NEW ORLEANS-Lucent Technologies Inc. announced at Wireless ’99 two new wireless intelligent
network applications-Calling Name caller ID and a short messaging solution that allows originated transmissions on
handsets, for Time Division Multiple Access and Code Division Multiple Access networks. The TDMA solutions will
be available in the second quarter and the CDMA solutions in the third quarter.
The new Calling Name service from
Lucent will allow wireless carriers to enhance their Caller ID service by delivering the name along with the number of
the calling party, something that long has been available for wireline networks. Global System for Mobile
communications networks already can support this as well, according to Jayshree Gururaj, who is with Lucent’s WIN
offer management team.
“Consumers want their wireless phones to have the same services they enjoy on their
wireline phones,” said Curtis Holmes, vice president-intelligent networks. “Using the power of our
intelligent network platform, carriers can now offer their customers a host of innovative services, including Flexible
Alerting, Short Message Service and now Calling Name.”
The same Calling Name application will work with
wireline and wireless networks, according to Gururaj, so multiple-service carriers can use the same software for both
types of service.
The service would work basically the same as wireless Caller ID applications. The caller’s name
will be sent along with the number by accessing calling name databases around the world using standard protocols, said
Lucent. The software would ensure the caller’s name is delivered whether the call is originated from a wireline or
wireless phone.
Lucent at the show also teamed with TeleCommunication Systems Inc., Annapolis, Md., to
introduce an SMS service that will allow users on TDMA and CDMA networks to not only receive messages but
acknowledge they have been received and originate new ones.
Lucent currently is working with handset makers to
develop handsets capable of supporting this new application, said Gururaj. She said Lucent expects to see such
handsets on the market later this year, possibly as early as this summer. She declined to mention the specific
vendors.
With this solution, the mobile user originating a short message could request two types of message
acknowledgements, said Lucent. The Delivery Acknowledgement notifies the sender that the message was delivered
and opened successfully. The User/Manual Acknowledgement prompts the user to respond to questions from the sender
via numeric entries on the keypad.
For example, a mobile user can send a short message to a friend asking,
“What do you want to do tonight?” with three prompts: 1) movie; 2) game; or 3) dinner. The message
is saved in the short message service center until the friend turns on the handset. When the friend chooses prompt 2,
that response is delivered to the sender’s handset.
