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For nearly 13 years, Greg Galitzine has been a tremendously valuable part of the TMC team. His career started as an editor for CTI Magazine in 1996. Where he reported on the collision of the computer and communications spaces including what we called IP telephony back in the day. In 1997 we convened a meeting with Greg to explore whether it made sense to launch a publication in the IP telephony space. The outcome of the meeting was to launch what we hoped would become a cornerstone of what we hoped would be a new industry - Internet Telephony Magazine.

Greg became the editor of this publication and had the vision to see this is where the industry was going. Many companies in the communications space told us we were nuts for launching this publication as at the time there was no industry, just a few nerds calling each other on softphones.

Lo and behold, over the past decade this nerdy, niche technology revolutionized telecom to the point where business models have changed, new entrants have come into the telecom market and entire industries were transformed through international outsourcing made possible by inexpensive VoIP-based telephony.

In the last few years, Greg did a great job helping transform TMCnet into a major web force in communications and technology news. We are grateful to him for the years he has put in.

I am very happy for Greg as recently he has been given a great opportunity which involves a move to a new industry altogether. Galitzine has accepted a position with ISA, Inc., a prime contractor to the National Nuclear Security Administration and working in about 18 countries through Central and Eastern Europe to identify and interdict the illegal movement of materials for weapons of mass destruction. Greg will be taking his analytical and editorial skills to a higher level, contributing to national-level policy and operational support analysis for these major international nonproliferation undertakings.

While we all selfishly wish Greg wouldn't move on, we are happy for him and are sure he will make a tremendous impact in his new position.

Device and service convergence continues to accelerate and as it does, the complexity involved in creating new products and services increases. A counter to the trend of increasing complexity is the new multi-industry ng Connect Program, founded by Alcatel-Lucent which is establishing a rich and diverse ecosystem of infrastructure, device, content and applications for both mobile and fixed broadband networks including 4G, LTE, GPON and other ultra high bandwidth technologies.

The group accelerates the deployment of new devices and services by helping to determine interoperability across industries such as automotive, entertainment, wireless and consumer electronics. The value proposition for members include access to research, reduced development costs and a first mover advantage across markets. For carriers there is the increased use of broadband, reduced OPEX and churn and accelerated time to market.

For consumers the benefits include better integration of disparate entertainment systems, a higher level of value for devices which are part of this initiative, enhanced payment options and perhaps lower cost for a variety of next-gen services and devices.

To learn more about the group's progress I had a chance to interview Chris Carfagnini, Director of Emerging Technology & Media for Alcatel-Lucent via email. The interview is below.

What is the ultimate goal of the ng Connect Program?

The primary goal is to facilitate improved end user experiences on all forms of ultra high bandwidth broadband connections. By helping to bring new applications and services to market for next generation networks more quickly, the ng Connect Program will facilitate an expansion of the revenue base for network operators and others, offer members a chance to work with companies they may not have been able to collaborate with individually and expand their own market opportunities. By doing so, ng Connect will also deliver the benefits of a seamless broadband experience to mobile phones, computers, cars, gaming systems though this ecosystem of infrastructure, devices, content and applications. Users will be able to stream more content, run more sophisticated applications on-the-go, and communicate in the most popular formats of today, and tomorrow.

Who should join and why?

Any company that is interested in leveraging next generation networks in their future offerings, and are interested in learning more about it today, before it's implemented. Initially we are focused on industries that can bring innovation and capability in five key focus areas, although this is expected to grow in the future: Consumer Media & Entertainment, Enterprise Collaboration & e-Healthcare, Automotive Connectivity, Digital Signage and Computing Experience.

We currently have 18 member companies in a variety of industries and specialties including augmented reality, consumer & enterprise electronics, digital signage, music label, mobile games and compelling social networking/entertainment developers as well as leading technology companies in the education and automotive fields. The initial members in ng Connect Program include 4DK, Alcatel-Lucent, Atlantic Records, Buzznet, chumby, Connect2Media, dimedis, FISHLABS, HP, Kyocera Communications Inc., LearningMate, MediaTile, QNX, Samsung, SIGNEXX, Total Immersion, TuneWiki and Words & Numbers.

What is the primary reason companies are not joining?

