Press Release
Hanover, MD — February 1, 2017 — East Kentucky Network, LLC d/b/a Appalachian Wireless, (EKN) has selected converged packet optical solutions from Ciena® (NYSE: CIEN) to increase network capacity, enhance service offerings and provide greater network reliability. With this upgrade, EKN can rapidly provision new offerings like 10G, 100G and Ethernet business services for its customers. Additionally, Ciena’s solution helps EKN provide up to ten times the capacity previously available, giving its customers cost-effective access to higher-speed, higher-bandwidth, low-latency voice, video and data services.
Key Facts:
- EKN is owned by a consortium of five partners, including Coalfields Telephone, Foothills Rural Telephone, Mountain Rural Telephone, Peoples Rural Telephone and Thacker-Grigsby Telephone. It serves 21 counties in Kentucky and is comprised of a 375-mile fiber ring network. Its customers include enterprises, government entities, educational, as well as its wireless and independent telephone company members.
- Offering these new scalable and reliable services helps place EKN in the best position to improve the communications experience for users in the mountains of East Kentucky. It also allows EKN to complement, and add to, what the Commonwealth of Kentucky is doing with KentuckyWired as well as the federal government’s First Responder Network Authority (FirstNet), to drive sustainable economic development across the state.
- EKN deployed Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform to provide ultra-high bandwidth services across its entire network, including customized Ethernet services for enterprise customers with the platform’s integrated packet switching capabilities. To increase the redundancy of the network, Ciena’s solutions are configured in a metro ring architecture, ensuring multi-site connectivity with capacity to handle data growth.
- EKN is also using Ciena’s multi-layer network management system to automate provisioning and streamline network management for faster service turn-up and improved service availability.
Executive Comments:
- “Our customers need cost-effective access to the latest high-bandwidth services and applications, anytime and anywhere. With Ciena’s 6500 platform, we are taking our offerings to the next level, and providing our customers low-latency, high-speed and scalable broadband connectivity to meet their needs today and enable sustainable growth for tomorrow.”
– W.A. Gillum, General Manager and Chief Executive Officer, EKN - “Regional service providers like East Kentucky Network recognize the benefits of leveraging advanced, packet-optical transport technology to construct a more reliable network that helps improve broadband connectivity for the community. Our solutions provide a future-proof foundation to ensure EKN’s residential, commercial and government customers have this important network to support business productivity and economic development.”
– Jason Phipps, General Manager and Vice President, North America, Ciena
