Commetrex is the leading worldwide supplier of fax and fax-related technologies to the telecommunications OEM and system integrator. Many of the finest names in communications, such as 3Com, AudioCodes, Catena Networks, Globespan Virata, Lucent, NMS, IP Unity, Sonus, and Spirent Communications are licensees of Commetrex’ fax technology. They chose Commetrex because it means they will base their product on the very finest field-proven technology.

Now, Commetrex has integrated its award-winning product and technology portfolio into a next- generation architecture for the enterprise and hosted-communications service provider OEM, who must be able to cost-effectively develop applications where the underlying platform renders the network—IP or PSTN—or the transport—G.711 pass-through, T.38 fax relay, or traditional fax modems—transparent to the application. Developers of enterprise systems must be able to take advantage of the power of today’s host processors, which double in power every 18 months while the MIPS required to process a fax media stream have remained constant, and, in the case of T.38, have actually gone down. In today’s market, business as usual with traditional “fax boards” just doesn’t fill the bill.

To learn more about the fax industry’s next-generation architecture read the white paper: Open Telecommunications Framework®, A New Architecture for Fax Telephony.

Commetrex’ BladeWare (our host-media-processing platform), BladeWare Fax-to-Email Server, and BladeWare Fax Media Server are the products that make all of this possible. But the architecture goes way beyond IP-based HMP.

If you're developing a fax server, an IP gateway, or network-based media server, Commetrex is the only fax-technology partner you will need. (We also have a comprehensive VoIP technology portfolio.) Commetrex’ fax modems, available in source-code licenses, have 12 years of field-proven deployment. Quantitative testing shows they are superior to the most-popular modem chip. This modem technology and PortableT30™ are the basis of PowerFax for OTF, the software product that makes the BladeWare MSP-H8 and MSP-320 resource boards the industry's most versatile and cost-effective "fax boards". Moreover, Commetrex has completed a rigorous validation of its recently completed V.34 fax modem, which is currently being integrated into a very high-volume multi-function peripheral.

Are you designing a fax gateway?  You can license Commetrex’ PowerRelay™ with support for both T.38 (Fax over IP) and I.366.2 (Fax over ATM).  Combine PowerRelay with Commetrex’ fax modems for a complete gateway solution.  And rest assured that your product is based on the industry's best technology.

Concerned about T.38 interoperability? Commetrex is the T.38 interoperability leader.  In January 2002 Commetrex announced the opening of its T.38 Interoperability Lab, which offers no-fee interop testing to any vendor with a fielded T.38-capable gateway.  Since its opening, 13 companies have signed up and eight have completed testing.  The T.38 Interop Lab has made PowerRelay and TerminatingT38 the industry's interoperability standards.

TerminatingT38™ lets you combine service-platform and gateway functionality in the same carrier-class product.  If you are a fax-server or media server vendor you can readily add the ability to terminate IP-based fax alongside legacy PSTN terminating fax.

Our newest product offering is called Multi-Modal Fax.  Enterprise platforms and network-based media servers must support fax regardless of the mode of transport (IP or PSTN) or the capability of an IP gateway (T.38 or G.711 pass-through).  T.30 is the ITU standard used to terminate a fax, but what goes on between two T.30 endpoints can involve quite a range of technologies.  The simplest is a straight PSTN connection, which only requires ananlog fax modems.  But insert an IP transport in the middle and things begin to get complicated.  T.38 is the ITU standard for gateways to handle real-time IP fax, but not all gateways support T.38.  Instead, they simply encode the analog stream and pass it through the gateway as a G.711 stream.  It's not very robust, but if a server wants to be able to terminate faxes from both types of gateways, the G.711 stream must be demodulated by fax modems.

So Commetrex invented the Multi-Modal Terminating Fax, and it's now shipping.  This licensed technology uses one terminating T.30 protocol engine to support terminating faxes transported over both types of networks.  And if the network is IP, it supports both T.38 and G.711 pass-through.

And you can now take advantage of the MSP Media Gateway line of Any Media…Any Port…Anytime DSP-resource boards.  The MSP-H8 sets the benchmark for affordability in the 2-8 line market.  And the MSP-320, supporting four DS-1 spans with the Quad E1/T1 daughterboard and per-port licensing, gives the OEM the ultimate in density, flexibility, and affordability.  The same S.100-conforming API is used for both PSTN and T.38-based send/receive. The MSP-H8 and MSP-320 boards are available.

Please take advantage of the information available on our Web site, then contact us to discuss how Commetrex can help you get your product to market faster and with less investment in product development.