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I just came across this web page with some important details on ITEXPO. I mentioned the keynoters in a recent post and I still think they are one of the best combinations of thought leaders in our space. Google Voice, Sprint, Digium, Polycom, Skype and Verizon Wireless are some of the companies you will hear from at the show.
In addition there are a full eight conference tracks you cannot find anywhere else:
As always, we poll the collective minds of the entire TMCeditorial team and industry when we put together the conference program for TMC events and I believe this is a major differentiator. It seems like just yesterday when TMC launched our first telecom event in Atlanta, GA but it was really 1986!
What I have learned in running communications and tech conferences for 20 years is that if you continue to give your customers unsurpassed value, they come back again and again for more conferences and bring others with them.
To all of you who have attended TMC events over the years - thanks.
I really think this next show in Miami - ITEXPO East 2010 will be our best to date and I am looking forward to welcoming you personally.
Here are more details on this can't miss conference.
It is obvious television viewing is merging with the web and as such, cable companies and other triple-play providers understand they are in increasing danger of becoming providers of dumb pipes. Of course the reason carriers are adverse to this distinction has to do with more than idle cocktail party conversation -- And what do you do? "Well, my company provides stupid data pipes." How nice - I think I'll go get a drink; it was nice talking to you.
You see, carriers want to continue selling enhanced or smart services so they can charge more for each. DVR? That's $10/month. Pay-per-view that's $6.95 per movie. Applications? That's $1.99 each, etc.
But we all know this model as it applies to TV is doomed and within five years we will probably see 20-30% of television watched in the US streamed over the net. This by the way assumes there is no major catalyzing event. I for one think there will be a catalyst which will likely be Apple and/or Google rolling out some new product and/or service which makes watching TVoIP a no brainer. If this happens in the next 18 months or so, expect 30-40% of US TV to be streamed over the net in five years.
In Google's case, picture an Android-powered set-top box with YouTube HD integration which in turn is connected to all major network programming and movies. In Apple's case, their unappreciated TV product gets a major upgrade in features and functions and perhaps links with their much-rumored tablet which like the iPod and iPhone can act as a smart remote control allowing previewing of other channels before viewing them on your main screen.
If you work for a carrier providing video with a business model which doesn't take the above into account, please stop reading, take a deep breath, update your resume and post it quickly on Monster.com. While you wait for the phone to ring, let's consider how to modify your business model to take advantage of this trend.
You can hire lobbyists to limit net neutrality legislation which you will argue will reduce your investment in broadband which is so essential to our future. Then you slow every video packet you can find on your network. Let's face it, as much as consumers think things should be free and there should be no early termination fees on networks, in reality -- banks and companies don't invest money unless they think they are going to see a return on their investments. I have taken both sides of the argument regarding net neutrality and for the record; I am concerned that carriers have a tremendous amount of control over our networks. But at the same time we should all recognize the massive investments operators are making to provide us wired and wireless broadband. We need these carriers to make a nice return on these investments so they can continue to invest.
You can try to strike up a deal with Google, Microsoft and/or Apple to see if you can somehow get a partnership going to ensure you can still generate revenue as consumers start streaming more and more TV.
You can buy content. Take a look at what Comcast is doing with NBC - they will be entering a JV which gives them a 51% stake of NBC Universal which is valued by the two parties at around $30 billion.
You can attempt to insert yourself as a middleman between web viewers and content. This in my opinion is toughest route but I hope I am wrong in thinking that carriers are not good at building entertainment portals people will gravitate towards. AT&T recently rolled out a portal called AT&T Entertainment and after being live for a few weeks Quantcast says it has roughly 46,000 US unique visitors while Alexa says it doesn't register at all. Then again, AT&T.com has a rank of 500, mostly due to webmail and this means it gets massive traffic levels as it is ranked in the top 500 sites in the world. It is subsequently tough for any sub-site of AT&T to make a major contribution to traffic generation in a few weeks.
Every time the web has become a major resource for providing a service such as shopping, auctions or music, a new player emerges to be dominant and traditional players struggle. Look at how Craigslist, Amazon, eBay and Apple have taken massive amounts of share in the spaces they now play.
TV is the next frontier and Microsoft has been in the space for years with its IPTV offering but Apple and Google are better positioned for the future based on a model which leverages the very fast and dumb pipes today's carriers provide.
