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August 2000

 

Deploying Enhanced Services In Softswitch-Enabled Networks

BY JACK KOZIK

[ Go Right To Services News ]

When softswitch technology first became available, it was seen as a way to address the shortcomings of the circuit-switched world. Softswitches promise to bring the speed and flexibility of the Internet to the telecommunications industry. But to fully deliver on this promise, carriers need to avoid duplicating some of the missteps of the circuit world in packet networks.

One of the first steps is to adopt a "service separation" strategy and distribute applications throughout the network. The next move is to determine which interface (or interfaces) would make the network as fast, flexible, and feature rich as possible.

While the value of softswitch technology in next-generation networks is irrefutable, its existing architecture could recreate some of the same problems found in circuit-switched networks. The softswitch provides new tools and technologies to build services in a more productive, Internet-based service creation environment. If carriers decide to move all of their services off the circuit switch and onto a softswitch they could be left with another monolithic, closed system that is difficult to manage and upgrade.

A carrier could end up with more than 30 million lines of code on a central softswitch if every service resides in the same place -- eerily reminiscent of today's circuit switches. This is a key reason why today's circuit offerings are slower than their packet counterparts. It is not because circuit switches are inherently slow, but rather because all the software is concentrated in one place.

ADOPTING A SERVICE SEPARATION STRATEGY
Carriers can avoid this problem by partitioning their services, rather than loading them all on one softswitch. Some softswitches are especially well suited for handling certain types of calls. Moving some services from a central softswitch server onto "application specific" softswitches is an excellent first step toward partitioning services. For example, one softswitch may be used to provide only residential dial tone, while others would handle tandem duties, business Centrex features, and so on.

Because the key purpose of softswitches is to perform call processing (set-up and tear-down of a call), the use of application-specific softswitches is only the first part of a comprehensive service separation strategy. To complete the strategy, carriers also need to deploy applications servers.

For carriers, one of the big payoffs for putting softswitches in a network is that it gives them a platform technology similar to that used on the Internet. In addition to serving as the engines behind the Internet, applications servers can readily talk to softswitches. Just as the applications servers of the Internet are used to support e-commerce services, carriers can use applications servers to help partition enhanced telecommunications services.

CHOOSING THE RIGHT INTERFACE FOR THE JOB
Assuming a carrier deploys softswitches according to a separation strategy, the next challenge is determining which interface protocol to select. An IP interface seems like the obvious answer, but this may be too simple a response given customers' growing expectations from their telecommunications provider.

There's no question that carriers need standard interfaces that will facilitate the interoperability between their softswitches and applications servers. Just as it would be inappropriate to have a separate Web browser for each Web site visited, global carriers do not want a different version of an enhanced service for each softswitch on the market. But the question remains: Which standards to choose?

Of the many technology options available, the industry has begun to gravitate toward three enhanced service protocols that serve as useful interfaces between softswitches and applications servers. They include Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP), and Intelligent Network (IN) protocols. While some carriers would like to narrow the choice to one, the truth is, each plays an important and complementary role in an IP-based network.

Session Initiation Protocol
SIP has increasingly become the favored protocol between softswitches and applications servers. For services where an applications server is hosting the service logic, SIP is used to set up a temporary session (or call) to the server so it can execute the necessary enhanced service logic. The exciting part of interfacing to SIP is that carriers can also interoperate softswitch-based voice services with other Internet services. This enables them to create interesting feature combinations that they would not be able to offer otherwise (e.g., linking the status of a mobile phone with instant messaging, or linking caller ID to Web page content).

Because SIP resembles HyperText Transport Protocol (HTTP), it can run through firewalls and routers to take advantage of all of the constructs in an e-commerce environment. As such, carriers are free to interoperate with, and build upon, the innovation curve that is rapidly taking place in the Internet paradigm. By using SIP, carriers can link voice services with revenue-generating enhanced services that are attractive to customers, including instant messaging, chat, Web pages, pre-paid, Internet call waiting, virtual private network, follow-me, e-mail, and more.

Lightweight Directory Access Protocol
LDAP is the standard directory server technology for the Internet. For example, when a subscriber types a name on an e-mail system today, typically the system retrieves the e-mail address from an LDAP server.

Because most softswitches and services are inherently a translation between numbers and addresses, LDAP is an invaluable protocol for supporting applications that are not well served by SIP. In fact, LDAP and SIP should be thought of as peers in terms of their service richness potential. Directory-oriented services best suited for an LDAP look-up include unified messaging, free phone (800 number translation), calling name service, and Internet phone number hosting.

