Hewlett-Packard Co., Intel Corp., Motorola Inc., Nortel Networks Ltd. and Siemens AG are just a few of the heavy-hitters aiming to certify interoperability requirements through a new trade group, the Communications Platforms Trade Association. While similar groups have been lauded by industry watchers, many note that few groups have produced tangible results.
“Their goals are laudable,” commented Lance Wilson, director of mobile wireless research at ABI Research. “A lot of smart people are involved with these groups, and common interfaces are always a good thing for the entire industry. And we have to understand that companies are under intense price pressure to lower their base-station costs. However, generally speaking, these types of organizations just haven’t produced a lot of results.”
The CP-TA described itself as “an association of communications platform and building-block providers dedicated to accelerating the adoption of SIG-governed, open specification-based communications platforms through interoperability testing and certification. With industry collaboration, the CP-TA plans to drive a mainstream market for open industry standard communications platforms by certifying interoperable products.”
The group explained that although the communications platforms industry has developed a set of open specifications in order to build modular communications platforms, the number of optional requirements and inconsistent interpretations of mandatory requirements have prevented the industry from moving to the next level of interoperability. The CP-TA says it intends to create a mainstream market for open industry standard communications platforms by certifying hardware and software building-block compliance to interoperability test requirements along with detailed test procedures supported by industry-harmonized automated test suites and benchmarks. The group said that periodic CP-TA Interoperability Plugfests would provide a confidential environment for CP-TA members to coordinate and execute automated test suites, as well as offer a multi-vendor environment for enhanced interoperability testing.
Ultimately, the CP-TA says its certified building blocks and base platforms that are consistent with SCOPE profiles will help network equipment providers simplify the selection process, increase supply chain flexibility, increase predictability of successful integration and reduce lifecycle management costs. Service providers would be able to increase the flexibility and scalability of their network as well as realize faster time to market with new, innovative services.
Wilson noted that the primary driver that leads companies to sign on with industry groups like the CP-TA is the desire to reduce base-station costs. Wilson pointed to the Open Base Station Architecture Initiative established in September 2002 to, “get base station companies to work together to define and agree upon open standards for base station internal architecture and key interfaces,” according to the group’s Web site.
In addition, Wilson referenced The Common Public Radio Interface group, “an industry cooperation aimed at defining a publicly available specification for the key internal interface of radio base stations between the radio equipment control and the radio equipment,” according to its Web site. The companies cooperating to define the CPRI specification are L.M. Ericsson, Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., NEC Corp. Nortel and Siemens.
Wilson added that although neither of these groups has seen a lot of success, it’s possible that the rise in managed services is driving this endeavor. In managed services, vendors need to be able to operate and maintain other people’s equipment. In such an environment, commonalities in the equipment could be an important factor.
But Wilson says price pressure is still the driving factor for groups seeking to define open and common standards.
“It’s all about the bottom line-cost.”