How service providers adapt to this changing world of video content delivery will determine their profitability for years to come. The one certainty is this transformation is happening and rapidly. If there are acquisitions to be made to shore up carrier positions, now is probably the best time to do so as valuations in the TVoIP space are likely to only go up.
Hopefully this article has helped your company form a solid TVoIP strategy which means you can just let that phone keep ringing.
The pace of tech acquisitions is not slowing and one area worth watching is the testing market where Ixia has recently picked up Catapult Communications to further its wireless IP performance testing strategy - especially as the company positions itself to be a leader in the LTE space. In a meeting in Ixia headquarters in southern California the company explained to me that they continue to focus on a broad range of testing areas such as Ethernet, 40/100 Gb Ethernet, devices, fiber channel, storage area networks and virtualization. And don't forget about some of the other areas the company plays in such as voice, video and data.
During SuperComm the company announced a new acquisition of certain assets of the Agilent Technologies N2X Data Network Testing Product Line and Kelly Malloit the company's director of PR explains the move to TMC's Erik Linask in more detail in the video below.
One area discussed by Kelly is the fact that this acquisition allows Agilent's customers to purchase a suite of complimentary testing equipment and moreover, through this move - Ixia becomes a far more international company and furthermore has a much larger focus on the carrier space. Also, Ixia Fusion allows customers to use open APIs to access Agilent and Ixia testing solutions. This by the way is pretty similar to how Oracle is integrating many of the companies it acquires - they also call their middleware Fusion.
Much of this sentiment was echoed by Atul Bhatnagar, President and CEO who spoke with me by phone recently and said, "When opportunity knocks, you respond." He further went on to say that the best time to change is when business is slow as you can do things you cannot when the business is running at a faster clip.
With these moves, the company is really focusing on becoming a leader in the converged IP performance testing space - in both wired and wireless markets by providing end-to-end tools which span the internet core to the wireless edge.
Regarding the specific reasons for this recent acquisition, Atul explained that every company much choose its focus areas and moreover there is a massive R&D expense associated with being on the bleeding edge which is required to provide testing tools, systems, protocols and capabilities long before networking companies even develop these capabilities.
Bhatnagar says his company felt honored to be picked as a potential acquirer by Agilent as they didn't want service for their customers to suffer and as such they wanted a strong partner to purchase the assets.
He further went on to explain how IP, Ethernet and LTE are strong pillars for the company which for you and me translates into areas of market growth. Remember that testing company strategies can be used as a strong barometer for where things are going. Based upon their relationship with carriers and equipment companies, test vendors become somewhat clairvoyant.
For Ixia, the Agilent acquisition move makes sense as it allows the company to broaden its scope and global reach with one acquisition and the Catapult deal is logical as wireless will be a hot market for years to come. I plan on watching the test vendors more closely for other signs which may foreshadow future trends.
We are thrilled to announce a slew of top notch keynoters for the upcoming ITEXPO which takes place in Miami, FL Jan 20-22, 2010. I will share them with you by first explaining why they were invited:
A keynote picture from ITEXPO East 2009 in Miami
Open Source
One of the biggest trends in tech this last decade has been open source and while you may not know this, I was a UNIX (the Linux precursor) system admin at TMC back in 1982 or so and I am a big fan of this OS which is reliable, stable and the strong basis for cost-effective solutions in a number of fields. Without a doubt, Asterisk is the major force in the open-source communications space and as such, Digium's CEO Danny Windham (the company behind Asterisk) was the perfect choice to address the audience of businesses, carriers and resellers. By the way, Digium Asterisk World (DAW) is collocated at this show and I hear it just sold out of exhibit spaces and my team is looking for ways to get the waiting list of companies into an expanded DAW pavilion on the exhibit hall floor.