Intelligent Network
Why use IN protocols to interface softswitches with applications servers? First, IN standards are widely deployed across the globe and are generating billions of dollars in service revenue today. Second, by interoperating softswitches with IN, carriers who already have IN and circuit switches have a ready-made vehicle for ensuring service transparency as they migrate their networks from circuit to packet.
IN is already a proven revenue generator for carriers. Therefore, as these carriers migrate their voice services from circuit to packet networks, why should they be asked to shut off this revenue stream and replace it with new equipment in a packet environment? Why not use use packet-enabled IN to enhance their revenue stream with new technology?

Customer demand for voice services won't go away. New and established carriers are going to want to provide IN services such as local number portability, carrier selection, personal number, free phone, pre-paid, call screening, call centers, and voice VPN to capture and/or maintain a share of this lucrative market segment.

A WINNING COMBINATION
While carriers are enthusiastic about the new service creation capabilities made possible by the softswitch layer, they are asking their vendors to ensure that these new capabilities don't put services -- and the industry -- back where they started. The challenge of delivering services will only intensify as networks continue to get larger and more complex. One need only look at any of the new super carriers recently created through mergers to recognize the scope of the task. This makes adopting a service separation strategy all the more important.

Additionally, given the sheer number of services that are becoming available -- from Web hosting to content caching to instant messaging to calendar maintenance -- it's clear that no single protocol will serve every need. Softswitches are connection-oriented platforms, while applications servers tend to be transaction-oriented, therefore more than one approach is needed. That's why SIP, LDAP, and IN together are the right combination of protocols to allow carriers to build a bridge between today's services and tomorrow's packet networks. 

Jack Kozik is Intelligent Network architecture evolution planning director for Lucent Technologies' Intelligent Network and Messaging Solutions Unit.

[ return to the August 2000 table of contents ]


Services News

IPeria, telecom technologies Partner
IPeria has joined telecom technologies' INIP Powered Partner Program and has successfully interoperated with telecom technologies' INtelligentIP softswitch. As a driving member of the program, IPeria will work with telecom technologies to deliver enhanced services applications over multi-service PSTN, IP, and ATM networks by leveraging telecom technologies' IntelligentIP softswitch.
No. 540, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

OptiCall Call Agent Offers Suite Of Class 5 Features
IPCell Technologies has announced the service offerings of its OptiCall Call Agent. The OptiCall Call Agent allows service providers to offer profitable, customized voice and data services to both businesses and residential customers. IPCell understands both the legacy switching infrastructure and the emerging next-gen network. Its flexibility and carrier-grade reliability allow the OptiCall Call Agent to meet the immediate tactical needs as well as contribute to longer-term strategies.
No. 541, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

3Com Unveils Next-Gen Total Control 2000 Multiservice Platform
3Com has unveiled the Total Control 2000 multiservice access platform, a carrier-class, high-density multiservice platform that will support a variety of access media, including narrowband data services, IP telephony, wireless data, and broadband services. The platform addresses the requirements of telecommunications services providers for an evolutionary service access platform as they migrate from circuit-switched networks to more efficient IP networks.
No. 542, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

VocalData Brands Product Family As VOISS
VocalData announced that it has branded its product family as VOISS (pronounced "voice"), representing VoIP Softswitch. VOISS, formerly IP*Star, more accurately describes the product's functionality and position in the emerging IP local exchange marketplace. VocalData markets the VOISS family of IP dial tone solutions to the CLEC and MTU markets.
No. 543, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

PurePacket Enables Carriers To Eliminate Class 5 Switches
Integral Access announced support for the MGCP Softswitch call control standard and the addition of intelligent MPLS routing to its PurePacket access system. The addition of MGCP to the PurePacket platform enables network operators to provide a full range of high-quality voice services without having to invest in legacy, circuit-switched infrastructures such as Class 5 switches. Integral Access also announced intelligent MPLS routing capability that allows ASPs to offer, and for enterprises to assign, differentiated grades of service for individual IP and legacy applications running over their access networks.
No. 544, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

