October 2001

IP/Converged Billing Solutions

Next-generation IP services are complex, dynamic, and varied, and billing systems must be simple, dynamic, and flexible in order to meet the needs of service providers. Billing systems must incorporate customer management, system monitoring and management, bill generation, and usage information just to get in the IP game, and the most effective systems are simplifying the collection of data and the creation of simple, intuitive customer contact points. And when it's time for your network to grow, those billing systems must be not only be capable of scaling to millions of users, but offer the management tools to create effective billing strategies once the customer base is intact.

Use this list of billing solutions to start your search for the systems that will prime you to both manage and reap the rewards of your next-generation service implementations in your network.

-Mike von Wahlde

Intelecable
DST Innovis
1104 Investment Blvd.
El Dorado Hills, CA 95762
800-835-8389
Intelecable is the leading-edge customer management and open billing system that supports video, voice, data, and interactive services from a single, integrated database. Intelecable is recognized as one of the fastest-growing convergence solutions in the market. With an open architecture and range of distributed APIs, Intelecable enables flexible, scalable solutions with rapid deployment of custom features and capabilities.

AP Billing Mediation Platform for Voice over IP
AP Engines, Inc.
1 Clock Tower Pl.
Maynard MA, 01754
978-461-5000
AP Engines' AP Billing Mediation Platform for Voice over IP enables telephony service providers to automatically collect accurate usage information from new network elements without change to existing core networks and OSS investments. The software collects raw usage data from IP switches, converts it to AMA or other standard formats, and delivers the formatted data to the applicable OSS. The accurate delivery of network usage information enables carriers to appropriately track and bill for services.

Singularit.e
ADC
P.O. Box 1101
Minneapolis, MN 55440-1101
953-946-3292
Singl.eView is an integral part of Singularit.e, ADC's suite of software, services, and enterprise application integration (EAI) connectors that help communication service providers build an open, comprehensive OSS to compete more effectively in the broadband era. Singularit.e automates key OSS processes by combining real-time integrated customer management, convergent billing, service fulfillment, and service assurance technology with integration services from leading consulting companies.

Mediate 6000
Baypackets
47266 Benicia St.
Fremont, California 94538
510-743-2500
The BayPackets RSI Mediate 6000 is a powerful real-time mediation solution that supports mission- critical applications such as billing, fraud, and churn. The RSI Mediate 6000 enables a single point for processing events and call detail records (CDRs) from circuit-switched and packet networks while seamlessly integrating with existing OSS/BSS systems. Legacy investments in OSS/BSS applications are protected and usage needs are met immediately. "As service providers begin introducing next-generation services to their customers, it will become paramount for them to be able to quickly deploy and manage services over multiple networks," says Anurag Goel, BayPackets cofounder and CTO.

NextGen Billing
EHPT Sweden AB
SE-112 78
Stockholm, Sweden
+46 8 685 2000
The EHPT NextGen Billing concept is a modular-based approach to communications management. It will help you provide tomorrow's services -- and make money from them. EHPT NextGen Billing consists of a comprehensive portfolio of wireline/wireless/IP products based on reusable software modules. The products can be combined into open solutions which are easily tailored to specific customer needs.

Amdocs Horizon
Amdocs
1390 Timberlake Manor Pkwy.
Chesterfield, MO 63017
314-212-7000
Amdocs Horizon provides customer care, billing, rating, and service management designed to meet the needs of broadband and next generation communications providers. Amdocs Horizon offers a flexible platform for defining and rapidly launching new services, with no coding delays or downtime. It enables communications providers to create differentiated service offerings with complex rating rules through its rule-based rating engine. Amdocs Horizon provides the tools required to manage Partner Relationship Management (PRM), which enables revenue sharing, sponsoring and m-commerce transaction-based services, with real-time prepaid functionality that seamlessly integrates with existing prepaid systems. Customer touch-points, including invoicing and Web-based self-registration, can be readily branded to support a communications provider's wholesale or Virtual Service Provider (VSP) model on a single platform. Amdocs Horizon offers flexibility to accommodate a wide range of services today, with proven reliability and scalability for future growth.

