April 1999
THROUGH THE GATEWAY:
The Future Of IP Communications
BY CHARLES GIAMBALVO
Imagine a world where you can receive all your email messages, voice mail messages,
faxes, and even a live videoconference - all from your laptop, connected anywhere in the
world. Imagine a world where you can browse the Web and still receive phone calls without
purchasing a second phone line. Imagine having all your calls prioritized, redirected, and
categorized for you. Imagine aligning your network to your business instead of aligning
your business to the network. These services are not simply blueprints in the minds of
developers, they are real IP communications applications, many of which are available to
users now. IP telephony is much more than cheap phone calls.
IP communications has the potential to enable a user to send and receive any type of
communication anywhere, instead of letting a network decide what type of communication is
available to them. In a truly "IP world," users have the ultimate control to
determine when and where to send and receive correspondences - from live phone calls and
e-mail to voice mail messages and faxes. Though many believe that this IP world is far
away, we are already witnessing the addition of new services such as phone-to-PC and
PC-to-phone calling, giving users unprecedented power to design communications around
their individual needs.
Demand for new services is driving network convergence, and an IP network is a leading
choice for yielding the necessary results. We have all heard the buzzwords, but what does
convergence mean?
Most of us still use more than one network every single day: The IP network to check
e-mail, and the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) for phone calls. It is hard to
imagine another option. Still, the face of network communications is changing rapidly.
TOWARD A MULTI-SERVICE PLATFORM
IP telephony provides an ideal platform for a multi-service environment that can
accommodate new network needs including the transmission of voice, data and new multimedia
capabilities. IP based multi-service platforms must integrate seamlessly into existing
networks. POTS (plain old telephony service) has served us well. We have grown used to
excellent service and reliable calling anywhere in the world. But multi-service networks
must also allow new services to be easily layered onto existing ones.
With traditional proprietary circuit-switched networks, expensive capital outlays and
hardware upgrades slow the growth of new and profitable markets based on these services.
An IP-based multi-service platform can overcome these barriers by offering
telecommunications companies the opportunity to secure existing markets and reach new ones
quickly and cost-effectively.
EVOLUTION OF IP MULTI-SERVICE NETWORKS
IP telephony began as a solution to offer low-cost long distance calling - fair enough.
And standalone gateways alone were enough to serve this purpose. They enabled carriers to
bypass international long distance charges and reap efficiency benefits. Gateways
seamlessly linked IP networks and the PSTN. The gateway propelled IP telephony into the
realm of service provision and continues to provide the PSTN-IP interface a smooth
integration with existing infrastructure. But the pace of Internet telephony development
moves at the same pace as the Internet, and innovators are hard at work perfecting the
next step in IP communications - the gatekeeper.
Gateways, which by nature must be highly distributed, cannot provide the many
additional functions necessary to support worldwide networks. Accounting, billing, and
security are dynamic entities and telecom managers need to constantly adjust and change
them to fit customer and business needs. In order to centralize the control of these
functions, developers recognized the need for a gatekeeper. The gatekeeper is a
"conductor" for a network. From protecting the system from hackers to choosing
the least-expensive route for a phone call to tracking an individual user's whereabouts,
gatekeepers synchronize the various IP telephony network elements including gateways,
specialized servers, and end-user clients.
The gatekeeper is a crucial component for the development of multi-service
environments. Gatekeeper functionality adds intelligence to IP networks. Over the long
term, gatekeepers are necessary to offer a full suite of options for efficient and global
IP networks. It is the gatekeeper that will allow not just one "killer app" but
dozens of new integrated services. Telcos and businesses will be able offer end users
seamless access to the services they already use, such as call forwarding, along with new
services like store-and-forward fax. In addition, the exclusively software IP environment
will allow service providers to give users services immediately, from a central location.
