Telemach invests in high-capacity Flexible Optical Network from Transmode

Telemach, based in the capital Ljubljana, is Slovenia's leading provider of cable TV, telephony and broadband internet services. The company is part of the United Group, which operates a number of different telcos in the Adriatic region. Today, the United Group's companies provide a multitude of communications and entertainment services to more than 1.65 million residential and business users. Transmode is now the primary optical networking provider to the whole of the United Group. The new network links Ljubljana with other major centres Maribor and Celje in Slovenia, and forms part of an international link to Graz and Vienna in Austria.

Telemach's Chief Executive Officer, Marko Šter, commented, "We wanted to both increase the capacity of our network and improve the ability to provision and deliver successful and innovative services to our customers. We chose Transmode because its team understood our needs and design requirements and they have provided us with quality and simplicity in this WDM solution. The new network provides us with a technological advantage and means we are able to offer our customers the best possible service experience."

The new 80 channel optical network was built in parallel to Telemach's previous optical network in order to ensure a quick and smooth switchover of customer services. Telemach needed to quickly decommission the old network in a controlled manner to switch over to Transmode's ROADM based Flexible Optical Network solution, which is provided by the widely-deployed TM-Series platform. Besides providing a cost-effective replacement, the Transmode installation is significantly more energy-efficient than Telemach's previous network and will make future upgrades easy to perform. The network started carrying live traffic on August 27th, less than one month after the installation commenced.

Mark Burton, Vice President Europe for Transmode, commented, "We are delighted to have won this major network business with Telemach in Slovenia. It exemplifies our continued success in Eastern Europe and ROADM-equipped Flexible Optical Networks."

Transmode provided the installation, training and testing of the network in advance of the deployment which has made the switch over as easy as possible. The network provides 10Gb Ethernet services that can scale to 100Gb when needed. One of the key factors in Telemach's selection process of Transmode's solution was that it enables a Layer 1 protected service which when coupled with Enlighten, Transmode's multi-layer management suite, facilitates faster provisioning of backhaul capacity and new wholesale services.