February 2000

BY KEVIN MAYER

Go Right To:
Next-Gen Services News
On The Dotted Line
Next-Gen Services Q & A
The Relevance Of TMN And OSS To Next-Gen Elements

A picture would start to emerge, however, only after you found those crucial pieces that connected the more uniform areas, those pieces that include not just a region of sky, but also the upper portions of the trees. In the case of next-gen services, a few such pieces are just now coming into view.

Until recently, information about next-gen switching platforms (or, to be slightly less vague, packet telephony switching platforms) said little about operational support systems (OSS). This omission was complemented by the sketchy presence of such platforms in discussions of OSS, the software assisting in a range of support services such as provisioning, trouble ticketing, billing, customer care, and network operations.

In many cases, OSS describes systems that are standalone or proprietary, or derived from Bellcore specifications. One could almost form the impression that OSS exclusively concerned incumbent carriers, or that carriers were by no means convinced that OSS integration was in their interests, or practical, at least any time soon. Nevertheless, OSS integration has become a hot topic, thanks in part to the efforts of the TeleManagement Forum, which insists that integration should lead to a plug-and-play management environment.

If OSS integration is impractical, at least one thing is even more impractical: implementing and supporting new service bundles and enhanced services without an open OSS environment. Accordingly, network elements will, at the least, have to nod in the direction of OSS integration. And this includes next-gen network elements such as packet telephony platforms.

Until recently, platform providers emphasized their hardware, their switching capabilities. But recently we've seen more announcements on OSS integration, including partnerships. Also, vendors are articulating how next-gen platforms could serve as development or application platforms -- with applications provided by the vendor, by partners, or by other third parties.

In general, the next-gen trends are shaping up as follows: 1) more cost-efficient means of delivering familiar services; 2) enabling novel bundling and billing of familiar services; 3) enabling unprecedented enhanced services.

We've asked several equipment providers to comment on these trends, and to indicate how their offerings relate to OSS integration. In addition, we've gleaned several relevant news items that illustrate the trends. Altogether, the pieces suggest at least two regions of the puzzle are coming together, moving -- if only gradually -- toward a coherent whole.

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Next-Gen Services News

• XACCT And Ennovate Integrate IP Billing With IP Service Automation
• TMN Architecture Here To Stay; Protocols Fade Away
• Studies Indicate Demand For Bundled Services
• Convergent Networks Licenses OpenCon’s Billing Platform
• Mockingbird Unveils Plug-And-Play VoIP
• Unisphere Launches Partner Program
• Tellabs To Acquire SALIX Technologies
• telecom technologies Announces Softswitch Initiative

XACCT And Ennovate Integrate IP Billing With IP Service Automation
XACCT Technologies and Ennovate Networks have entered into a strategic partnership, integrating the XACCTusage metering and mediation solution for IP networks, and Ennovate's EnSight, a service automation system that enables network service providers to automatically provision, deploy, and monitor IP VPNs and related IP WAN services.

The announcement signals Ennovate's first integration partnership with a third-party application vendor. The partners assert that their offerings are able to integrate rapidly and seamlessly because of their open interfaces (CORBA and XML) and directory-enabled management through support for Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP)."With the combined solution," said Anil Uberoi, vice president of marketing at XACCT, "NSPs will have the ability to quickly provision new, differentiated services and pricing models without the need to invest in expensive customized software, improving their competitiveness and bottom line."

Current proprietary management and provisioning approaches force service personnel at NSPs to manually perform a host of low-level configuration tasks repetitively via a command line interface. These tasks -- such as determining IP addresses and unique VPN members, creating interfaces and virtual routers, and configuring links and IP layers -- consume a significant amount of staff time and must be performed for every VPN site. With Ensight, low-level, repetitive tasks are automated for all VPN sites via predefined policies, and executed with customer data entered through a point-and-click Web interface.
No. 554, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

TMN Architecture Here To Stay; Protocols Fade Away
In a recently released study, “The Global TMN Market: Managing Telecom Networks In The 21st Century,” the Venture Development Corporation reports that the Telecommunications Management Network (TMN) architecture has been widely accepted in the telecom industry. However, the TMN prescribed protocols are seldom implemented and are losing support.

Worldwide revenues from sales of TMN products and services, reportedly $2.3 billion in 1999, are expected to grow to more than $5.3 billion in 2004. Awareness of TMN — a five-layered model for defining, assigning, and creating functionality in a telecommunications management environment — has reached an all-time high. However, the original TMN protocols have not been accepted, or used, by the majority of telcom service providers.

