September 9, 2009 | New Evolved Packet Core, Device and IP Backhaul Software Frameworks Combined with Existing eNodeB Offering Provide End to End LTE Systems Development Solution

Aricentâ„¢, a global innovation, technology and services company focused exclusively on communications, today announced the expansion of its Long Term Evolution (LTE) solutions portfolio to include new software and frameworks for devices and Evolved Packet Core (EPC) systems, and enhancements to its existing IP backhaul offering.  These new capabilities, combined with Aricent’s existing eNodeB offering, provide Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) and Device Manufactures with a complete solution for LTE user equipment, network access, IP backhaul, and EPC.

According to Arete Research, LLC, commercializing LTE will require vendors to commit more than $1 billion in research and development (R&D) over three to five years, based on teams of 2-3,000 engineers. Aricent believes that telecommunications equipment manufacturers are faced with the difficult task of managing this significant R&D investment while maintaining competitive LTE product readiness as service providers continue their evaluation and deployment cycles.  To solve this challenge, vendors increasingly are looking for pre-built LTE frameworks and advanced engineering services to improve LTE R&D efficiency and lower costs.

“Aricent’s deep domain knowledge and proven track record in delivering telecommunications software and services make them a clear choice for a development partner in LTE,” said Venkataraman Prasannan, Sr. Director of ATCA at RadiSys. “An application-ready platform for EPC elements based on a combination of Aricent’s LTE frameworks and RadiSys’ industry leading ATCA platforms and middleware is an excellent way for telecom equipment manufacturers to dramatically reduce time-to-market in delivering cutting edge solutions to the industry.”

Aricent has built a strong LTE practice consisting of software, frameworks and comprehensive lifecycle services to jumpstart LTE device and systems development and reduce engineering complexity and cost. From product strategy and design to product development and from testing to certification, Aricent offers a complete portfolio of services to help equipment manufacturers scale initial LTE implementations and meet the challenging requirements associated with commercial deployments. Aricent’s strategy and design services provide assistance to OEMs as they weigh product strategy and assess critical architectural directions. Once customers enter the implementation stage, Aricent’s domain experts provide expert R&D resources for requirements definition, feature development, managed interoperability testing and certification.  These services are proven to help significantly reduce the costs associated with bringing capital intensive products to market for new disruptive technologies such as LTE.

“Aricent continues to invest heavily in 4G technologies, broadening our portfolio of technology and service offerings,” said C.P. Murali, Sr. Vice President at Aricent. “Equipment manufacturers are actively seeking opportunities to reduce risk and time to market, while mitigating the cost of development. Aricent uniquely provides the end-to-end frameworks and product lifecycle services to that address today’s most difficult development challenges.”

The company offers a comprehensive set of products including protocol stacks and frameworks to help equipment vendors to jumpstart their LTE programs with pre-tested toolkits conforming to the latest 3GPP standards. Aricent’s LTE products span the entire spectrum from user equipment to access networks to the core. These include:

• LTE User Equipment Software Suite – Aricent’s LTE UE Software Suite is a complete software package for device and semi-conductor vendors including fully optimized Layer 1, Layer 2 protocol software with support for 100 Mbps downlink and 50 Mbps uplink data rates. The implementation ensures optimal power consumption, processor utilization and easy integration on multiple hardware platforms.
• eNodeB Protocol Stacks and Framework – Aricent’s existing eNodeB offering provides a turnkey solution for radio access, from pluggable stack software to a pre-integrated and optimized software frameworks for Radio Access equipment, that have been benchmarked on multiple industry leading hardware platforms. Aricent’s eNodeB Framework (eNBF) serves as a robust software platform for infrastructure providers planning to develop a complete LTE Release 8+ compliant eNodeB of varying densities (macro/pico/femto).
• IP Backhaul – Aricent’s IP Backhaul solution is based on its industry-proven ISS Metro platform which offers pre-integrated Layer 2 switching solutions and can be used to build LTE and IP backhaul devices such as IP RAN Aggregation devices, Internet Offload Gateways, and Metro Ethernet devices.
• Evolved Packet Core Protocol Stacks and Framework – Aricent offers EPC protocol stacks as well as frameworks for the System Architecture Evolution (SAE) Gateway and the Mobility Management Entity (MME) Gateway. These include support for charging, QoS, high availability, lawful interception, and bearer-related features.

For more information about Aricent’s LTE offerings, please visit: http:/www.aricent.com/lte.

About Aricent

Aricent is a global innovation, technology and services company focused exclusively on communications. Aricent combines the leading innovation capabilities of frog design with unparalleled domain expertise in communications as a strategic supplier to the world's foremost infrastructure, application and service providers. The company’s investors include Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., Sequoia Capital, The Family Office and Flextronics International Ltd. For more information, visit www.aricent.com.