ANDOVER, Mass., April 28, 2004 — Stargus announced that Rich Higgins has joined the company as Vice President of Advanced Technology. Higgins previously worked for Time Warner Cable where he was Director of Telecommunications Engineering and served as the principle network architect for the cable operator’s Digital Phone service, the industry’s first primary-line residential telephone service using VoIP technology.
In this new position at Stargus, Higgins will be responsible for expanding and accelerating the company’s VoIP strategy and product line to build on Stargus’ early customer success supporting several VoIP roll-outs in the U.S. and Europe.
“As cable operators continue to turn to Stargus to support their VoIP roll-outs, the addition of Rich extends our technical and market leadership in VoIP network management,” said Larry Derany, Vice President of Engineering and Operations for Stargus. “Rich complements our existing DOCSIS expertise with a unique combination of PacketCable technical leadership, a network of strong industry relationships and real-world experience deploying Time Warner’s nationwide VoIP service.”
Stargus is working with five of the top seven cable operators worldwide and the company’s CableEdge software is monitoring more than 20 percent of the world’s cable modem-based devices in deployments across the U.S. and Europe.
As Director of Telecommunications Engineering for Time Warner Cable, Higgins was responsible for driving the technology and business strategy for the cable operator’s VoIP residential phone service. His responsibilities included helping to develop the business models and product strategy, negotiating contracts, and managing all VoIP vendor relationships.
In addition, as a VoIP thought leader in the cable industry, Higgins represented Time Warner Cable interests at the CableLabs and IETF standards bodies, participated as a full voting member of the PacketCable Certification Board, and served on the PacketCable Business Committee and the PacketCable Technical Committee. He is a member the Society of Cable Television Engineers, the IEEE, and the American Physical Society. Higgins also has two patents pending for innovations related to VoIP and home networking products.
“Based on my experience rolling out VoIP, the quality demands of telephony make Stargus’ proactive, DOCSIS and service aware approach the ideal way to manage VoIP and all advanced services on broadband cable networks,” said Rich Higgins, Vice President of Advanced Technology for Stargus. “The Stargus team literally wrote the standard for how to manage DOCSIS so I look forward to working closely with them as cable operators increasingly focus on how to improve the manageability of their VoIP deployments.”
Prior to Time Warner Cable, Higgins served as the senior manager at MCI responsible for hardware and software test and deployment for network interactive voice response services, a business unit with $200 million in annual revenue. Earlier in his career, Higgins worked in senior engineering and management positions at Transportation Technology Center and as a scientist at the Naval Ocean Systems Center.
About Stargus, Inc.
As a provider of policy-based network management and control software, Stargus enables broadband operators to take control of Cable’s Last Mile by reducing operating costs and revenue leakage, driving revenue growth and improving customer satisfaction. CableEdge is the only intelligent network analysis and control software designed exclusively for DOCSIS infrastructure and advanced IP services. The company is headquartered in Andover, Massachusetts. For more information, visit Stargus online at www.stargus.com.
