Lake Oswego, Ore.-based VideoTele.com, a Tektronix company, has completed a digital headend system that uses phone lines to bring video and data services to the entire state.
Iowa Network Services Inc. (INS), a Des Moines-based telecommunications company, purchased VideoTele.com's Astria content processor and Aveon software for delivery of 175 video and audio channels over INS' 4,500-mile fiber-optic network, potentially to 147 independent rural telephone companies serving 280,000 end users.
"We strategically designed our digital platform in Clear Lake with the intent of offering voice, data and video services simultaneously over the phone line as the technology became available and accessible," said Tom Lovell, general manager of Clear Lake Independent Telephone Company, the first independent operator in Iowa to offer the service.
In the arrangement with VideoTele.com, independent operators support installation costs and own the transmission portion of the project. They then receive programming, high-speed Internet capability and integrated telephony services.
