* 23International Herald Tribune | ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT | Thursday,May 24, 2007

NGN delivers previously disparate services, ranging from broadband Internet to broadcast TV, over a single network.

STO

CK

BYT

E/

GET

TYIM

AGES

Developing world | Cost benefits

Can NGN help bridge the digital divide?Television | Entering the digital age

Out of the box: IPTV gives control back to the users

Next-generation networksA paradigm shift in telecommunications

Spotlight | Next-generation network technology

ITU leads march into new digital age

Next-generation networks: A paradigm shift in telecommunications did not involve thereporting or editorial departments of the IHT. It was sponsored by the InternationalTelecommunication Union, which provided the text.

For information on the IHT Advertising Supplements program: supplements@iht.com

Global standards: ITU shows the way

Regulations | Challenges ahead

Regulating for the next generation: Guidelines are necessary

‘With IPTV, we’re heading into uncharted waters’

In response to an urgent market call for global standards, the International Telecommunication Unionestablished an NGN Focus Group back in 2003 to define priorities and work plans encompassingalmost all 20 ITU Study Groups involved in developing telecommunication and radiocommunicationstandards. Eighteen months later, the group had produced 900 pages of deliverables defining the high-level architecture frameworks for tomorrow’s networks. That road map now serves as the basis of theNGN Global Standards Initiative, under the coordination of ITU-T Study Group 13. In addition to activelydeveloping its own NGN standards, ITU has set up a joint coordination activity to ensure that thethousands of new standards comprised by NGN systems are developed in the most appropriateindustry forum, to avoid duplication of effort. ‘‘NGN represents an unprecedented example ofconvergence, both technical and operational, bringing together every major player in the ICT sector todevelop standards that will benefit the industry as a whole,’’ says ITU Secretary General HamadounTouré. ‘‘Our members have risen to this enormous challenge, and we’re well on track to ensure thenext digital revolution rests on a very solid foundation.’’

Selected NGN initiatives

C onvergence is here. It is changing the nature ofwhat we once called telecommunications ser-vices, reshaping the way we consume and ac-

cess those services — and transforming the networksby which they are delivered.

Next-generation network (NGN) technology is repla-cing our legacy circuit-switched phone systems with anew packet-switched architecture, most commonlybased on the Internet protocol (IP), to deliver a plethoraof previously disparate services — ranging frombroadband Internet to fixed, wirelessand mobile voice and data, and evenbroadcast television — over a singlenetwork with guaranteed quality of ser-vice.

The International Telecommunica-tion Union, the United Nations agencycharged with developing global stan-dards and policy guidelines for theworld’s telecommunication and infor-mation and communication technology(ICT) resources, is currently leading oneof the most massive standards-devel-opment projects ever undertaken in aneffort to build a global road map of the technologiesand services that will define the shape of our increas-ingly digital age.

NGN promises seamless global connectivity overany network, any device, any time and any place. Ahighly flexible transport mechanism that can carry justabout any kind of electronic information, IP makes itpossible for new rivals like cable TV providers, broad-band Internet service providers (ISPs) and other digital-age companies to encroach on the territory tradition-ally dominated by telecom companies and state-li-

censed broadcasters, allowing them to deliver bundledvoice, Internet and entertainment services over asingle connection. ITU predicts that by 2008, at least50 percent of all international telecommunicationtraffic will be carried on IP networks.

New game, new rules

With the decline of revenues in voice traffic, manytelcos are looking for new streams of revenue while re-ducing costs to remain competitive.

Working through the Study Groupsthat make up ITU’s TelecommunicationStandardardization Sector (ITU-T) andRadiocommunication Sector (ITU-R),these companies, along with theworld’s leading equipment vendors andresearchers, are pushing the envelopetoward a fully integrated single networkarchitecture capable of seamlessly de-livering just about any service userswant, on about any device.

