NEWS BRIEFS

UNE-P reseller Z-Tel Communications Inc. plans to launch broadband voice and data services based on Cisco Systems Inc. equipment. Z-Tel initially will focus on the small to medium-sized business market, multiple dwelling units such as condominiums, apartment buildings, and hotels in Georgia and Florida.

Vonage Holdings Corp., the broadband phone company, recently announced a partnership with Wireless Telcorp Inc. to provide unlimited calling to its customers: small businesses and people working out of their homes. Vonage, of Edison, N.J., will offer all five of its flat rate service plans to Wireless Telcorp customers. The services will be offered under the Wireless Telcorp name. Wireless Telcorp, of Grand Prairie, Texas, is a fixed-wireless broadband provider to telecommuters and small businesses.

Ron Harden, the outgoing co-chairman of the CompTel/ASCENT Alliance has joined Caerus Inc., the parent company of carriers carrier Volo Communications, where he will serve as executive vice president of sales and marketing. Previously, Harden has held various executive positions with Grande Communications, PointOne Telecommunications Inc., Williams Communications, WorldCom Inc. and the original WilTel.

Progress Energy says it will use EarthLink to test high-speed Internet service over power lines. The test is among about a dozen underway by U.S. energy companies to evaluate ways to beam highspeed data over their power lines into homes. The broadband service will be available to about 500 homes in Wake County, N.C., Progress Energy says. Progress Energy says it is testing technology by Massachusetts-based Amperion Inc. that uses fiber optics and power lines to transmit data to a relay point in the neighborhood. From there, devices attached to electric poles and transformers send a wireless signal into the home, the Raleigh, N.C., energy company says.

PowerNet Global Communications is using its Aleron OC48 nationwide backbone to deploy an IP-based voice network in 11 U.S. cities. To roll out their facilities-based network, PowerNet Global has joined forces with softswitch vendor Veraz Networks. PowerNet has PoPs in New York; Los Angeles; Chicago; Atlanta; Detroit; Miami; Denver; Cincinnati; Seattle; Palo Alto, Calif.; and Ashburn, Va.

New Edge Networks will purchase wholesale SDSL broadband access and T1 service from Choice One Communications. The deal will allow the carrier to expand the reach for multisite managed network services to businesses and carriers in the upper Midwest and Northeast. It also gives New Edge access to 360 Choice One switching centers in 29 markets, including at least 225 central offices that will be brand-new to New Edge.

Allegiance Telecom has expanded its wholesale product line to include local voice services, offering a range of customized T1-based local voice and integrated products to carriers; no POTS lines are available. Online pre-evaluation is available now through a Web portal. Online order entry and installation tracking are scheduled to be available in the second quarter of 2004.

Effective Jan. 1, Rick Eberhardt has signed on as president of TransPacificTelecom Inc., makers of  “plug-and-play” software and services that turn ISPs and other “last-mile” providers into telephone companies. Eberhardt is the former senior vice president of marketing and business development with Acceris Communications Inc.