Starent Networks calls its solution voice instant messaging-with emphasis on the word “instant,” thereby distinguishing itself from the prominent voice solutions already in the marketplace, including push-to-talk service and more traditional voice instant messaging, which suffer some degree of latency.
Starent said several major carriers will start testing its VIM solution next month, and the company expects the product to be a strong competitor to existing offerings. The company’s VIM product uses Internet Protocol and adapts it to the mobile arena, combining both telephony and wireless features like voice-driven interaction, voice-based message and location information. It can be used for both individual and group calls. The solution sits in its media gateway in the network.
But rivals like LogicaCMG and some analysts wonder whether existing technologies can actually produce VIM without latency. “It will be hard to do with guarantees of no latency,” remarked John Delaney, principal analyst at Ovum. “I need to see it proved.”
LogicaCMG, which also offers VIM, said latency is unavoidable because it is based on VoXML, which sits on the short message service infrastructure. Starent said its IP-based product uses voice channels and is built inside its media gateway in the company’s intelligent switch.
Starent said its VIM solution works on second-generation devices, unlike push-to-talk service, which works only on next-generation services and handsets.
One of the downsides of push-to-talk technology is that it does not allow spontaneity in group conversations and participants cannot chip in a word without first pushing a button and waiting their turn to speak.
But like PTT, Starent claims to have presence (it knows when a user is on the system) and also is capable of translating data into voice playback for the handset user, said Ash Dahod, president and chief executive officer.
“It will work with any handset and define a group either through the handset or through the Web,” said Dahod.
Other companies that offer VIM include Messagevine, Followap, Jabber, Antepo and L.M. Ericsson, according to Delaney. Carriers that offer SMS-based services would lend themselves to a VIM product like this one. “Deployment of voice instant messaging leverages a very popular Internet service while adapting it for the mobile environment,” said Starent. “It provides all of the message delivery, presence and management capabilities of any standard instant-messaging service.”
But whereas Starent’s solution will go into trial in a few weeks, FastMobile earlier this month launched its PTT service, which is mixed with text, SMS, IM, pictures and e-mail.
“The genie is out of the bottle and the impacts are going to be debated,” noted analyst Albert Lin of American Technology Research. “One thing is certain: the level of uncertainty has taken a jump toward the stratosphere.”
A variety of carriers like Verizon Wireless, Cingular Wireless L.L.C. and AT&T Wireless Services Inc. are looking to launch push-to-talk services soon as competition to Nextel Communications Inc.
ATR’s Lin said the FastMobile launch also highlights the “ongoing trend toward software-based solutions and applications to derive value from the massive network of phones and networks.”
But there are drawbacks, he observed, adding that FastMobile’s service FastChat has latency of one to four seconds.
Major vendors Nokia Corp., Ericsson and Siemens AG have come together to set standards for PTT under the Internet Protocol Multimedia services platform.
On how PTT will affect the handset market, Lin said it will favor Nokia as “a software-centric phone maker.” Motorola may do well because of its iDEN technology, but Lin thinks “second- and third-tier phone makers do not have a prayer in this regard.”
IMS technology, which focuses on presence and real-time communications, offers the same services as multimedia services, which rely on store-and-forward offerings, explained Patrick Lopez, director of the MMS program at LogicaCMG.
“One does what the other doesn’t do,” explained Delaney.
Lopez, however, said both may merge in the future, but that may take some time.