New technology is also providing the means for administrators to carefully monitor and
adjust an IP telephony network, ensuring the "five 9's" reliability (99.999
percent availability of the network). Network management capabilities and user-friendly
interfaces will enable administrators to deliver ceaseless network availability to users
who have come to expect rapid assistance and high-quality service. The combination of
gatekeeper intelligence and network management capability will finally provide the impetus
for businesses to move mission-critical applications onto IP networks.
With developments enabling multi-service environments, IP communications is introducing
new services that cut across nearly every industry. From online financial transactions to
collaborative document sharing, IP communications provides tools that are useful for
almost any business or end-user. The Internet can be viewed as the powerful first foray
into a global online community, and full service IP networks are the next-generation leap
in the globalization of communications.
OBSTACLES IP TELEPHONY MUST OVERCOME
In older, more mature industries, we have grown used to standards. We accept that light
bulbs will automatically fit their sockets, and we rely on air traffic control procedures
to see us safely to our destinations around the world. However, in mature industries,
companies eager to bring an advanced product to market must often deal with proprietary
technology. Emerging standards provide a basis for cooperation, but they often lack the
depth and complexity necessary to permit comprehensive interoperability between elements
from different vendors.
IP communications is emerging from an early stage in which vendors released new
technology that was not interoperable with that of other vendors. Service providers and
corporations want their technology investments to offer long-term returns. Standards
prevent a company from being tied to the fortunes of a single vendor, and they also give
users a wider array of choices, infusing quality and competition into the market.
The newly formed iNOW! interoperability initiative is an excellent example of
inter-company cooperation to advance an industry. iNOW! is a standards-based, multi-vendor
initiative established to quickly provide interoperability among IP telephony platforms.
VocalTec (www.vocaltec.com), Lucent (www.lucent.com), Ascend (www.ascend.com),
Cisco (www.cisco.com), Clarent (www.clarent.com), Dialogic (www.dialogic.com), Natural MicroSystems (www.nmss.com), and Siemens (www.siemens.de)
will be working with the iNOW! profile to make their gateways and gatekeepers
interoperable with each other's products.
IP communications must overcome yet another hurdle - the reputation acquired from its
slightly older cousin, the open Internet. Compared to the phone network, the Internet has
a reputation for unreliability and delay. However, it is important to realize how far the
Internet and IP communications has come in a few short years. The POTS system we all know
today did not develop overnight - it took decades to become the reliable service we depend
upon daily. Yet within a few short years, since the introduction of software capable of
packetizing voice for transport over IP networks, IP telephony has moved from a hobbyist's
toy to a reliable and useful method of transporting voice, video, and data.
Further developments in IP communications technology are fostering quality improvements
quickly. Upcoming fiber optic buildouts and service upgrades to the home will ensure that
bandwidth for IP applications is much more plentiful. The powerful and versatile Quality
of Service applications under development, introduction of classes of service (COS), and
the evolution of traffic management techniques are ensuring that IP communications will
offer the reliability of POTS but with much greater sophistication.
Those who feel IP communications will disappear in the face of deregulation and lower
calling rates on the PSTN, or who point to present-day obstacles such as lack of standards
or inadequate bandwidth, fail to see the larger picture. IP communications is not simply a
short-term, cost-saving measure. Present-day obstacles are temporary and to-be-expected in
a nascent industry. All indicators reveal that these obstacles are surmountable.
Already, advances made in the past few years far outpace those on the PSTN. In the
future, long-term gains in the delivery of advanced services over IP, such as Internet
call waiting, and store-and-forward fax, will become much more crucial than the initial
wave of cost savings. IP communications achieves what the PSTN alone cannot deliver:
Unprecedented control over communications according to individual needs and preferences.
These developments benefit end users and open up lucrative new markets for service
providers.
Charles Giambalvo is president of VocalTec Communications, Inc. VocalTec develops
and markets end-to-end communications solutions for service providers, corporations, and
individuals. For more information, please visit their Web site at www.vocaltec.com.
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