We've been lucky that nearly every company we approach and have had the opportunity to discuss the ng Connect Program with, has become a member company, even some that are traditionally quite conservative see the value. In fact, our challenge isn't convincing companies to join once we've discussed the value of the program, it is determining which companies to bring into the program in which priority ... we have many, many companies in the funnel today.   Right now on the membership front, the focus is on educating people about who we are and our goals, the more companies we can reach, the more companies will join.

What is the most exciting part of your involvement with this group?

I work with Alcatel-Lucent who conceived and created the organization and I have been closely involved in helping this initiative get off the ground. The most fun is working with companies in industries not traditionally associated with telecom and seeing their eyes light up when they realize the value proposition of what next generation broadband networks and applications enablement can do for their business plans.

It's great because we at Alcatel-Lucent believe that a broad spectrum of companies must come together to collaborate in a strong ecosystem to innovate, remove business and technical barriers and define new business models to accelerate mass adoption of new services and devices for next generation networks.

There is currently an unmet demand scenario in the telecom services marketplace. Ultra high bandwidth networks will unleash the art of the possible for meeting these demands and creating exciting new user experiences.   The members of ng Connect represent multiple industries' key innovators within a framework to focus them collectively towards breakthrough innovations in both services and business models.

Do companies quickly understand the group's value proposition or does it take work to explain? 

Those within the ICT (Information and Communication Technology) sector clearly understand immediately but even those in diverse industries, who have not, to this point, engaged deeply with communications technology, understand very quickly and are eager to start which is why we've been able to sign up 18 companies in a very short time.

Does the success of the organization depend on any particular companies or is critical mass most important?

As an ecosystem, it's most important to have key players in each of the segments we are focusing on that include both large, well-established companies as well as the smaller, nimbler start-ups. We are extremely happy with our current membership and look forward to expanding it.

When will companies see the benefits the group has to offer?

Companies, both our customers and potential new members, can see it today. To date the membership have collaboratively developed 6 Proof of Concept demos and there are many more in the funnel.   In addition to visiting our labs, many of these demos can be seen at tradeshows. In fact at CTIA Wireless we had six Proofs of Concept in the Alcatel-Lucent booth under the ng Connect banner, including a Mobile Enhanced Reality demo, with member companies 4DK and Total Immersion that was recognized with an E-Tech Award from CTIA. 

How about consumers? Will we see a day where ng Connect becomes a recognizable consumer logo?

While that might be flattering, the goal is not to create a Consumer brand, but to facilitate innovation that allows consumers, member companies and service providers and network operators to experience the value of what next generation broadband can enable. It would be optimal though, if ng Connect was eventually recognized by multiple industries as a key "enabler" organization. 

What benchmarks have you set to gauge future success?

Clearly, the ability to collaborate and rapidly create compelling proofs of concept demonstrations for new services and experiences is a key benchmark.   We measure ourselves on our ability to demonstrate the "art of the possible" over broadband networks. Also, attracting key members from many industries to help drive demand and remove barriers to innovation will help enable new business models for all along the digital media value chain and improving uptake of new technologies and services.

How do prospective new companies learn more?

Interested companies can go to our website where we have lots of information on upcoming events, current members and our blog.

It looks like Nortel could be gone as a standalone company in the next few weeks according to published reports. The news is sad but true. It looks like Avaya or Siemens could pick up the enterprise pieces. The optical division could go to Fujitsu, Huaweii, Alcatel-Lucent or potentially a private equity firm. The wireless unit could go to NSN.

What is terrible about the situation from my perspective is the communications and tech spaces are doing well relative to most other markets. In other words, this downturn for these markets has not been terrible. And there is a chance we could see these spaces bounce back faster than other industries.

This IMHO makes the Nortel assets very valuable as they are going for bargain-basement prices and their upside potential is probably good.

I should mention that some of the companies on the list above are not known for their customer facing marketing... If you are one of those companies you will likely not see the value from the assets you pick up.

The real value here is to put a better sales and marketing engine in front of some of the best engineering around. If that is done it will be the best possible outcome for employees, customers and the acquirers.

If you look at TMC from the outside and find yourself asking how you can get a job as an intern at this global integrated media company which builds communities online, in print and in person while gaining marketshare regardless of economic climate, I have some great news to share. We are looking for a small army of interns who want to learn what it's like to take on major multibillion dollar media companies with infinite resources and consistently win.

