Vendors are looking to deploy the Internet Protocol multimedia subsystem platform not only to differentiate themselves, but also to raise the stakes for third-generation wireless applications and services by compelling operators to upgrade their networks.
Major vendors like Nokia Corp., Lucent Technologies Inc., Nortel Networks Ltd., Siemens AG and L.M. Ericsson are pitching their IMS platforms to position themselves in a frantic move to dominate the provision of IP-based services. They are also undertaking trials with major operators.
To avoid commoditizing their IMS offerings, vendors are partnering with a variety of wireless players-including software providers, application enablers, developers, device manufacturers, system integrators and content providers.
IMS can provide a host of services that, if successful, could pressure carriers to expand their bandwidth, thereby accelerating their journeys to implement wideband CDMA networks. Already, some carriers, especially in Europe, have begun putting in place the first phase of the UMTS technology known as HSDPA (high-speed data packet access), which has been in the works for a couple of years.
Applications over IMS “will task the IP networks of the carriers and push them to 3G,” remarked Jeff Lieble, vice president of marketing at Ubiquity Software Inc., noting that IMS was built for 3G networks.
Nevertheless, IMS platforms work with today’s 2.5-generation networks like CDMA2000 1x and GPRS, and support upgrades like CDMA2000 1x EV-DO and EDGE.
“It’s a smart move on the part of the vendors to push the carriers,” said Grant Henderson, co-founder and executive vice president of strategic marketing at Convedia Corp., which supplies IMS underlying technology called the multimedia resource function. Convedia both competes and partners with big players, including Nortel and Siemens.
Wireline players have begun to pay more attention to IMS as the world gravitates to an all-IP core. Some carriers with converged architectures like British Telecom want to harness the benefits of wireless and wired services to provide a staple of options for their customers.
Lieble said converged networks are looking at the Third Generation Partnership Project as a model, adding, “we are moving to fixed-mobile convergence,” including multiple access networks and applications that can work over both wired and wireless systems.
“It means wireless people are winning,” Lieble said, referring to the attention IMS got at the recent The VON (Voice on Net) Show in Santa Clara, Calif., which targets the wired community.
Other top tech companies like Microsoft Corp., IBM Corp, Intel Corp., and LogicaCMG also play roles in creating IMS services.
The IMS platform is inadequate to edge out the competition because it is an underlying technology that every carrier will have, so they have to differentiate themselves using apps and services on top of the service layer. Vendors have developed laboratories to create applications and services to entice carriers. Siemens says it has a prototype lab in the United States, and Nortel has labs in Dallas and in France. Nokia and Lucent also said they have labs in which they work with a suite of players.
Siemens said it is partnering with Sun Microsystems to open the Java community to its customers. The German vendor also entered into an alliance to leverage Ubiquity Software’s application server.
The IMS platform can offer certain basic applications like Push-to-talk over Cellular, presence and MMS. Even within these provisions, carriers will require vendors to differentiate themselves, thus the broad partnerships taking place between vendors. Nokia announced its IMS offerings last year at the CTIA show in New Orleans. Since IMS technology complies with the specifications of the 3GPP, which eliminates differentiation at the underlying structure, all IMS products are expected to work with one another.
“We’ll start with the trial networks and see how it functions and interoperates,” explained Thomas Jonsson, spokesman for Nokia.
The technology, which leverages the intelligent edge of the network, will help carriers offer a variety of services and billing, using the session initiation protocol that sets and monitors transactions on the network.
“At the end of the day, it’s about increasing average revenue per user by deriving new revenue streams from value-added services,” said Ken Rehbehm, principal analyst at Current Analysis on the Siemens’ partnership with Ubiquity.
It allows players to “combine value-centric services, cost-reduction, innovation and differentiation,” said Henderson.