The Q3 CMIP interface, the fundamental TMN inter-layer protocol, has not been implemented due to its complexity and expense. Other protocols, such as the legacy ASCII-based TL1, SNMP, and CORBA are more frequently used than the Q3 interface.
No. 555, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Studies Indicate Demand For Bundled Services
According to studies released by the Strategis Group, demand for bundled consumer and business telecommunications services is strong with consumers, SOHOs, and small to large businesses. The studies reveal that 66 percent of businesses and 63 percent of consumers are interested in purchasing bundles with at least two services.
No. 556, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Convergent Networks Licenses OpenCon’s Billing Platform
Convergent Networks, by licensing OpenCon Systems’ Billing Mediation Platform (BMP), will be able to offer customers standard Bellcore AMA format call detail records (CDRs), which can be integrated into a variety of back-end billing and customer information systems. According to Convergent Networks, this announcement demonstrates the company’s strategy of partnering with industry leaders to add best-of-breed services to its convergence solutions.
OpenCon’s BMP, a multi-protocol, multi-source, data collection distribution management solution, enables service providers to take raw data, collected from multiple sources and environments, and turn it into useful billing information. For example, when a telephone call is made, a switch — the Convergent Networks ICS 2000 — may generate one or more CDRs that provide information, such as origination and destination, identification of the caller, and other important descriptive details about the connection. As a result of the licensing agreement, the ICS 2000 will be able to take the information captured in its CDRs and make it all available to carriers, enabling simplified, streamlined billing, even across multiple network infrastructures.
No. 557, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Mockingbird Unveils Plug-And-Play VoIP
Mockingbird Networks, a developer of distributed carrier-class IP telephony switches, announced a complete hardware, software, and carrier-connection IP telephony solution for ISPs and next-generation network service providers. Mockingbird’s plug-and-play solution integrates the Mockingbird Nuvo IP telephony switch, Impresaria OSS customer care and billing software, phone card software, and global network carrier connections within a scalable, standards-based architecture.
No. 558, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Unisphere Launches Partner Program
Unisphere Solutions launched the Unisphere Management Center (UMC) Partners Program. An integral part of Unisphere’s commitment to address the network and service management needs of service providers, the UMC Partners Program is designed to bring together the industry’s leading software providers, in conjunction with Unisphere’s developed software, to offer a complete set of service creation, delivery, and assurance tools and services.

Early participants include Micromuse, which has successfully integrated its Netcool fault- and service-level management software with the UMC system, enabling enhanced monitoring of Unisphere’s high-performance edge routers and voice/data switches to immediately pinpoint problems within the network. Another participant, Quallaby Corporation, has integrated a network performance and service level management solution. The solution, called PROVISO, in combination with UMC, creates a powerful service level assurance tool.
No. 559, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Tellabs To Acquire SALIX Technologies
Tellabs announced that it is acquiring SALIX Technologies, a developer of class-independent switching solutions that enable service providers to offer next-generation, converged services such as voice over ATM, voice over IP, and Internet services — over any network infrastructure. According to Tellabs, the acquisition will bolster the company’s strength in delivering an integrated switching portfolio. Tellabs also indicates it will leverage its voice quality enhancement solutions and its acquisition of digital signal processing technology from DSP Software Engineering to offer service providers best-in-class telecommunications equipment.
No. 560, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

telecom technologies Announces Softswitch Initiative
By announcing the INIP Powered Partner Program, telecom technologies signals its intention to promote development of total softswitch solutions for service providers by establishing the means to certify standards-based interoperability between application, hardware, and softswitch vendors’ products. Under the initiative, telecom technologies is offering and operating the INIP Powered Laboratory. Vendors participating in the program include Brooktrout Technology, Integretel, IPeria, Natural MicroSystems, SALIX Technologies, Sonus Networks, Tachion Networks, and Taqua Systems.
No. 561, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

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Several equipment vendors report success deploying their next-gen, carrier-class switching platforms.

Convergent Networks: The company announced that 2nd Century Communications, a second-generation CLEC, completed the first-ever voice call between an ATM-based local exchange network and the PSTN. Convergent notes that the event opens the door for small and medium businesses to benefit from a broad portfolio of integrated communications services.
No. 562, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

SALIX Technologies: The company announced that International Long Distance Corporation (ILDC), a provider of enhanced communications services, has chosen the SALIX ETX5000 as its platform for expanding its network and service portfolio. The ETX5000, a class-independent telephony switch, will be deployed throughout ILDC’s service areas as part of the company’s global network upgrade. No. 563, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Convergent Networks: The company announced a multi-year contract valued in excess of $50 million from Global NAPs, a national CLEC focused on providing high-volume, high-usage services to companies such as WebTV, Mindspring, MSN, Netcom, and Ziplink. Global NAPs chose Convergent Networks’ solution for its ability to cost-effectively address the CLEC’s current traffic demands, and its flexibility in meeting the need for future service delivery.
No. 564, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Taqua Systems: The company announced it has shipped its Open Compact Exchange (OCX) Class 5 access switch to Allegiance Telecom, a nationwide facilities-based CLEC. The CLEC will trial the OCX for a new network service enhancement application.
No. 565, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

