BERNE, Switzerland-The European Telecommunications Standards Institute said it signed a cooperation agreement with the Fixed Line Multimedia Messaging Service Forum to cooperate on multimedia messaging for fixed-line subscribers starting next year.
The groups said they are committed to promoting and supporting an industry standard for fixed-line multimedia messaging services and promoting MMS interoperability across fixed and mobile networks.
European wireless carriers have been furiously working to drive the use of MMS services, which allow mobile-phone users to send and receive messages with sounds, animations and graphics. Already many European wireline operators have introduced fixed-line text messaging services to tap into the massive short message service market in Europe.
ETSI said the 3GPP work on MMS Release 5 is complete, and ETSI committees TISPAN and AT are producing specifications for fixed-line MMS implementations. F-MMS Forum has sent contributions to those committees.
“The common-based F-MMS standard will allow for interoperability between mobile and fixed MMS and will open the door for new services and exciting terminal equipment designs,” said Erich Schmidt, chairman of the F-MMS Forum.
German wireline carrier ITENOS, which has fixed-line MMS plans, in September said fixed-line handset makers like Siemens AG and Alcatel Corp. are currently developing specialized cordless digital handsets to display such multimedia content.
