International Telecoms Week (ITW), the event that brings the interconnect market together to conduct business, is in two weeks. Historically, ITW has focused on minutes exchange for landline networks. But mobile networks via IP packet exchange(IPX) are now entering the picture, and IPX is set to be a hot topic at this year’s conference. With LTE coming to the forefront, IPX is becoming even more important because it provides a way to enable LTE roaming.
LTE is also enabling VoLTE, and through VoLTE, HD Voice. Since HD Voice is supported by our softswitch and gateway products, it will likely be a topic attendees will ask us about often at ITW.
I would also expect virtualization to dominate conversation in the same way it was a key topic at Mobile World Congress. For the ITW carrier attendees that run their networks on switches and softswitches, the movement to NFV could have a profound impact on their businesses over time. First of all, who could imagine that a softswitch could run as a virtualized network function (VNF)? But it’s possible. Dialogic’s ControlSwitch has been running on COTS servers for some time, and so it’s just a matter of time before we make the true switch to NFV. This shift could enable easier upgrades and longer life for the softswitches, and make it simpler for MVNEs, which enable MVNOs, to get into this game, since the capital expenditure would be considerably less. Over time, this change might bring about many more choices in the interconnection market.
Finally, WebRTC will probably be a main topic of conversation, as well. WebRTC could impact this crowd in the same way that HD Voice does; they’ll need to carry the WebRTC minutes, so support of the technology by their core equipment will be important. The convergence of WebRTC and IMS networks is also gaining traction, so I expect we’ll be getting more than a few questions on the subject.
ITW has been an excellent event for Dialogic over the years, and it should be again this year. If you’ll be there, please come and see us in meeting room #4130. To schedule a meeting, send us an email at [email protected].
