Mandan, North Dakota – February 13, 2023 – National Information Solutions Cooperative (NISC), a leading provider of software solutions to utility and broadband companies, announces new integration between the NISC Enterprise System and Nokia’s line of broadband network equipment. To bring greater efficiency to NISC Members who are offering broadband service across the United States, NISC worked closely with Nokia to enhance not only the broadband provider experience but also the end customer experience.
This new integration was enabled by leveraging NISC’s Provisioning and User Services System (USS) solutions, which bring greater interaction between the NISC Enterprise System and Nokia’s line of equipment. This interaction will streamline operational and regulatory needs along with enabling enhanced customer service and a more efficient billing process.
SRT Communications, Inc., a cooperative telecommunications company serving North Central N.D., utilizes the Nokia access platform to deliver broadband to their service area. With this new integration, NISC’s Provisioning communicates with Nokia 5520 AMS, allowing the telecom to provision services in the office as well as in the field when using NISC’s iVUE AppSuite.
“It is critical we provide our staff with the tools they need to deliver exceptional service and ensure they are utilizing their field time as effectively as possible,” said Shawn Grosz, Chief Technology Officer at SRT. “The integration between our Nokia equipment and NISC’s Provisioning helps us achieve those operational goals.”
The integration doesn’t stop with provisioning, however. Nextlink provides internet and phone service across Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois and is expanding into Indiana, Louisana, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Wyoming. With such a large service area, the leadership at Nextlink prioritized finding the proper software tools they needed for required speed and latency testing as well as the ability to scale with to multiple states, multiple test areas and sheer volume.
“Nextlink selected NISC’s User Services System for a reason: the overall value of the offering,” said Claude Aiken, Chief Strategy Officer at Nextlink Internet. “Speed and latency tests ensure that our high-quality network build is accurately reflected to our federal, state and local partners. A scalable system like NISC’s USS helps us do just that across the many states we serve.”
“Nextlink utilizes Nokia’s Beacon 6 residential gateways for in-home Wi-Fi service, which uses Broadband Forum standards for device management – the same standard NISC utilizes,” said Ryan Larson, NISC Senior Product Marketing Manager. “Having a mesh Wi-Fi solution, like the Nokia Beacon 6, that can work with the existing USS solution and meet the regulatory testing obligation for delivering 1 GB broadband service is vitally important to these service providers.”
“Nokia is committed to providing technology solutions to meet the needs of broadband service providers from an operational and regulatory standpoint,” said Mark Klimek, Nokia’s Vice President of North America Fixed Networks Business Center. “Nokia is pleased that its work with NISC confidently certified the Beacon 6 solution for a 1 GB speed test using Broadband Forum’s standards via the NISC’s USS, and that Beacon 6 provides a high-performance whole home coverage experience with ease.”
