The two IEC IMS events were pretty interesting (the first one, a full day IMS session on Monday - where I gave a talk - and the second one, an hour-and-a-half long wireless IMS perspective on Tuesday).
The first day featured the perspectives of SBC (David Deas) and Comcast (Jason Livingood). David's presentation focused on wireline/wireless convergence and brought up a few key points, including cellular/WiFi integration, and the big divide between wireline and wireless service providers. David mentioned that wireline carriers overwhelmingly believe in FMC (Fixed Mobile Convergence), whereas wireless operators are quite skeptical. The latter part of his talk was also interesting, as he considered implementation issues (such as Parlay/OSA integration options). Jason offered a very insightful perspective on the MSO view of IMS, including the ongoing standardization efforts and the issues faced by most cable companies in considering their strategies. He also mentioned a few IMS applications that could be of interest to MSOs, and the ongoing Cable Labs activities.
The second day featured the perspectives of Bell Canada (Philippe Jetté) and Bell South (Bill Smith). Phillipe's presentation emphasized the evolution towards the seamless access in the world of IP (wireline/wireless and nomadic/fixed). IMS will play a key enabling role in the transformation from a single bill to a single network and to a single (user-centric) seamless application space, according to Philippe. Bill's presentation highlighted the IMS view not only from Bell South's, but also from Cingular's perspective. He emphasized some of the consumer IMS apps, including managing a family's communications, seamless roaming, etc.
Overall, the consensus throughout the two days was that while IMS still is very much a work in progress, it will play a key role in the transformation towards a user-centric world in which applications can be delivered quicker and more efficiently to certain segments in the subscriber bases. All in all, the IEC put together a couple of great sessions that provided a good current perspective in the world of IMS.
Note: I posted a few photos from my day on Monday (including the IEC session and an evening at Wrigley Field).
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The Supercomm Nortel update included the revelation that the MPE9000 switch/router that was announced last year will finally hit GA by the end of June. The MPE is expected to be a "big product" (according to VP of Carrier Marketing Jim Dondero) for Nortel within six months, as wireline and wireless operators will begin to rely on it to aggregate ATM, Ethernet, Frame Relay and IP at the edge of their networks. Nortel has been quoting some pretty impressive VoIP numbers: 55 carrier VoIP customers and 20 out of 35 MSOs that have made VoIP decisions up to now.