We will teach you how to sell collaboratively - how to listen and to be loved by your customers (well most of them anyway).

We will teach you integrated marketing and online marketing - not theory but ever-evolving practice.

If you love media and want to work at the company that is light years ahead online, contact us ASAP. We are very picky so if you aren't a super-hard worker and collaboration and hat-wearing are not your middle names, let's end our relationship now as friends (it's not you it's me).

One last thought about TMC - our culture is unusual - we have the financial stability of a 37 year-old company with the energy and enthusiasm of a start-up.

Let's just say if you're thinking of contacting us, please don't delay


Here's more:

The Sales & Marketing internship position at TMC is designed to provide hands-on experience that will be mutually beneficial for both the intern and the organization. The internship position is designed to challenge students and provide them with practical experience in the advertising and media industry.

TMC is looking for a dynamic, creative, enthusiastic, high energy professional to support the Sales organization, to help build advertising and marketing presentations for prospects and clients.

• Work with sales & marketing team to assist in the implementation of various campaigns
• Contribute to the creative input in building campaigns and support the campaigns
• Copyediting and proofreading
• Communicate with customers and peers
• Minimum Qualifications:
• Working towards completion of a college degree program in business, marketing or communication
• Excellent communication skills verbal and written
• Proficient in Microsoft Office suite, specifically PowerPoint and Excel
• Excellent communication skills
• Detail Oriented
• Initiative and proactive thinking
• Team player
• Ability to multi-task and work in a fast paced environment meeting deadlines

The mobile video opportunity grows by leaps and bounds and with bigger mobile screens and faster wireless broadband networks, we can expect larger amounts of revenue to be derived from mobile video by carriers and content providers.

Dilithium Networks (www.dilithiumnetworks.com), founded in Sydney, Australia, offers converged video solutions, with customers in 60 countries on five continents. The company grew out of the participation on the ITU-T H.324/H.324M workgroup by Dr. Marwan Jabri, a company founder and CTO. Jabri spent nearly 20 years developing intelligent signal processing multimedia coding and transcoding algorithms, as well as some early protocol stack implementations of the H.324/H.324M standard. Today Jabri's company, Dilithium carries on and has brought his work to commercial fruition, as it provides pioneering mobile video solutions for network operators, content owners, and aggregators across 2G, 3G, and WiFi networks. They're the global market share leader in terms of their 3G-324M/H.324M/H.324 Protocol Stack and inventive Unicoding technology for high performance intelligent media transcoding. Indeed, Dilithium pioneered the field of 3G mobile video. There software can be found in many phones.

At CTIA Wireless recently, I ran into Paul Zuber, is the founding CEO of Dilithium. He told me that Dilithium is enjoying 400 percent growth year-over-year in the areas of mobile, broadband, Internet, mobile video and surveillance applications. 85 percent of their business occurs outside of the U.S. Some readers may know Dilithium as a world leader in multimedia gateways (said to be a 60 percent global market share) including their The DTG 3000 Multimedia Gateway family that provides a multimedia solution for cellular, IP, and PSTN convergence as networks evolve towards the IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) architecture. Others may be familiar with their Video Ringback Tone Solution, VT-Ring, or their Integrated multimedia gateway and service creation environment, ViVAS, or their QoS Video Telephony Probe for QoS, or perhaps their Video Refresh technology that can eliminate video corruption in mobile networks.

Zuber says there's been increasing demand for anything related to supporting video and services, and social networks are starting to have an impact, as is the craze for user-generated content. Dilithium supports content adaptation so any content can travel to and be experienced via any codec to any device - it's all an outgrowth of their transcoding, transrating, and transizing expertise. They have end-to-end solutions for 3G networks and a powerful service creation platform -- Zuber says they can roll new services in just six weeks. This is pretty remarkable, especially when you consider that the modern network is a jumble of differing standards, codecs and bit rates. Dilithium's technological expertise also extends from mobile (2.5G, 3G, EDGE, Smartphones, WiFi) to set-top boxes. The customers themselves, of course, are agnostic to access methodology, they just want somebody like Dilithium to make it easy for them to access content, and for it to be a high-quality experience, regardless of whether it's delivered by H.264, H.263, Flash, Windows Media, Quicktime, or what have you.