‘‘NGN takes into account new realit-ies for operators, such as the need toconverge and optimize networks in or-

der to reduce costs,’’ says Malcolm Johnson, directorof ITU’s Telecommunication Standardization Bureau.‘‘By rolling out and operating, on a single network, mul-tiple services — including fixed and mobile voice, high-speed Internet and multichannel digital TV — operat-ors, providers and users are bound to benefit. Andsince services effectively run independent of the net-work and each layer is well defined, NGN means amuch more competitive offering among providers, andtherefore choice and lower prices for the network oper-ator and consumer while protecting the investments

I f next-generation network (NGN) technol-ogy streamlines content and service de-livery, it also raises regulatory challenges.

‘‘Somewhere between the telecoms and In-ternet worlds, NGN creates a raft of new is-sues that need to be addressed by regula-tors worldwide,’’ says Sami Al-Basheer Al-Morshid, director of ITU’s TelecommunicationDevelopment Bureau (BDT). To that end, theBDT’s annual regulatory gathering, the GlobalSymposium for Regulators, which took placein Dubai in February, focused entirely on the

W hile next-generation network (NGN)deployment is expected to flourishfirst in countries with a fast-grow-

ing market for broadband services, the po-tential cost benefits are already attractingthe attention of operators in the developingworld. Senegal’s Sonatel, for example, re-cently rolled out a triple-play offering thatcomprises voice, Internet and TV, targetingthat country’s growing middle class. Brazil, In-dia and Vietnam have announced plans tomigrate their core national networks to NGN;Bangladesh, Brazil, Pakistan and Vietnamare also currently investing in building fibernetworks whose direct links to apartmentbuildings, local neighborhoods or even indi-vidual homes will deliver unprecedentedlevels of bandwidth to consumers.

While operators in developing countriesoften wrestle with a chronic lack of invest-

By breaking down traditional broadcasting models, the rapid rise of IPTV has createdregulatory challenges. With individuals in the driving seat — both as consumers and,increasingly, as generators of content — how will or even should governmentsmaintain the degree of control necessary to ensure offensive or exploitative materialis not broadcast? And in a world where any content can be accessed at any time,how can minors be protected? ‘‘Convergence is setting two very different regulatorycultures on a rapid collision course,’’ says ITU’s Robert Shaw, head of the agency’sICT Applications and Cybersecurity Division. ‘‘Broadcasting regulation hastraditionally been highly interventionist, while the regulation of telecommunicationservices has been mainly concerned with delivery, not content.’’ To complicatematters further, he adds, control of audiovisual material is a highly sensitive issueclosely tied to societal, cultural and, in some countries, religious values.

In Europe, this has been tackled in an updated Television Without FrontiersDirective — now more accurately named the Audiovisual Media Services Directive,implicitly recognizing that regulating 500 or more IPTV channels, many of which maybe based abroad, will be very different from overseeing three or four nationalstations. For its part, ITU is currently working to define a set of principles that couldhelp guide regulators through what looks like a digital minefield. As the only globalorganization with a membership spanning the entire ICT industry, the organization isuniquely placed to serve as an impartial, accessible forum for all stakeholders tobuild consensus on the need for, and shape of, future action. ‘‘With IPTV, we’re reallyagain heading into uncharted waters, and a paradigm shift is inevitable,’’ says Shaw.‘‘The Church in Europe in the Middle Ages tried to prevent the Bible being publishedin Martin Luther’s German because it broke the power of an elite who used only Latin.As in Luther’s time, convergence is likely to lead to a modern-day reformation wheredigital content is in the hands of many rather than just a few.’’

E ven the humble TV is morphing into adigital-age device. In Europe and else-where, IPTV — television delivered

over Internet protocol-based networks, in-stead of over the airwaves — is replacingthe paradigm of fixed-program schedules in-terspersed by advertising breaks that domi-nated broadcasting since its inception.

Instead, IPTV viewers determine their ownviewing schedules, receiving the programsthey want to watch directly from their serviceprovider at any time — and potentially fromanywhere in the world. What’s more, the kindof device viewers use to access those pro-grams no longer needs to be a traditionaltelevision set — it can be a desktop orlaptop computer, a Web-enabled PDA, oreven a GPRS or 3G mobile phone.