Tachion Networks: The company announced that its Fusion 5000 has been selected by TelePacific Communications to power the introduction of voice and data services in a multi-city rollout over the next three years. TelePacific will use the Fusion 5000 as part of its network plan to provide integrated local and long-distance voice, data, Internet, and multimedia services to corporate customers.
No. 566, www.comsolmag.com/freeinfo

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Q:How are OSS trends relevant to next-generation packet telephony switching platforms? Or your platform in particular?

We realized early on the importance of OSS as a vital component of our services mediation strategy. This strategy is based on the assumption that there are very few true greenfield opportunities. Even CLECs tend to have a sizeable base of legacy infrastructure that needs integration with new devices, new systems. We see current trends as follows:

A. Demand for new (read: IP-based) services, leveraging conventional infrastructure, and taxing it.

B. Proliferation of new devices, service platforms, staff, and business processes to support these IP-based services.

C. Realization that these new introductions create vast inefficiencies that hinder competitiveness.

D. New approaches developed by both service providers and infrastructure vendors to integrate operations, administration, management and provisioning, and to enable both higher efficiency and greater flexibility and market responsiveness.
— Achmad Chadran, senior product manager, and Marcelino Chua, director of product development, Unisphere Solutions

OSS integration plays a crucial role in providing enhanced and bundled services. New entrants are stretching their network boundaries to their customer’s premises and are offering turnkey solutions by means of Integrated Access Devices (IADs). As the network elements in the central office are collapsing and the features are being distributed towards customer premises equipment, OSS integration is becoming crucial for the success of these carriers.
— Paresh Shah, director of technical marketing, Tachion Networks

Q:Is it fair to characterize OSS as a crucial intermediate step on the way to next-gen services?

Next-gen switches collapse many network elements traditionally required in the central office in one platform. This changes the way the operators operate their network. Traditionally, an operator was only responsible for one type of network element providing one service (may it be voice or frame relay or ATM or IP). Now, the same operator must provide multiple services. Hence, the vendor must make their management system as friendly as possible to overcome this issue. The problem gets further complicated when multiple vendor systems need to be managed by these operators.
— Paresh Shah, director of technical marketing, Tachion Networks

OSS is exactly where a lot of the integration must take place for service providers to realize these new levels of efficiency and flexibility. The way the market has played out to date, one would think that OSS is not so much an intermediate as a final step. But that’s only because of where IP solutions came from: mostly from the corporate enterprise networking environment. It’s a different mindset, necessitated by a different set of concerns, and it doesn’t translate well into the service provider environment.

We have heard from numerous customers — incumbents and new entrants alike — who understand the criticality of developing an OSS strategy early enough to truly leverage the architectures and tools available to them. It’s like building a car from start to finish: if you build everything except the management interfaces — like the dashboard, how users will steer, accelerate, slow down, stop, etc. — then build these functions after the fact, the final product’s going to wind up pretty kludgy.
— Achmad Chadran, senior product manager, and Marcelino Chua, director of product development, Unisphere Solutions

Q:How might OSS challenges differ among incumbent and competitive carriers? Large and small carriers? Established and new carriers?

A certain amount of OSS integration is necessary for all carriers. For example, everyone wants integration of billing information. Beyond the basics, it appears to be based on the carrier’s size and sophistication. Most large or sophisticated carriers already have a set of OSS that combined can be considered a Network Management Systems (NMS). They expect each vendor to provide an Element Management System (EMS) to manage that vendor’s equipment and interact appropriately with the NMS. The NMS provides the end-to-end view. This model seems to be a long term direction, as virtually every good-sized carrier is faced with a multivendor network.

In the NMS-EMS approach, interaction between the OSS of different carriers tends to be handled at the NMS level. For example, carriers who provide long-distance service often have some form of automated feed from the LEC of subscribers who have chosen them as their Preferred Interexchange Carrier. This information is fed into the NMS, which then would pass the necessary information down to any relevant EMS for action. A similar process is often used for LEC trunks. As a result, equipment vendors don’t normally get involved. Once the NMS-EMS link is established, information flows naturally downward.