TalkingNets To Implement telecom technologies' Softswitch Technology
TalkingNets has selected telecom technologies' softswitch technology to support its next-gen nationwide local exchange network. This programmable switch technology provides flexibility that will allow TalkingNets' ISP and DLEC customers to provide a wide range of unique services to their customers. "TalkingNets' selection of telecom technologies' leading softswitch technology is the next step in our development of the most forward-looking, least-cost IP-based nationwide telecom network available anywhere," said John Philips, president of TalkingNets.
No. 545, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Sonus Networks Unveils Access Strategy
Sonus Networks has outlined its strategy for moving access providers, such as ILECs and CLECs, away from Class 5 circuit-switched infrastructures to packet-based networks. The combination of Sonus' PSX6000 Softswitch and GSX9000 Open Services Switches will enable Sonus' carrier customers to provide Class 5 features to their subscribers. Additionally, the Sonus solution also supports a range of packet-based access solutions based on IADs, DSL, cable, wireless, and residential and access gateways.
No. 546, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Carrier Access, ArelNet Demonstrate Integrated Softswitch Network
Carrier Access and ArelNet announced an end-to-end softswitch network integrating Carrier Access' Adit 600 customer service terminal as a media gateway and ArelNet's carrier grade I-Tone PRIME Gateway and call agent. The combined solution enables service providers to originate VoIP calls from customer premises using the Adit 600 and route them anywhere in the world through ArelNet's I-Tone PRIME gateway.
No. 547, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Nuera Announces ORCA SSC Softswitch
Nuera Communications has developed the ORCA (Open, Reliable Communications Architecture) SSC Softswitch, a software-based call processing and signaling technology that, when used in combination with a gateway, eliminates the need for traditional telephone switches in networks. The ORCA SSC Softswitch -- which supports the SS7 signalling protocol -- communicates with gateways using Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP) and with other softswitches and network resources via Session Initiation Protocol (SIP).
No. 548, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Nx Networks Announces New Softswitch Technology
Nx Networks announced its softswitch technology, the Nx OpenSwitch. Designed to allow the easy and dynamic provisioning of traditional and next-gen communications services, the Nx SoftSwitch represents a flexible and extensible service creation platform. It includes well-tested reusable components that have undergone many generations of refinement and improvement, developed in coordination with client demand.
No. 549, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

New Inet Softswitch Liberates Carriers' Networks
Inet Technologies announced that VIA-Internet Access, its carrier-class, evergreen softswitch application that will relieve voice networks of resource-consuming Internet traffic, and further enable carriers to focus resources on revenue-generating opportunities. VIA-Internet Access, the first in a series of VIA softswitch applications, enables the redirection of modem calls from voice networks to more efficient data networks. "Lengthy Internet calls are consuming bandwidth on networks designed to handle short-duration voice calls," said Elie Akilian, president and CEO of Inet.
No. 550, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

GNP Announces Carrier Class Softswitch
GNP Computers announced its first carrier class softswitch, Continuant Softswitch. The Continuant Softswitch is designed for easy service integration in a highly scalable network solution by interfacing to voice and multimedia data networks to deliver smooth call control, customer policy management, SS7 Intelligent Network services, and back-office services. In addition, it integrates all aspects of a complete softswitch solution from hardware, software, and operations support services to packet networks and the PSTN.
No. 551, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Integral Access And ipVerse Partner
Integral Access and ipVerse have partnered to deliver integrated communications services to business and residential customers. The companies will conduct interoperability testing to provide seamless integration between the Integral Access PurePacket platform and the ipVerse ControlSwitch. The combined technologies will deliver high-quality voice services with advanced call control features over packet-based networks. Integral Access has also joined the Open Softswitch Alliance (OSA), ipVerse's initiative to accelerate migration to next-gen network infrastructures.
No. 552, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

BroadSoft, Mediatrix Provide Next-Gen Access Solution
BroadSoft announced a partnership with Mediatrix Telecom. The partnership includes joint marketing and sales efforts between the two companies and their products, BroadSoft's BroadWorks and Mediatrix's APA III-1 and APA III-4. BroadWorks is a complete service delivery and creation system designed to enable integrated communications providers to offer their customers a set of user-friendly enhanced telephony services. The Mediatrix APA III product line is a set of standards-based customer-premises access gateways for enhanced telephony services.
No. 553, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Syndeo Announces Interoperability Of Class 5 Softswitch
Syndeo has demonstrated a wide range of traditional Class 5 services -- including call waiting, caller-ID, call forwarding, three-way calling, and call screening -- running over Copper Mountain Networks' CopperEdge DSL concentrator. Syndeo's Broadband Services System, an IP-based Class 5 softswitch with integrated voice services, will use the new Media Gateway Control Protocol (MGCP) standard to manage delivery of these services to phones connected to Copper Mountain's CopperRocket 408 IAD.
No. 554, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

Motorola, Xybridge Announce Relationship
Xybridge Technologies and Motorola Network Solutions Sector (NSS) have entered into a strategic relationship to develop and integrate Xybridge's technology with Motorola's Aspira architecture, an IP-based communications solution for convergent communications. Under the agreement, Xybridge will license to Motorola its Universal Services Suite (USS) for mobility applications. Additionally, Motorola has invested $15 million for an equity position in Xybridge.
No. 555, www.itmag.com/freeinfo 

 [ return to the August 2000 table of contents ]







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