The power to deliver TV services over IPnetworks is paving the way for telecomcompanies and others to set themselves upas TV content providers — often in partner-ship with strongly branded traditional broad-casters. ‘‘NGN technology is giving telcostriple- or quad-play capabilities coveringvoice, data, video and interactive services,’’says Simon Jones, vice chairman of ITU’s Fo-cus Group on IPTV. ‘‘As revenues from voiceand simple data services decline, traditionaloperators are looking to capitalize on thatnew functionality to create a ‘single relation-ship’ with the customer through the provisionof competitively priced bundled services.’’

In Europe, incumbent operators in Aus-tria, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands,Spain and the United Kingdom have alreadylaunched local IPTV offerings; now, many arebeginning to look outside their national terri-tories to establish TV offerings further afield.Not to be outmaneuvered, existing pay-TVoperators are joining the fray; BSkyB ac-quired the United Kingdom’s DSL-providerEasynet in 2006, while Austria’s UPC tookcontrol of Inode, another DSL provider.

For ITU’s Focus Group on IPTV, the chal-lenge is to harmonize and integrate the vari-

ous standards that are being developed forNGN components into a unified global stan-dard that will maximize interoperabilityacross networks and markets worldwide.

‘‘In the absence of a firm global standardsframework, many players have launchedproprietary-developed IPTV services in therush to be early-to-market,’’ says Jones. ‘‘In-teroperability hasn’t been seen as a pressingneed, but that will change as NGN technologybecomes widely deployed, and telcos, broad-casters and others vie for a larger slice of anincreasingly global pie.’’ The group has fo-cused its efforts on those requirements ofimmediate use to the IPTV industry, namelyarchitecture, quality of service, security, digit-

al-rights management, middleware andhome networks, all of which are expected tobe adopted by the end of this year.

Jones says his group aims to coordinateand promote the development of global IPTVstandards, taking into account the existingstandards development efforts of a widerange of organizations, with a view to definingan optimum set of blueprints that will helpthe fast-growing IPTV sector to flourish. ‘‘Ourfocus is on interoperability, while maintainingthe degree of flexibility IPTV providers need todevelop their own unique service models,’’he says. ‘‘We’re not in the business of dictat-ing what shape IPTV offerings will ultimatelytake — that’s for the market to decide.’’�

implications of NGN and the challenge of fos-tering strong investment while assuring openmarkets.

Before convergence transformed thelandscape of information and communica-tions technology (ICT), separate services ranon separate networks — fixed line over cop-per and fiber links, mobile over wireless net-works based on GSM (global system for mo-bile communications), CDMA (code divisionmultiple access) or regional systems, televi-sion via broadcast antennas and satellites.

made, irrespective of the evolution of services or net-work technologies.’’

Consumers, Johnson points out, are looking for at-tractive, affordable services with the same quality of ser-vice as provided by legacy networks and with the samekind of access to all services everywhere. ‘‘The world-wide success of mobile telephony has created a cultureof mobility that has changed the way consumers relateto their daily communication needs,’’ Johnson says.‘‘They’re increasingly expecting the same features andperformance from all services, along with simpler,bundled packages. They want personalized services thatcorrespond to their own needs, and that offer speed andperformance as well as ease of access.’’

At the same time, he says, NGN means network op-erators and providers will be able to achieve tremen-dous economies of scale by being able to offer all ser-vices independently over the same infrastructure.

Few users realize it, but early implementations ofNGN are already up and running — though often underdifferent guises. BT’s 21st Century Network beganNGN deployment in Wick, near Cardiff in South Wales,last year, with full national migration expected to becompleted by the end of 2012.

Korea Telecom’s Broadband Convergence Net-work, meanwhile, will see customers using an all-IPnetwork within five years, while Japan’s NTT is quicklybuilding NGN infrastructure in a bid to offer ubiquitousnational broadband services. In North America, Sprint,Qwest, Bell Canada and Telus have all announced NGNrollouts, while in Europe, Telecom Italia and TelekomAustria have been among the most bullish in moving toall-IP platforms.

That’s not to say, however, that most of the stan-dards needed to support next-generation services arealready in the bag. While some component systemsmay be finalized, Johnson says there’s still a long roadahead in terms of realizing the vision of globally ubiqui-tous, increasingly personalized services delivered overa wide range of different devices. ‘‘NGN representsone of the most complex technological transitionsever,’’ he says. To give some idea of the scale of thetask, he cites a single meeting of ITU’s NGN Lead StudyGroup last year, which had to evaluate some 650 dif-ferent technical proposals.

