Cisco and Avail Media Offer Complete Solution for Service Providers to Accelerate IPTV Launches

Fully Integrated Solution Helps Speed Time to Market While Cutting Costs

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Cisco and Avail Media today announced an agreement that will help enable service providers to easily, quickly and cost-effectively offer IPTV services to their subscribers using an innovative solution that combines the Cisco® IP Next-Generation Network (IP NGN) and IPTV platform with Avail Media’s IP-based video service.

The solution is designed to help service providers meet the challenges of transforming themselves from voice and data providers into “experience providers” that can offer any-play services anywhere, anytime. By taking advantage of Cisco and Avail Media technologies, partnerships and experience, service providers can add IPTV to their portfolios and converge all their services over a single Internet Protocol (IP) network. This capability enables service providers to gain significant cost efficiencies, generate new revenue, and establish long-term competitive advantages.
Key Facts:

* The Cisco and Avail Media end-to-end offering processes content and television programming and distributes it via satellite to telecommunications companies and their IPTV consumers nationwide.

* Systems integration from both companies and their respective partners is an integral part of the offering.

* Unique to the solution, the IPTV services are fully managed through Cisco’s National Control Center, eliminating the need for service providers to hire staff for headend management.

* MPEG-4 content distribution is provided via Avail Media’s Avail ConnectTM service. The service, combined with the Cisco IP NGN architecture and IPTV solutions, creates a complete end-to-end IPTV service with encoding, encapsulation, middleware and digital rights management, scrambling and descrambling, satellite receivers, conditional access, set-top provision, service management, systems integration services, and program management for video hub office components.

Supporting Quotes:

* “We’re harnessing Cisco’s networking heritage and IPTV expertise and combining it with our proven IP-based video solution to give service providers the means to launch profitable IPTV services quickly while helping them control their capital costs and ongoing operational expenses,” said Ramu Potarazu, chief executive officer, Avail Media. “Our integrated solution includes an expansive composition of industry-leading technologies for aggressive launches that leverage the two companies’ proven experience.”

* “This solution greatly reduces the complexity of and time to market for service provider IPTV deployments,” said Dave Davies, vice president and general manager, IPTV Solutions, Cisco. “We are extremely pleased to be working with Avail Media in our efforts to help service providers deploy flexible and differentiated end-to-end IPTV solutions that are designed to evolve and help them stay competitive in an ever-changing marketplace.”

About Avail Media, Inc.

Based in Reston, Virginia, Avail Media is the industry leader in providing managed content aggregation services through a fully-integrated, head-end infrastructure for the profitable deployment of IP video. Avail Media is the only company today to deliver to its affiliates a combined MPEG-4 linear IPTV, HD Overlay (MPEG-2/4) programming solution, and Video On Demand (VOD) solution. The Avail Media solution includes a full content lineup of live television programming with hundreds of channels, all quality-encoded in MPEG-4, IP-encapsulated, encrypted, combined with VOD, and designed for future value-added services. Avail Media’s system has been designed for use by video providers of multiple types - whether triple-play, quad-play, or pure video play. For more information, please visit www.availmedia.com.
About Cisco Systems

Cisco, (NASDAQ: CSCO), is the worldwide leader in networking that transforms how people connect, communicate and collaborate. Information about Cisco can be found at http://www.cisco.com. For ongoing news, please go to http://newsroom.cisco.com.

Cisco, the Cisco logo and Cisco Systems are registered trademarks or trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries. All other trademarks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company. This document is Cisco Public Information.