Cable IP Voice: Buffet or Sit-Down Dinner?
By David Iler
from the April 16, 2001 issue of Broadband Week
Cable operators will be faced with an interesting set of choices when interoperable Internet Protocol telephony gear hits the market, as expected this year. Do they want to shop a la carte or have the whole suite of PacketCable gear served to them at once by a lead vendor or integrator?
The answer is, both.
"Initially, we and probably most of the MSOs (multiple system operators) will be looking to an integrator," says Rich Higgins, director of telecom engineering for Time Warner Cable, which is engaged in IP telephony trials in Rochester, N.Y. and Portland, Maine. "As PacketCable becomes more of a known quantity," he adds, operators will be able to "mix and match" the components a little more. "Interoperability is certainly the big issue."
Emboldened by the completion of key telephony standards and the initiation of IP voice trials by the industry's top operators, cable industry vendors are jockeying for position to bring the long list of IP telephony gear to market. In their target sights are system operators that still are pondering migration from their current circuit-switched mode--that is, those operators that are offering telephony yet at all.
In the words of Gerry White, RiverDelta Networks' vice president and chief technical officer, the industry will witness "a loose-knit set of alliances that change faster than alliances at the U.N."
For pure play cable modem termination system (CMTS) makers RiverDelta and competitor Cadant, alliances will be crucial to bringing their next-gen gear to market because the list of components needed to outfit a cable system for IP voice is long.
That shopping list includes:
- A combined multimedia terminal adapter (MTA) and DOCSIS 1.1 cable modem at the customer's premise;
- A CMTS at the operator's headend nimble enough to pass off both voice and data traffic;
- Call agent or Call Management Server (CMS) to perform "softswitch" call control functions;
- Provisioning server;
- Media gateway;
- Signaling gateway;
- Media gateway controller;
- Record-keeping server
All these components will be placed under the scrutiny of Cable Television Laboratories Inc. to ensure they meet the standards outlined in the cable industry's PacketCable 1.0, 1.1 and 1.2 protocols, the guiding force in the migration to diversified IP services. Six PacketCable compliance waves have been scheduled this year, with the first now underway.
Components can be combined in whatever way vendors see fit. For example, the media gateway controller and/or the record-keeping server may be combined in the same box as the CMS.
With IP voice gear in CableLabs' engineers' hands, vendors are beginning to plot market strategies. RiverDelta, while more than happy to sell its CMTSs individually to cable operators, also will be turning to Siemens subsidiary and systems integrator Unisphere Networks for assistance. Cadant has announced partnerships with softswitch developer Clarent, MTA maker Future Networks and voice gateway manufacturer General Bandwidth.
However, with Tellabs' acquisition of Future Networks in January, it's unclear to what degree Tellabs will market Cadant's CMTS. After all, Tellabs, together with Cabletron Systems spinoff Riverstone Networks has developed a next-gen CMTS specifically to handle primary line voice and data services.
Because of the sheer complexity of making all the PacketCable components work together, the deal-making is not confined to the pure play vendors. Even networking behemoth Cisco Systems, which makes CMTSs, cable modems and routers, needs a little help.
Cisco, points out Mark Bakies, director of solutions marketing in Cisco Systems' service provider and aggregation group, has worked with cable modem vendors Samsung and Askey and is "working with other CPE (customer premise equipment) partners that the cable industry has understandably been comfortable working with," i.e. Scientific-Atlanta and Motorola Broadband Communications Sector. "From Cisco's point of view, we're not out to declare winners and losers, but to work with a number of them," says Bakies.
Cisco, together with call agent developer Telcordia, was involved with the cable industry's first big jump into IP telephony when system operator Videotron embarked on a trial in Montreal. Yet while noting "we've been very comfortable with the (Telcordia) call agent," Bakies says Cisco's acquisition of call agent developer IPCell Technologies last year may result in the development of a PacketCable-based call agent for secondary line phone service.
And in the development of the tricky operational support systems pieces of the PacketCable puzzle, "for us, that's all partners," says Bakies. Cisco has been leading both KPMG and Accenture, two large systems integrators, down the PacketCable path. "We've spent a lot of time with those guys," says Bakies.
Tellabs, especially in light of its Future Networks purchase, which gives it both indoor and outdoor MTAs, is well-positioned as it already has CMS and media gateway products in its product portfolio. "Tellabs has a large number of the pieces to deliver a PacketCable solution," and sees itself as a "prime contractor," says Jeffrey Schmitz, Tellabs' director of marketing for cable products.
To plug the call agent gap in its product line, Tellabs has partnered with soft switch developers Sphere Communications and ipVerse. For record-keeping and other server components, in addition to back office functionality, Tellabs will be looking to establish other partnerships, says Schmitz.
In a sea of upstarts, IP call agent pioneer Telcordia is not sitting still. It recently demonstrated interoperability with Thomson, Broadcom, Samsung and Texas Instruments integrated telephony cable modems, according to Mike Cook, who develops strategy for Telcordia's call agent business. Telcordia also is working to make its call agent compatible with trunking gateway manufacturer Nuera Communications and other component vendors before entering PacketCable compliance tests.
Not to be forgotten in the PacketCable mix are ADC Telecommunications, which through its purchase of Broadband Access Systems last year added a next-gen CMTS to its MTA products, and telecom heavyweight Nortel Networks.
It's already clear that when cable operators pick up the phone to look around for IP voice products, there'll be plenty of folks ready to answer the call.
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