Digium Asterisk World Photos from ITEXPO East 2009 this year
Google Voice has been one of the most disruptive influences in telecom these past years and this service has single-handedly become a point of public argument between the search leader and Apple and AT&T - with the FCC acting as referee of sorts. The argument revolves around net neutrality - the concept that carriers will apply discrimination to traffic on their networks based upon traffic, application type or source. Google obviously wants their services to run on any network in an unencumbered fashion while AT&T has said since 1995 when they were SBC that they want to charge for their pipes. AT&T actually then pointed out to the FCC that Google Voice does not terminate all calls on its free Google Voice service meaning it is not adhering to the principles of net neutrality. The reason of course as Google points out is traffic pumping and bizarre intercarrier compensation rules which allow some rural carriers to charge exorbitant rates for calls terminating in their areas. Craig Walker founded Grand Central, the company purchased by Google and the basis for Google Voice and as the Group Product Manager for the Real Time Communications Group at Google, he was a natural person to invite to speak with us at the show. It seems his accomplishments have unleashed a firestorm of controversy which should hopefully clean up some of the ugly mess that is telecom policy and regulation.
Exhibit hall pictures from ITEXPO East 2009 in Miami
HD Voice/SIP and Video
Another major trend in our markets is that of HD voice, video adoption and of course SIP endpoints. AT ITEXPO last year, we had the first panel in the world focusing on HD voice (video) and since then I am excited to see other conference organizers throwing their hat in the HD ring. A major player in all of the above spaces is Polycom and they have done an amazing job of working with disparate vendors on interoperability issues which has moved the market forward by reducing the friction caused by proprietary endpoints. In the world of video, the company has been a major player - developing telepresence systems all the way down to video phones. To get a bead on where this market is heading we invited Polycom Co-Founder, and the CTO of the Voice Communications Group Jeff Rodman to join us as a keynoter.
HD Voice Panel I moderated from ITEXPO East 2009 in Miami
Skype
No matter how you break out the IP communications market, Skype is likely a factor in changing the market in a pro-consumer manner. By giving away global voice calling with quality which far exceeds the PSTN, they have disrupted while getting users used to better voice quality. On top of that, they give away video calling as well, making them a company which excites consumers and scares carriers and anyone else who dares compete with their network of hundreds of millions of subscribers.
Interview I had with Skype's Ian Robin
Skype has been making a major push into the enterprise and is working on enhancing relationships with carriers as well. They are even looking for channel partners who can share in the newly created revenue streams from a number of products like Skye for SIP. When you take all of this into account, it does make great sense to invite Skype Chief Strategy Officer Christopher Dean to speak, doesn't it?
Smartphones, Wireless and Smart Ecosystems
One of the biggest trends in the world of communications is smart devices and ecosystems. What is an ecosystem you ask? Well it is a group of companies who develop products which work with a product or service offered by a host company or companies. The iTunes App Store may be the best example but certainly Avaya's DevConnect or Cisco's Partner Programs are good examples as well. You may know that TMC has focused a tremendous amount of resources on educating the world on smart ecosystems via our new SPEC site. I truly believe ecosystems have a bright future.
In order to bring attendees up to speed on all these topics we invited two top keynoters to present on the matter. Sprint's Mathew Oommen is the vice president of device and technology development at the company and uniquely positioned to share with us his company's view on the future of wireless technology. Oh and by the way, be sure to check out my recent interview with Sprint's Wayne Ward who heads up the company's M2M activities (did I mention there is a collocated M2M conference at ITEXPO?).
To get a handle on wireless devices as they pertain to ecosystems we invited Brian Higgins the Executive Director for Ecosystem Development within Verizon Wireless to join us so we can learn where the company thinks the market is headed. Verizon has been very ambitious in its goal to develop an ecosystem of products and applications which interoperate in the hope of one-upping the iTunes App Store.
We continue to work to add fantastic new speakers to our roster and you can expect this ITEXPO to be the most comprehensive and educational ever and a must-attend. I personally hope to see you there.
Oh and by the way, we have secured great rates this year at the Loews Miami Beach Hotel - you can save $150/night if you book now - the rate is $249 vs. what is typically a $399 rate at prime season. There are many advantages to staying at the show hotel such as networking, etc - and I have always been a fan of the Loews. In fact I was a guest the first day the hotel opened about ten years ago or so.
Today I am headed to Huntsville, AL where I will be giving a presentation on the state of the industry to Adtran customers and I am really excited to be meeting with a number of carrier representatives and resellers at the event. Typically to get from New York to Huntsville I drive from Nashville, TN which a direct flight from New York but a 131+ miles away. Today I am connecting via Detroit directly to Huntsville - I am a bit surprised that there is such a direct flight when there isn't one from NY to Huntsville but then again I know there are auto plants in Tennessee which could explain why there are flights from Detroit.
