RAD’s Vmux Slashes Voice Transmission Costs in Russia’s Tele2 Networks

Tele2 is one of the top Russian cellular operators. It operates six Tele2 GSM networks in different regions throughout the country, in Irkutsk, Rostov-on-Don, St. Petersburg, Kemerovo, Omsk, and Izhevsk, and will soon add Smolensk, Nizhniy Novgorod, Belgorod, Chelyabinsk and Kursk to its list of locations. Offering the lowest prices as well as simple and convenient services is the cornerstone of Tele2’s marketing policy. This strategy requires special network solutions that allow Tele2 to minimize voice transport costs and make the services available to mass customers.

To reduce infrastructure costs, Tele2 selected RAD’s Vmux compressed voice solution. The Vmux-2100 voice trunking gateway employs powerful voice compression algorithms that greatly increase the amount of voice traffic transmitted over the same trunk, compressing up to 16 full E1 lines (480 concurrent voice conversations) onto a single E1 line while providing the highest voice quality.

In the first phase of the project, Vmux-2100 gateways were deployed in five Tele2 regional departments for connecting cellular base stations to mobile switching centers (MSCs). The Vmux devices yielded Tele2 85% savings on leasing E1 channels. The project is now being expanded to all 11 regional networks, and more voice compression modules will be added as each network grows.

TeleInCom PK, a Russian partner of RAD Data Communications, designs the network segments according to requirements of the Tele2 technical center and provides consultations to the operator’s staff during Vmux installation. “For the first time in Russia, the project for Belgorod cellular network includes a multichannel router module on a Vmux platform,” says Alexander Piataev, CEO of TeleInCom PK. “In addition to voice compression and high quality voice, this solution allows Tele2 to implement a star topology, for the operator’s convenience.”

The project also includes a billing application for Tele2 regional networks based on RAD’s FCD products, which provide additional resilience for maximum redundancy of the billing system. Tele2 also deploys RAD’s DXC multiservice access nodes and ASMi-52 modems in its networks.