IPhonEX
MINDCTI
777 Terrace Ave.
Hasbrouck Heights, NJ 07604
201-288-3900
The real-time MIND-iPhonEX billing and customer care solution enables service providers including mobile operators, carriers, cable operators, ISPs, ITSPs, and ICPs, to provision, rate, and deploy new services at Internet speed including voice, data, video, content, unified messaging, and others. MIND-iPhonEX features the easy bundling of new services into packages suitable for different types of customers and enables flexible rating models based on different usage parameters. Diverse business models are supported including prepaid and post-paid, wholesale, retail, and branded VSPs. An integrated customer care and billing system gives service providers the tools needed to analyze and respond to customer behavior and network activity in real time. Web interfaces, providing up-to-the-minute account information and online registration for services and payment are available for both subscribers and customer service representatives.

Kenan IP Services Software
Lucent Technologies
Billing and Customer Care
One Main St.
Cambridge, MA 02142
617-225-2200
The Lucent Technologies Kenan IP Services Software offer is a comprehensive portfolio of modular and scalable software products delivering capabilities including: Registration and customer care; real-time usage collection; real-time, usage-based rating and billing; and revenue assurance. Capitalizing on extensive experience in the IP services market and our strategic partnerships with edocs and Siebel, this offer will enable service providers to bring new revenue-generating services to market today while laying the groundwork for future business models.

Rodopi 5.2
Rodopi
4660 La Jolla Village Dr., Suite 880
San Diego, CA 92122
877-4-RODOPI
5.2 offers advanced features for new and existing Rodopi users including an open API interface enabling the world's leading billing and provisioning software for millions of end users to seamlessly harness the collective power of other products and services. Easier to implement and more secure than ever before, Rodopi 5.2 broadens the range of services and applications, which can be offered by its clients. "We are committed to technology and providing the best software solution for the industry. 5.2 enables Rodopi users to enjoy a new level of sophistication; unlocking its power for both new and existing enterprise applications, whether these applications are developed in-house by companies or by independent software vendors," says Ivan Vachovsky, CEO and President.

Impresaria CCB
Mockingbird Networks
10050 Bubb Rd.
Cupertino, CA 95014-4132
408-342-5313
Mockingbird Networks Impresaria CCB is a full-featured customer care and billing software package that provides real-time call accounting capabilities, allowing a carrier to track revenue, help control costs, streamline operations, and improve customer service through a single-point customer care database.

MetraTech Billing Solution
MetraTech
330 Bear Hill Rd.
Waltham, MA 02451
781-839-8300
MetraTech is the first Web service billing and revenue sharing solution designed for business on the Web. MetraTech's native XML architecture enables rapid service creation for e-Commerce-based services and easily integrates with existing OSS/BSS systems. MetraTech's Web services platform delivers a product-based solution designed from the ground up to be extended and expanded. The MetraTech Billing Solution includes MetraBill, MetraPartner, MetraView, MetraCare, and MetraPay. These applications can be implemented separately or as a total solutions package.

Talking SIP
Dataflex
1900 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Suite 212
Los Angeles, CA 90025
310-445-1822
Talking SIP is an advanced software solution for voice applications and real-time billing over SIP networks. Talking SIP speaks SIP directly to industry leading softswitches and gateways to provide applications such as calling cards, voice mail, one number locator, call screening, and e-commerce. Talking SIP comes standard with integrated real-time pre/postpaid billing, reporting, and a complete management interface. Built on Windows 2000 Server and Microsoft SQL 2000 Server, Talking SIP runs on off-the-shelf Intel Pentium processors, so there is no need for costly and special hardware configurations.

FusionWorks
Openet Telecom
6 Beckett Wy.
Park West Business Park
Dublin, Ireland
353-1-620-4600
FusionWorks is a high-performance, fully-scalable convergent mediation platform that unifies customer usage patterns from legacy network infrastructure, IP networks, and 3G wireless networks, including WAP, GPRS, EDGE, and UMTS. Developed by Openet Telecom, FusionWorks enables service providers to manage the growing complexity of their business infrastructure -- including the collection of subscriber usage information, the integration of new and legacy billing systems, event-based transaction pricing and management, customer care, data warehousing, fraud management, and other related applications. The software easily interfaces with applications that provide a unified, real-time view of each customer and their usage habits, enabling service providers to target strategic sales and marketing campaigns that lead to increased revenues and improved speed-to-market when introducing high-margin, value-added services.

