USOO6614781B1

(12) United States Patent (10) Patent No.: US 6,614,781 B1

Elliott et al. (45) Date of Patent: Sep. 2, 2003

(54) VOICE OVER DATA FOREIGN PATENT DOCUMENTS

TELECOMMUNICATIONS NETWORK
EP O 789 470 A2 8/1997 ........... HO4L/12/66
ARCHITECTURE
(List continued on next page.)
(75) Inventors: Isaac K. Elliott, Broomfield, CO (US); OTHER PUBLICATIONS
Steven P. Higgins, Colorado Springs,
CO (US); Andrew John Dugan, Yang, C.; INETPhone: Telephone Services and Servers on
Superior, CO (US); Jon Peterson, Internet; Apr. 1995; pp. 1-6, Network Working Group,
Boulder, CO (US); Robert L. RFC#1789.
Hernandez, Longmont, CO (US); Rick
D. Steele, Longmont, CO (US); Bruce (List continued on next page.)
W. Baker, Erie, CO (US); Rich Primary Examiner Kwang Bin Yao
Terpstra, Louisville, CO (US); (74) Attorney, Agent, or Firm Merchant & Gould P.C.
Jonathan S. Mitchell, Superior, CO
(US); Jin-Gen Wang, Westminster, CO (57) ABSTRACT
(US); Harold Stearns, Erie, CO (US);
Eric Zimmerer, Westminster, CO (US); The present invention describes a System and method for
Ray Waibel, Arvada, CO (US); Kraig communicating Voice and data over a packet-Switched net
Owen, Boulder, CO (US); Shawn M. work that is adapted to coexist and communicate with a
Lewis, Southboro, MA (US) legacy PSTN. The system permits packet Switching of voice
calls and data calls through a data network from and to any
(73) Assignee: Level 3 Communications, Inc., of a LEC, a customer facility or a direct IP connection on the
Broomfield, CO (US) data network. The System includes Soft Switch Sites, gateway
Sites, a data network, a provisioning component, a network
(*) Notice: Subject to any disclaimer, the term of this event component and a network management component.
patent is extended or adjusted under 35 The system interfaces with customer facilities (e.g., a PBX),
U.S.C. 154(b) by 0 days. carrier facilities (e.g., a LEC) and legacy signaling networks
(e.g., SS7) to handle calls between any combination of
(21) Appl. No.: 09/197,203 on-network and off-network callers.

(22) Filed: Nov. 20, 1998 The Soft Switch SiteS provide the core call processing for the
(51) Int. Cl................................................. H04L 12/66 Voice network architecture. The Soft Switch Sites manage the
gateway Sites in a preferred embodiment, using a protocol
U.S. Cl. ........................................ 370/352; 370/401 such as the Internet Protocol Device Control (IPDC) proto
(52) col to request the Set-up and tear-down of calls. The gateway
Sites originate and terminate calls between calling parties
(58) Field of Search ................................. 370/352, 353, and called parties through the data network. The gateway
370/354, 355, 356, 395.1, 395.2, 395.21, Sites include network acceSS devices to provide access to
395.5, 395.51,395.52, 395.6, 465, 466 network resources. The data network connects one or more
of the Soft Switch Sites to one or more of the gateway Sites.
(56) References Cited The provisioning and network event component collects call
U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS events recorded at the Soft Switch sites. The network man
agement component includes a network operations center
4,100,377 A 7/1978 Flanagan ................ 179/15 AS (NOC) for centralized network management.
4,238.851 A 12/1980 Takahashi et al. ............ 370/94
(List continued on next page.) 10 Claims, 137 Drawing Sheets

150
102 y\ CARRIER
FACITY
120

122 A. CUSTOMER STE CUSIOMER 24

FACTY FACLTY
110 132
 US 6,614,781 B1
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U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS 5,423,003 A 6/1995 Berteau ...................... 395/200

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 US 6,614,781 B1
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