Global playing field

ITU undertakes that mammoth effort to assureboth the ongoing success of the industry it serves andthe best-quality, most affordable products for con-sumers. ‘‘Global standards give access to global mar-kets,’’ Johnson says. ‘‘They also help keep prices

down, through competition and economies of scale.Today’s ICT industry is backing NGN to the tune of bil-lions of dollars so we’re proud to have been entrustedwith this work. Manufacturers and operators alike un-derstand that global standards will stimulate innova-tion, deliver better technology and enable full interoper-ability across any kind of system, protecting theircurrent and future investments. ITU is the only agencywith the reach and authority to ensure full convergencebetween different NGN platforms on a global scale.’’

While Johnson readily says that achieving con-sensus on technological approaches developed byrival companies isn’t always easy, he shrugs off thedifficulty. ‘‘It’s what we do,’’ he says, ‘‘and we’ve beendoing it with considerable success since the deploy-ment of the first telegraph systems more than 140years ago. Our standards already underpin the entireglobal communications framework — and will soonserve as the platform for a whole range of as yet un-dreamed-of services.’’�

ment capital and limited consumer-spendingpower, they enjoy some advantages when itcomes to migrating to NGN. Compared withthe aging networks of fixed-line operators indeveloped markets, public switched tele-phone networks in the developing world tendto have less legacy technology buried deep inthe core, making it easier and cheaper toleapfrog to an all-IP (Internet protocol) archi-tecture. Given the spectacular growth in mo-bile networks in these countries, it is expec-ted that for many developing countries, themigration path to NGN will mainly rely on theuse of wireless technologies. The ratio forthe relative number of mobile to wired con-nections may reach 20 to 1. Solutions forboth NGN providers and user applicationswill need to cater for such environments in abid to access these markets. In addition, thelimited scale of copper-line infrastructure,

combined with the falling price of opticalfiber, is helping spur greenfield developmentof fiber to the apartment, curb or home (FT-Tx), with operators free to look to next-gener-ation systems rather than being constrainedto try to squeeze the last drop of value out ofinvestments in old technology.

As part of efforts to spur NGN uptake inthe developing world, ITU is working with re-gional organizations and industry bodies toensure that the key building blocks of an en-abling environment, such as regulatoryframeworks and global standards, are read-ily available. For example, last month, theagency held a workshop in Bangkok in part-nership with the Asia Pacific Telecommunity,designed to highlight regional issues and ex-change views on practical ways to plan themigration to NGN cost-effectively, particularlyin low-income, remote and rural areas. �

Not surprisingly, networks were optimized forthe kinds of services they carried, so that thepublic switched telephone network (PSTN)delivered excellent voice quality, the Internetwas geared to the cheap transportation ofpackets (at the expense of service qualityand security) and broadcasting networks de-livered one-way video and audio in line withstrict national broadcast regulations.

Now, as more and more of these services— video, voice, radio, television — begin tomove onto IP-based networks, the digital bitsand bytes are, in Nicholas Negroponte’swords, commingling so that one service be-comes indistinguishable from another as ittravels across the network. In an NGN world,should different bit streams be regulated dif-ferently — and if so, how?

For the moment, the answer is still farfrom clear. At one extreme are those who fa-vor the tight regulation that has traditionallycharacterized the broadcasting sphere; atthe other, some are lobbying hard for theearly Internet’s ‘‘Wild West’’ ethos, where anykind of control is viewed as anathema.

‘‘NGN introduces a radical new paradigmthat requires a complete review of currentregulatory frameworks,’’ says Doreen Bog-dan, head of ITU’s Regulatory and Market En-vironment Division. ‘‘Our role is to fosteropen, in-depth international dialogue and topromote the sharing of experiences and ap-proaches, as well as assisting nations thatlack resources to reap the full rewards of thepotential of NGN to reduce operators’ costsand extend access to consumers.’’