"We enable protocol translation," says Zuber, "but bringing IP to the mobile world is a tougher proposition. The U.S. is still an emerging market. Things are more advanced on the Internet than on wireless. Still, we've had wins with many Internet aggregators and carriers, and they're starting to launch services. We've helped Vodafone, for example, as well as China Telecom, SingTel, and so forth. Pricing plans and business models are starting to take shape. Our cash flow is positive and we're profitable."
 

I got a chance to demo the technology on an iPhone and was blown away by the quality of the stream over the AT&T 3G network. I happened to be driving in a portion of Connecticut with poor cellphone coverage and was surprised that the stream kept playing in areas where I remember having problems talking. I would imagine most users would be impressed with this technology as well and pay serious money for the ability to stream live TV to their cellphones. Obviously this capability exists today but the screen size of an iPhone makes it an especially compelling viewing experience and I would imagine AT&T should be in a big rush to roll this out to the masses.

I would of course precede all programming with a stern warning about the dangers of watching TV as you drive which as you can imagine can be quite distracting as it was to me.

As TMCnet has expanded I have to admit it is tough to keep track of all the sites we have which can help you in your job. To that end I decided to take a moment and list some of them which you may not be aware of. I thought this entry made sense as I have received some comments about how TMC should launch some of the sites listed below. This shows me there are just so many things we do that our 2-3 million unique visitors each month may not be aware of. I hope you find these sites of use:

• Europe
• Asia
• Africa
• Latin America
• Middle East
• Australia

• Mobile site
• iPhone site
• iphone news site

• Information technology
• Cable technology
• Robotics
• Satellite
• Green Solutions

• Jobs Site

The Upcoming Era of Deep Telephony Personalization and How Tellabs Wants to Help Carriers make it Happen

As the global population grows it seems the desire for each of us to do things differently from others will only grow. Just as this trend is responsible for billions of dollars on fashion spending, millions of tattoos and custom cars, expect it to take over the worlds of tech and telecom as well. Don't believe me? Then how do you explain consumers sporting music players of different colors which match their outfits?

This trend was a major theme of a recent meeting I had with Robert Pullen the CEO of Tellabs in the company's Illinois headquarters. According to Pullen, his company will help carriers succeed by assisting them as they provide customized services to their customers.

He further went on to describe the evolution of communications which started with humans sending information over water, roads, railroads and planes. He feels the internet and now personalization and customization are the most recent embodiments of communications.

Interviewing Pullen was made pretty enjoyable by his use of frequent and succinct statements which quickly show where his company adds value. For example, a one-liner which was particularly memorable was that Tellabs Enriches peoples' lives by innovating the way the world connects.

Pullen explained his company is transforming first from TDM to IP and now the next layer of applications and content. From there he touched on parental controls as a potential area of personalization.

Other important nuggets include the idea that you need to sell your way through the downturn and he pointed to emerging economies as one area where they are doing this. Latin America sales for example were up 60-70% at the time of this interview. Another interesting factoid is the company's R&D spend which is currently a significant 16-17% of sales.

Some of the focus areas of the company are mobile backhaul, optical, business and professional services. The future of the company is certainly going to be more closely tied to mobile devices and Pullen acknowledges they are positioning the company to take advantage of this trend.

This is likely one of the reasons for the recent hiring of Vikram Saksena, the ex-CTO of Sonus and ITEXPO keynoter. Saksena has impressed me greatly in the past as he understands how the next generation of services will transform telecom. Saksena and Pullen were busy strategizing when I spoke with them and I am very interested in seeing what new solutions this collaboration allows Tellabs to bring to market.

Greg Galitzine was in this meeting as well and we can expect a more detailed article from him in the May 2009 issue of NGN Magazine so be sure to subscribe today so you don't miss it.

But until this happens - and I doubt it will, Nokia is adding healthy amounts of FUD on the WiMAX market and to be honest, there is likely no other equipment manufacturer in a better position to read global wireless trends.

It is worth mentioning however that Nokia's comments and pulling out of the WiMAX market may lead to a more sophisticated conclusion. More specifically, WiMAX will likely make it in poorer nations such as India, Africa, etc. Coincidentally these areas will require low-margin devices and perhaps Nokia is factoring this into their future business plan. After all, it may not make sense to focus on markets where you make a few euros per device.

