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New School Fiber Makes Instant POTS Possible

In this world of IP, there are still legacy devices that need to be supported.  Michael Cronin of the Sanford Center in Bejidmi, MN was reminded of this recently, as a client realized at the last-minute that they would need a POTS (Plain Old Telephone Services) line.  As Director of Facilities Operation for this 185,000 square foot arena/convention center, Cronin had partnered with local communications service provider, Paul Bunyan Communications (PBC), to ensure that this state-of-the-art facility would have a state-of-the-art communications’ system.

With fiber to his building from PBC’s network, bandwidth was certainly not an issue.  Additionally, PBC was a partner in designing and implementing the internal network that features wired and wireless broadband, television services, two-way video and the latest in IP telephony services.

As Cronin explains in this video, he had to fulfill a last-minute need for an analog phone line on a Thursday afternoon at 5 pm.  This request was critical for the video call that was to connect the conference in his facility in Bemidji, MN with a facility in New York City.

Because of the fiber installation and software capability inherent in their last mile access equipment, PBC was able to provision a POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) line within 15 minutes.  If PBC had a traditional copper network, it is doubtful that a new telephone circuit could have been provisioned this quickly, as it would have required much more manual intervention (e.g. truck roll for a technician to assign a pair, testing of the loop, provisioning in the central office) and coordination between different disciplines within the company.

A critical asset that PBC brings to its partners is its commitment to the community.  This commitment, combined with local staff that understand and address the needs of their partners, allows PBC to bring its partners the right technology at the right time.  It is somewhat ironic, that PBC’s new school fiber system makes provisioning of old school POTS more efficient and faster.

This video made possible by Calix, Inc.

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