Anyway, I was reminded of the importance of face to face communications as I saw this video interview of Scott Kargman by Suzanne Bowen. Suzanne works for DIDX, a company supplying DIDs to carriers worldwide. Scott runs Crossfire Media, a TMC partner in our M2M, 4G and Smart Products initiatives or SPEC. Check out the interview which took place at Supercomm 2009 in Chicago.
At Supercomm 2009 in Chicago I had a chance to speak with MRV Communications a leader in the carrier Ethernet market boasting among other things, access solutions for 10/100 GE, 10GE, SyncE, 1588, SHDSL and fiber which share a common OS and management interface. The 20-year old company was an early innovator in the field of lasers and now employs more than 4,000 engineers, has 6 R&D divisions and $538 million in revenue coming from a broad range of connectivity products primarily targeted at carriers and campus networks.
A common theme at the show was backhaul solutions and MRV too is looking to help carriers as they transition to 4G networks and more importantly the company like others in the market is helping service providers leverage packet-based technologies while giving up little the more expensive and proprietary circuit switched world has to offer.
Case in point is the company's new synchronization over packet addition to its Optiswitch 900 product line. The goal of this entry is to facilitate the migration to 4G/LTE in mobile backhaul networks. Specifically the environmentally hardened (allows it to be installed almost anywhere) 904-MBH is a compact carrier Ethernet demarcation device supporting IEEE 1588v2 and synchronous Ethernet.
Company execs explained that they didn't want to have two separate boxes and this new device is the first to to enable synchronization-gateway functionality between synchronous and asynchronous physical layer networks for both 3G and 4G networks.
In addition, this device supports traffic management for enhanced QoS meaning carriers can ensure timing packets have ultimate priority over other packets.
The company also announced its new LambdaDriver IP switching module (OPN 800/1600) for migration to packet optical transport networks. These new carrier Ethernet aggregation switches have 8 GbE ports for access to XFP-based ports for backbone network connections. The products tie into the GMPLS control plane and allow MPLS enforcement and are tunable as well.
The company has put a big focus on SLA assurance and their new OAM techniques are embodied in their new network provisioning ands management software. Among other things this new solution hopes to squeeze fault isolation to minutes instead of hours in order to facilitate more rapid truckrolls. The GUI-based Pro-Vision software platform is touted as an easy-to-use tool allowing central management. In addition, it is designed to allow quicker time to revenue for carriers through its use of pre-defined individual service platforms.
A constant theme recently has been using Ethernet in carrier networks whenever and wherever possible. Logically this is what has to be done as the cost per bit is continuing to decline and margins are being eternally squeezed. Lowering the cost of network infrastructure is the best way to combat this trend. MRV has a suite of solutions they have been successfully selling in the space and they hope to continue in their pursuit to provide more and more strategic solutions to carriers worldwide as they transition to next generation networks.
Carrier Ethernet ring network standard allows potential SONET/SDH replacement at as little as 1/10th the cost
As smartphones and netbooks proliferate and drive more wireless data traffic, the need for better backhaul solutions only grows. In fact this week the new Verizon/Motorola Droid will be released with a new version of Google Maps which includes free turn-by-turn navigation. Expect it to be a single application which is called out as a bandwidth hog in the future.
One company looking to help provide carriers with less expensive and more reliable solutions which support this massive bandwidth growth is Actus Networks. Recently at Supercomm I had a chance to speak with company execs about their ITU-T G.8032 and G.8032 2010 compliant ring protection products which bring many of the benefits of SONET/SDH to the world of carrier Ethernet.
In addition, Actus has equipment which allows carriers with circuit switched networks to use their equipment to access both their legacy and new Ethernet networks. As carriers move to IP-based 4G/LTE networks they will have to explore using IP in their backhaul applications as well and this is where the Korean-based company comes in.
The current product offering consists of a NEBS level 3 compliant, 16-port, 1U G200 carrier Ethernet access device which supports QoS, PBB-TE, OAM, ring protection, E-Line service and circuit emulation (discussed above) as well as the G300 Carrier Ethernet Access Platform.
To learn more, you can read this article, view a recent press release and/or watch a video interview (get popcorn )I had recently with Kevin Rhee CSO and Peter Cho CEO/President.