Still, I don't recall a time when so many were aligned against any technology. Especially when the technology - in this case WiMAX is already up and running and being compared to little more than a paper standard in LTE.

Here is another problem. I don't want to point to any associations in particular but logic dictates when you get attacked, you formulate a response and then put said plan into action.

When Las Vegas was attacked by President Obama, Las Vegas countered with ads about how Vegas is a great destination for events - low cost, easy to get to, etc. Moreover the Mayor of Las Vegas even penned a response to Obama with the facts about this oasis in a desert location. On the lighter side when Borat relieved himself comically on the image of Kazakhstan, they took out ads to tell us how great the nation was.

The point is where are the ads for WiMAX? In the absence of any positive comments about the technology, what do you think equipment providers, carriers and investors will do? They will pull WiMAX investment and make Nokia's comments self-fulfilling. And that is too bad because competition is a good thing.

And what is the deal with WiMAX vendors in general? They seem to do no marketing at all to push the standard they depend on so much. WiMAX vendors forgot they not only needed to build products but also focus on building and protecting the market which will purchase these products. In other words industry marketing. These vendors did not position their market and now someone else did it for them.

In fact if I think quickly as to who the strongest and most vocal proponent is of WiMAX, it is likely Carl Ford, the person who has partnered with my parent company TMC to launch the 4G Wireless Evolution conference.

But then again, if LTE does indeed become the single wireless broadband standard, we will see device prices driven even lower which will be great for consumers and perhaps even good for equipment manufacturers.

Many people in the communications space have asked me recently what TMC's secret is. After all, we are in the toughest media environment of our lifetimes and we produced our best show ever and have more paying customers online than at virtually any other time in our history.

The answer may lie in a bit of luck and some skill. The lucky part is we built our first online community for a customer about a decade ago. And since this time we have invested a small fortune in building our own proprietary technology which allows us to build highly-ranked, viral, news-driven communities for customers. Well over 100 of these sponsored communities live on TMCnet and generally consist of the tabs at the top and down the left of most of our pages.

Moreover TMCnet now houses millions of pages of content which gives the site tremendous prominence. And we have ranked very high on search engines for many years which has generated a tremendous amount of links to the 100+ articles we write a day and other content such as blog entries on the site.

The community product is called a GOC or "gock" and stands for Global Online Community. When we launched the program the term "organic search results" was probably not common but now, these communities help our customers rank extremely high for a variety of keywords which are important to them.

I know what you are going to say. Rich, that is what those click ads are for. Well to be honest the value of an organic search result is much higher to the searcher because it is not blatantly paid for and moreover it is not in a sea of other ads. Most importantly, research shows less that 20% of people even click on search ads. What about the other 80%?

TMC's communities answer the request we have been hearing -- How do you recreate the best part of tradeshows online?(shots from last ITEXPO East February 2009 in Miami)

Finally, unlike search ads, these communities help your own site(s) rank high organically by providing links. Moreover they help companies build their brand and thought leadership.

In addition, as a news-driven entity, GOCs draw traffic from other pages on TMCnet, newsletters, the TMCnet home page, news search engines and traditional search services. They are multimedia in nature, allowing companies to interface with customers via audio, video and of course text.

Example of an IP-PBX GOC (click to see full screen image)

Many of you have told me over the years that there needs to be a way to combine the best part of trade shows online. The GOC program is exactly this as it brings in your potential customers from around the world and gives them a reason to come back and see your message as the news is constantly updated. It is a very busy 24x7 community consisting of the most targeted people available on the web. And it is targeted by the news you find important.

In addition, it is measurable, and includes a wealth of metrics which can be used to analyze your spend and justify it up the chain of command.

For the reader the benefit is clear. They come to the GOC and bookmark it so they can keep up to date on the latest happenings in the space. How many people come? Well our record is over 650,000 pages viewed on a GOC in one month but typical results are between 250,000-500,000 per month. Generally, each GOC will average about 100,000 unique visitors per month - and they are targeted exclusively by content. In other words, you can use this program to build a community of people interested in subjects such as colocation, IP communications, HD voice, next generation communications, fixed mobile convergence or anything else in virtually any field. Click on any of these above links to see how the design is different and mirrors the look and feel of the sponsor.

If you are interested in learning more, here is an updated (4/14/2009) video which describes the program. Feel free to drop me an email for more.