To help policymakers and regulators re-spond effectively to these and other chal-lenges, ITU’s Global Symposium for Regula-tors reached consensus on a set of BestPractice Guidelines that can serve as a regu-latory road map for migration to NGN.

The new guidelines cover all aspects ofservice provision, including authorization, ac-cess, interconnection and interoperability,numbering, universal access, quality of ser-vice, consumer awareness and security; theyalso promote good governance and regulato-ry independence. In addition, they recom-mend that regulators consider applying‘‘technology neutral’’ rules to all providers, re-gardless of how services are delivered to theconsumer.

Investment-friendly policies will also be

important, particularly in the developingworld where the possibility of leapfrogging toNGN systems could have a dramatic impacton access and affordability.

Addressing the 470 assembled regulato-ry experts from around the world, ITU Secre-tary General Hamadoun Touré said that mi-gration to NGN represented an idealopportunity for regulators to develop innova-tive new frameworks that better enable de-veloping countries to meet their ICT develop-ment goals. BDT’s Al-Basheer added that thenew guidelines will assist regulators in theimmensely difficult task of garnering politicalsupport for effective regulatory frameworksthat will help countries leverage the benefitsfor emerging technological and marketdevelopments.�

• Africa: Gateway Communicationsboasts having deployed the world’s firstlong-distance NGN in 2006, linking mobilenetworks across 30 African countries.

• Austria: Telekom Austria has chosen amultiyear program aimed at a smoothmigration to NGN, allowing for thedevelopment of innovative services whileoptimizing network costs by usingexisting infrastructure.

• Brazil: All major operators in Brazil haveannounced plans to migrate to core NGN.An FTTx project is under way.

• Canada: Bell Canada and Telus have alsoannounced plans to implement NGN.

• Chile: VTR launches triple-play serviceson IP-NGN architecture.

• China: Jilin Mobile Communications usesa mobile NGN solution to deliver servicesto 30 million subscribers in Jilin province.China Netcom has started deploying anNGN long-distance trial network coveringall 31 provinces of China; it is also rollingout tandem and local NGN networks in twoprovinces. Shanghai Telecom andChunghwa Telecom have beenundertaking NGN deployment since 2003.

• France: France Telecom carried out itsfirst trials in 2002 and started deploymentof NGN in 2007.

• India: MTNL has announced plans tomigrate to core NGN and tendered to addcapacity in Delhi and Mumbai based onNGN. An IP-MPLS Core network will alsoaggregate all the next-generation networkswitching, data broadband and videotraffic.

• Italy: In January, Telecom Italiaannounced it was starting to roll out itsfiber-optic network, or NGN, this year. Thenetwork will cost ¤6.5 billion ($8.8 billion)to build over a 10-year period.

• Japan: In November 2004, the NTT Groupannounced its plans for building a next-generation network and developingubiquitous broadband services.

• Korea (Rep. of): Korea Telecom startedits migration to NGN in 2002 and intends tomigrate all its networks onto a NGN-basedbroadband converged network by 2012.

• Romania: Rom Telecom announced plansto move to NGN. It adopted a newregulatory framework in 2002 promotingtriple-play services.

• Russia: In 2006, the regional operatorJSC Sakhatelecom announced its NGNplans.

• Singapore: In February 2006, SingTelannounced its next-generation nationalbroadband network (or next-gen NBN) todeliver speeds of 1 Gbit/s to all homes,offices and schools, as well as awireless broadband network (WBN) tooffer ‘‘pervasive connectivity.’’

• United Kingdom: BT’s 21st CenturyNetwork began deployment of NGN inWick at the end of 2006 and expects itscore national infrastructure to havemigrated to NGN by March 2008. Thefull national migration is scheduled for2012, adding customers at the rate of150,000 per week. In October 2006,Cable and Wireless announced it hadcompleted the rollout of its NGNinfrastructure.

• United States: Sprint announced itsmove toward NGN, and Qwest says ithas completed a transcontinentaldomestic IP network

• Vietnam: VNPT has announced plansto migrate to core NGN.

ITU predicts thatby 2008, at least50 percent of all

internationaltelecommunication

traffic will becarried on IP

networks

***