I conducted dozens of videos this week at Supercomm and many were done in the TMC newsroom. I posted a few of them below for you to see. Feel free to check out the complete list of Supercomm video interviews performed by the TMC news team and others. Expect them all to be posted by October 30, 2009.
I wanted to alert my readers to some exciting news happening at TMC. As you likely know TMC is among a handful of media companies growing at a time when the media landscape is in dramatic decline. As you might imagine this growth is primarily online. Over the last decade and especially in the last few years we have focused on building online communities (Channels and GOCs) for customers who sponsor these areas as they rapidly attract focused decision-makers from around the world.
The visitors who come to these communities benefit from a massive amount of free content which helps them make informed purchasing decisions. For example people looking for products in Call Recording, Smart Data Centers, IP communications, HD Voice, Fixed Mobile Convergence or Next Generation Communications can come to the respective communities focused on these topics and have access to hundreds and in most cases thousands of TMC written articles detailing the news in their specific area of interest. Our business model is straightforward; aggregate massive amounts of focused and quality content using custom-built content targeting technology - make it relevant and pertinent so as to attract the right readers who need this information as they research the products and services they are looking to buy.
For our sponsors, these communities allow them to rank high organically on search engines to get their message out to a focused audience while simultaneously being able to measure the traffic to ensure they can justify their spend to the sales and executive management teams.
Basically, this suite of communities replicates the trade show model online and just like a trade show that attracts more attendees as the exhibitor base grows; the 120 monthly sponsored communities on TMCnet attract a massive audience which in turn attracts more sponsors.
In short, I am very confident we can continue to provide free quality content in all the areas we enter. Meaning while other media companies are beginning to charge for their once free content and many others are reducing their editorial teams, TMC is adding to its editorial, sales and marketing teams as we have a model which works exceptionally well for our readers and sponsors.
We are growing our team as we enter a slew of new markets with our business model of providing laser-focused content - backed by over a decade of proprietary content targeting technology; essentially building targeted online communities which rank high on search engines as they attract large amounts of focused traffic.
Here is my quote from a press release we put out today mentioning the hire of a brand new position - VP of Business Development. Matt Weiner is filling this position and his background of working for Penton and Yahoo! make him a good fit for the position."Over the last decade, TMC has invested in the technology and people necessary to build a next-generation media company which creates communities online, in-print and in-person," Tehrani continued. "By providing our audience with top quality news, training and information, we have attracted global purchasing decision-makers to our communities. As TMC's global communities have increased in size and quality, they have attracted hundreds of advertisers and sponsors who receive regular measurable results for their marketing and SEO budgets. Our future strategy involves continuing to build communities which draw large amounts of targeted traffic as we continue to connect buyers and sellers -- and adding Matt to the team is an integral element of that strategy."
Aside from Matt, we have added a number of other positions and just as importantly we continue to ink partnership after new partnership as we enter new spaces where we leverage our community building engine in combination with the thought leadership of individuals and/or corporations in new markets.
Thank you for continuing to support our rapid growth - thanks to our readers and existing and news sponsors - we look forward to helping all of your companies grow with ours.
GlobeCast is a division of France Telecom and is a broadbast service provider handling content management and delivery for broadcasters and other companies. According to Mathew Rosenstein, the company has an extensive satellite and fiber network and they are expanding their fiber footprint quickly into Latin America to handle the burgeoning sporting events market in the area. Speaking of sports, they are also upgrading their network to ensure the best HD possible.
The company looks at content management as a burgeoning area and recently made an acquisition of NETIA which means they can now help broadcasters organize their libraries as well as distribute their content.
One final bit of worthy information is their work with Inmarsat to allow it to interwork with their Content Exchange network allowing content from the field to be sent back to stations. Check out the video for more about how the company looks to add value to media asset management solutions and HD optimization.
Rich Tehrani tweeted, "Interop New York 2009 Videos: I got back from Interop New York 2009 last night and was pretty excited to conduct a ... http://bit.ly/5ZuyWb"
Rich Tehrani tweeted, "Interop New York 2009 Videos: I got back from Interop New York 2009 last night and was pretty excited to conduct a ... http://bit.ly/5ZuyWb"Rich Tehrani tweeted, "Interop New York 2009 Videos: I got back from Interop New York 2009 last night and was pretty excited to conduct a ... http://bit.ly/5ZuyWb"2009-11-20T23:43:41Z2009-11-20T23:43:41Z
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