 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Home > Press Releases > 2004 Press ReleasesPrepaid Industry Leader NACT Teams with Excel Switching to Deliver a New Generation of Integrated Prepaid Solutions for Fixed and Mobile Service Providers- Partnership Unites Premier Software and Hardware Technology to Offer Service Providers World-Customized Services Across PSTN and IP Networks – Intele-CardExpo Spring 2005, Miami Beach, Fla. – March 23, 2005 – Excel Switching Corp. (www.ExcelSwitching.com) and NACT Telecommunications (www.NACT.com), two long-standing technology leaders in the prepaid market since its inception, announced today a partnership that brings together the industry’s most robust service platform with the most reliable and flexible call-processing solution. Excel’s AnyGen family of media gateways and media servers, coupled with NACT’s IPAX family of application solutions, will provide fixed and mobile service providers with a wide variety of basic and enhanced services working across TDM and IP networks. This new partnership combines NACT’s expertise in integrating turnkey prepaid, shared value, and management software applications with Excel’s feature-rich, open hardware platforms. According to recent figures published by the Telecommunications Industry Association, the prepaid calling card industry in the United States represented a $4.6 billion market in 2004, with wireless prepaid representing $5.8 billion; and there is an expected 26 percent growth rate in 2005. The NACT/Excel partnership intends to address the continued growing needs of this market with a complete service provider solution. NACT has over 175 customers, an installed base of over 600 intelligent switching gateways, over one million operational ports worldwide, and is the single largest provider of prepaid solutions in the United States. Excel’s hardware, with over 8,500 systems shipped and installed in over 70 countries, is used in approximately 35 percent of the prepaid solutions in the U.S. market. “Excel has an established worldwide customer base that it can leverage to offer pre-paid solutions,” said Danny Klein, senior analyst at the Yankee Group. “Through this partnership with NACT, carriers can take advantage of a combined hardware/software call processing solutions across multiple networks that will lower costs, deliver differentiated subscriber services and drive revenue growth.” Prepaid providers are under extreme price pressure, and customized services have emerged as a dynamic opportunity for revenue growth, especially in wireless applications. The Yankee Group predicts the wireless prepaid market will grow 24 percent by 2008. To accelerate revenue, prepaid providers are expanding the number of customized services that personalize a user’s experience such as: multi-media messaging, ring tones, screen savers, file downloads, Internet browsing, and more. Creating and deploying these services imposes various problems for providers. The Excel/NACT product offering enables carriers to hurdle many challenges by offering:
“NACT has tremendous global knowledge, a broad customer base, and extensive understanding of the network requirements at the application level for the prepaid market. It is the premier name in the industry for applications and management software,” said JC Murphy, Excel president. “We are looking forward to the exciting prepaid service offerings that will be delivered as a result of this partnership. The large volume of global prepaid traffic provides great opportunity in this growing market.” NACT to Launch Excel-Based Prepaid Platform Additionally, IPAX-XL combines feature-rich applications and management tools with Excel’s time-tested carrier-grade hardware, and reduces capital equipment costs because Excel-based prepaid providers no longer need to purchase adjunct switching systems. Along with the IPAX-XL, NACT’s billing/provisioning and Web-based management tools will be key components in the company’s ability to provide a variety of prepaid, stored or “shared” value services, and offer a host of other enhanced telecom solutions to service providers worldwide. “We have been successful in prepaid because of our ability to adapt quickly to market changes and to provide applications that drive revenue and/or reduce operational costs” said Eric Gurr, CEO of NACT. “Becoming an application partner with Excel is a key to our continued growth. Excel’s extensive protocol expertise and its powerful carrier-class platform provide an unmatched level of openness and flexibility. As we see the prepaid market moving quickly toward a more service-centric model, Excel’s platform will be a cornerstone in our ability to continue application delivery in ever changing network environments.” About NACT Telecommunications About Excel Switching Corporation ### Press Contacts Excel Switching: NACT:
 | |||||||||||||||||
|
|