Innovative Systems

Farmers Mutual Coop Reduces Expenses Deploying IPTV Middleware from Innovative Systems

April 23, 2012

Moulton, IA – One Iowa telephone company has proven that IPTV video can be delivered economically even though they have a small customer base. By utilizing a strategy of headend sharing and middleware sharing, this small southern Iowa telephone company is able to provide its customers with a quality video service that can effectively compete with satellite offerings. Farmers Mutual Coop deploys their IPTV through the Iowa Network Services shared headend and shares their middleware with another rural telephone company, Citizens Mutual in Bloomfield, Iowa.

Switching to APMAX™ Middleware, according to Farmers Mutual General Manager Tammy Wheeler, has been recognized as a vast improvement by their subscribers, almost immediately. Wheeler adds, “News of the upgrade of service has spread throughout our exchange area and the benefit is that we are getting a number of new customers each week, which is significant in the rural Telco environment."

The majority of the subscriber feedback relating to the new system has been about the responsiveness and the overall appearance of the program guide. Wheeler says they are also pleased with how well the DVR component has been received by their customers adding, “Our inventory of DVR set top boxes is almost gone which is certainly a nice problem for us.”

About Farmers Mutual Coop
Farmers Mutual Coop has been in business since 1905. Farmers Mutual buried fiber optic cable to all its customer’s premises in 2008. Customers began to switch over to the fiber system in early 2009. The company increased its broadband Internet to 100% of its customer base with the switch to the fiber system. Farmers offers the triple play with Internet up to 5 Mb down, voice and IPTV services. Visit their website:

About Innovative Systems
Innovative Systems offers the APMAX IMS Application Server, the only platform in the industry that delivers enhanced voice services and IPTV video solutions, eLation, a fully integrated OSS solution which includes billing, financials and staking and mapping applications. With over 1200 systems in service throughout North America, Innovative Systems is one of the leading suppliers of telecommunications hardware and software for the Independent Telco Market.  For more information, please contact the Innovative Systems Corporate Office at 605-995-6120 or visit: www.innovsys.com