Smaller carriers may choose not to pay for an NMS, instead using the individual vendor EMS (or even command line interfaces on boxes) and letting the network operators do the integration. As they grow, they face the need for real OSS, and this is where the partnerships come into play.
— Bob Dye, director of product marketing, Sonus Networks

OSS matter to carriers whether they have a lot of legacy systems or not. Only the challenges differ. For example, if you are a large service provider, and you are adding new boxes in your networks ... you want to make sure these boxes work with your legacy OSS platforms, since you’ve already invested millions in them. And you don’t want to retrain your people just for a few new boxes.

If you are a greenfield CLEC the primary concern is going to be life cycle costs. Whatever high-level systems you put into the network must get you a return on your investment over the next ten years at least. You’re going to look for open, extensible architectures, standards-based solutions, and vendors who are going to be around. Support will be paramount.
— Achmad Chadran, senior product manager, and Marcelino Chua, director of product development, Unisphere Solutions

Q:More particular to the company you represent … Does anything about your platform or strategy lend itself to OSS integration?

Unisphere Solutions was founded on the premise that, in the end, services not hardware define a provider. No matter the underlying infrastructure, and no matter the transport or access media. Unisphere has made great strides in addressing our customers’ challenges via this model. We offer systems that support a variety of media, all kinds of services, and an infinite number of business models. We can plug into legacy environments as easily as we can support standalone operation. And our Unisphere Management Center offers either blanket OSS functionality or more specific, tailored solutions, depending again on our customers’ specific requirements.
— Achmad Chadran, senior product manager, and Marcelino Chua, director of product development, Unisphere Solutions

Having been born of old world telecom companies, the appreciation for standards compliance is well ingrained in Tachion. And that applies to both U.S. and international flavors of all requisite protocols/signaling including SS7/C7, T1/E1, T3/E3, SONET/SDH, SNMP/TMN, etc. It is very difficult for platforms to come to market as quickly as possible without regard for the architectural issues surrounding standards adherence. For example, if the billing or diagnostic data streaming out of your new box is only formatted in a proprietary vendor format, external boxes will be needed to massage that data for manipulation by the billing systems or network management systems.
— Jeff Matros, CEO, Tachion Networks

Q:Which challenge is more daunting — internal network management or management from provider to provider?

If “provider to provider” refers to carrier to carrier, then internal network management is definitely the bigger challenge. Most carrier to carrier interactions are non-real-time (for example, provisioning). In cases where a call traverses multiple carriers, either the individual carriers have stringent enough requirements that the overall call is acceptable (the typical case with larger carriers) or the customer has the appropriate expectations about the level of service he will receive (for example, next-gen carriers providing cheap international service).
— Bob Dye, director of product marketing, Sonus Networks

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Where do next-gen elements fit into the value-added services picture? To help us with that question, we spoke with Ellen Sun, the senior product line manager at Convergent Networks. Sun, who is also a member of the TeleManagement Forum, offered us her observations from the most recent TeleManagement World event.

According to Sun, OSS is drawing more and more interest, as evidenced by the increase in attendance at Telemanagement World event, which rose from 900 last year to 1,400 this year. Sun recalls that she saw a good mix of attendees, including incumbent carriers, competitive carriers, equipment vendors, and application developers for OSS systems.

At the event, Sun said much emphasis was placed on four major business needs that OSS must address:

1. Fast deployment of services. Attendess were interested in improving delivery of familiar services as well as in preparing infrastructure for new services. A key item of interest: consolidated bills.
2. A combination of applications in the environment. Carriers prefer the best-of-breed approach, preserving the ability to pick and choose among applications to accomplish such things as trouble ticketing, element management, order processing, and troubleshooting. The ultimate goal is to create an environment characterized by plug-and-play components.
3. Efficient training of the workforce. Many incumbents rely on cryptic command line interfaces to configure equipment. As older staff members near retirement, the training of successors becomes an issue. Carriers express greater interest in point-and-click, intuitive interfaces to simplify training and business processes in general.
4. Defining scalability and security requirements. Scalability in the sense that carriers will need to support more and more new applications. Also, they will rely on a new generation of OSS to support services to different regions and different types of customers.

In addition to outlining these OSS challenges, Sun noted that she saw a lot of collaboration among vendors. For example, the Forum had organized task forces to work on prototypes of interworking among vendors. One particular challenge is CORBA, for which an interface language has yet to be defined. However, TMN members produced a draft. Futher, they were able to demonstrate that interworking is possible, an advance that may attract interest from additional vendors.

Finally, for Sun, the evolution of OSS confirms a general trend seen in many areas of technology: when new equipment and applications are introduced, much emphasis is placed on features and functionality. But as more and more competitors enter the field, other priorities arise, such as ease of use and openness of design. This trend, played out in the OSS space, will place a premium on flexibility, the ability to evolve for next-gen design and service provisioning.

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