Asia, the relations between the incumbents and emerging carriers are changing to allow similar business arrangements. Moreover, Market forecasts project more than 60 percent of all households in the major Asia-Pacific markets will subscribe to cable TV by 2001. With TollBridge technology, carriers will have the opportunity to offer consumers a bundled package of value-added services. Layering packetized voice over the physical networking medium will enable the migration of existing services to all broadband networks and will accelerate the evolution of enhanced services, realizing the vision of the new public network.

"The TB200 solution enables service providers to offer voice communications over any broadband medium. TollBridge has the largest installed base in North America-over 40,000 voice lines. The experience and know-how gained in this market helped us develop a viable V5.2 version for global markets, and it will allow our customers to deploy faster and offer a wider variety of voice and data services," said Grady.

About TollBridge Gateway Solutions

TollBridge's TB200 carrier-grade Local Exchange Gateway allows carriers to integrate packet-based voice traffic from cable, xDSL, or wireless systems into the public switched telephone network via Class 5 switches. The TB200 uses the industry standard GR-303 and V5.2 protocols to ensure compatibility with Class 5 switches and also supports emerging protocols such as the Segment Interface Protocol (SIP) and the Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP).

The TollView(TM) Management Suite is an element management system that includes a graphical interface for simple end-to-end configuration, troubleshooting, and performance management of up to 100 TB200 systems via HP OpenView(TM) on Sun Solaris(TM) platforms.

About TollBridge Technologies

Founded in March 1998 and located in Santa Clara, Calif., TollBridge Technologies-selected as one of UPSIDE magazine's Top 100 Private Companies (May 2000)-is the leading provider of high-quality voice-over-broadband solutions to the new generation of carriers. TollBridge's solutions change the economics of delivering voice services to small businesses and consumers by allowing carriers that own Class 5 switches to use broadband access technologies (such as DSL, cable, and wireless), to use alternative technologies in the local loop, and to deliver toll-quality voice and integrated data services.