mPhase Technologies this week will launch what it¡¦s coined ¡§IPTV in a Box¡¨ that packages together virtually everything a carrier would need to launch video service for $500 per subscriber.

„XThe offering is built around a 22U rack of HP ProLiant DL380 and DL360 servers running mPhase¡¦s software and includes SkyStream iPlex head end hardware and software, Latens security software, an Entone video-on-demand platform and Triveni¡¦s Digita¡¦s electronic program guide software. The package also includes 1000 Amino set-top boxes and 1000 BestData ADSL2+ modems.

It¡¦s to take a complex installation and makes it simple,¡¨ said Mary Whelan, executive vice president of marketing and communications for mPhase.

About the only thing the offer doesn¡¦t include is an access element, which was left out intentionally. Also missing is a source of content, another intentional omission, said Mike Devlin, executive vice president of sales and business development for mPhase.¡¨

¡§They can get their feed from a couple of different ways,¡¨ he said. ¡§It¡¦s fully prepared to take feeds from satellite, local data or anywhere.¡¨

The companies are targeting smaller, independent telcos and will likely be facing competition from a number of different other collaborative efforts such as the IP Prime product from SES Americom, NTCA and NRTC. A number of access vendors also have put together many of the same elements into pre-packaged offerings.

mPhase believes it can differentiate its offering by ensuring all vendors in the system are on the same release schedule and that all equipment has been pre-tested and certified. Carriers could swap out some elements, however, that would add time to any deployment schedule.

¡§We have assembled best in breed,¡¨ Devlin said. ¡§They are swappable but one of the issues you hit is you¡¦re going to go through months of integration work. What we¡¦ve learned is that there¡¦s an extensive amount of work in integrating them and testing them.¡¨