Sentori IP System
Sentori
14401 Sweitzer Ln.
Laurel, MD
240-568-6201
The Sentori IP system meets the unique provisioning, mediation, customer care and billing needs of IP communication service providers offering services such as VoIP, Internet access, broadband, and multi-media content. Built using an object oriented, three-tiered and Web-based technology platform, the Sentori IP system features a modular architecture allowing for flexible configuration, and integration with multiple external interfaces via APIs and XML. Specific features include: Quick service provisioning via the Sentori Open Mediation Manager (OMM); credit control applications; IPDR data collection and transaction-based, real-time rating for single or multiple services; reconciliation functionality to manage revenue sharing across the content supply; accounting for incremental QoS billing; and multi-service billing options including online billing (EBPP) and self care.

APEX Billing System
APEX Voice Communications
15250 Ventura Blvd., 3rd Floor
Sherman Oaks, CA 91403
818-379-8400
The APEX Billing System is a transaction-based rating system for TDM- and IP-based networks designed to bill traditional and enhanced services such as long distance, carrier, travel card, wireless, call back voice/fax mail, IP, and prepaid. APEX Billing's rating engine offers numerous rating schemes for use with virtually any currency. The platform has multi-level marketing and commission accounting capabilities, a distributed architecture and an open software design that uses a relational database with SQL. Other features include a modular structure and internationalization and localization features.

XACCTusage
XACCT
2900 Lakeside Dr., Suite 100
Santa Clara, CA 95054
408-654-9900
XACCTusage captures the Internet protocol session and transaction information from individual network or service elements. With its unique, real-time policy-based record synthesis features, XACCTusage transforms this raw data into meaningful business information. To accomplish this, a variety of device-specific, as well as general-purpose software modules called information source modules, or ISMs, are utilized. These are the software modules that capture, filter, aggregate, correlate, and merge the data collected from network elements such as routers, switches, firewalls, probes, remote access servers, DNS servers, Web servers, e-mail servers, video servers, voice over IP gateways, and hundreds of other network and service elements. Because they are located on or near these elements, the ISMs enable service providers to capture IP service usage information from all layers of the network -- from the physical layer to the applications layer.

Infranet
Portal Software, Inc.
10200 South De Anza Blvd.
Cupertino, CA 95014
408-572-2000
Built from the ground up to support cutting-edge business infrastructures, the Infranet platform enables communications service providers to swiftly develop, price, and provision services while strategically managing customer usage and billing. Value-based pricing support maximizes revenue by billing based on value and quality of content, minutes, bytes, or quality of service. Features include: Powerful pricing tools, support for multiple languages, full internationalization support, which allows providers to standardize on a single product worldwide, database reporting, real-time authentication and authorization, sophisticated rating engine, support for multiple currencies, full integration with financial systems allows for instant general ledger updates and enables providers to track earned and unearned revenue at any time, and a powerful payment tool captures accountholder payments and reflects them immediately in customer care tools.

COMX
Telution, Inc.
65 East Wacker Pl., Ste. 600
Chicago, IL 60601
312-201-6600
Communication Exhange, COMX, Telution's integrated suite of customer care, order management, and billing applications, utilizes B-to-B connection tools and e-commerce applications to unite communication providers with their customers, networks, and business partners. COMX manages all customer interactions and business transactions, from ordering and provisioning, to billing and support.

PhoneBill, DirectBill, WebBill, CreditCard, ACH
eBillit
408-362-4100
As one of the Internet's leading Payment Service Providers, eBillit offers a comprehensive suite of payment platforms: PhoneBill, DirectBill, WebBill, CreditCard, and ACH, along with an array of complementary services including Validation and Fraud Control, Customer Management, and Customer Care. eBillit's PhoneBill payment platform enables providers to place Internet charges directly onto the subscribers local phone bill in more than 1,400 Telco regions, reaching more than 90 percent of U.S. households.

CostGuard
Info Directions
833 Phillips Rd.
Victor, NY 14564
888-924-4110
In-house and ASP solutions from Info Directions are the ideal fit for the integrated communications provider seeking an open architecture, billing, and customer care solution on the MS, SQL, or Oracle database platform. Info Directions' usage-based, consumer-centric solutions support traditional and next-generation telephony, complex based IP, and data-driven event processing. Integrated with Info Directions' thin client, and Web-enabled functionality, solutions from Info Directions offer an immediate return on investment from billing operations.

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