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Flanagan Consulting
Network Analysts and Consultants
"We Have the Experience"
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ViewsLetter on
Provisioning 20 Oct
2003 #31
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A fortnightly look at provisioning automation.
--Voice Over DSL Becoming a Reality
--Can Automated Telephony Service Be Far Behind?
William A. Flanagan, Editor and Publisher
Five years ago I tried to convince DSL vendors they should offer voice
services. None of them wanted to deal with anything but pure
Internet access. At that time, voice generated over 90% of
telecom revenue, so their business plans, based only on data, addressed
less than 10% of the potential market.
Since then almost all pure-DSL companies have disappeared, been bought,
gone through bankruptcy, or more than one of the above. But there
is joy in the world as several local exchange carriers (LECs) are
rolling out local voice service over IP on DSL access.
Telecom Italia declared last week (at ITU Telecom World in Geneva) that
it plans to move entirely to VoIP on DSL (eventually). They
expect 4 million Italian subscribers (20% of Italy) to be on this
service by 2004. Today, they report all backbone voice is
VoIP. For practice with VoDSL, they'll roll it out first in their
French subsidiary, starting in January 2004.
In the U.S., we've had many VoIP LECs who provide the softwswitch
(functional intelligence for dialing plans and "phone features") and a
gateway to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) for IP phones
or PCs equipped with speakers and microphones. For the most part,
the IP access could be anything that was fast enough: DSL, cable
modem, T-1, or better.
The interesting development is that in September one of the surviving
DSL companies, DSL.net (www.dsl.net), bought one of the VoIP companies,
TalkingNets. Now there is a single entity offering broadband IP
and local telephone service (long distance, too, but that's actually
easier than local service).
To put whipped cream on my cake, the softswitch is from BroadSoft,
which offers a web portal
(http://www.broadsoft.com/products/web_enabling/service_provider.html)
that can control all provisioning functions. This portal was
designed for customers as well as carrier personnel. Existing
customers can personalize their services and features. New
customers can order their local and long distance services.
DSL.net hasn't deployed automated provisioning, but they are aware of
the potential and at least thinking about it. That thinking may
continue for some time--the people in the acquiring company were mostly
data-oriented. Understandably, they'll want to get comfortable
with being a LEC before biting off a chunk as big as automated
provisioning by new customers.
But as the Italians say at meal time, Mangia!
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"Flanagan Consulting" and "ViewsLetter" are
Service Marks of W. A. Flanagan, Inc.
Updated: 17 July 2004 2003
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