Comverse introduces real time converged billing and signs Indonesian operator

Prepay systems provider Comverse debuted a converged billing system for providers of both post-paid and prepay services this week through a deployment with Indonesian operator Mobile-8.

The Comverse billing solution offers real-time rating and charging for both types of subscribers as well as instant access to subscriber information.

"It’s not just about the billing," said Steve Menear, assistant vice president of business and market strategy for Comverse Intelligent Networks. "It’s about billing in the most effective way based on value or content, not some anonymous amount of usage. That capability must be in both post-paid and prepay systems and it must be synchronized."

Today that isn’t the case, Menear said. "Prepaid systems today are almost a completely separate world from traditional billing systems and that has cost implications because [operators] are duplicating their processes," he said.

The Comverse system brings the two together by providing a common platform based on Intelligent Network technology. Its parent company, Comverse Technology, has 400 deployments in approximately 100 countries.

Mobile-8 is a startup operator in Indonesia and will use the Comverse real-time converged billing solution in its CDMA 2000 1x and EV-DO network. Comverse will authorize all service requests for voice calls and data service in real-time using IS-826 Wireless Intelligent network technology.

"Real time processing is not something you can pretend; it has a real knack of sorting out the sheep from the goats," Menear said. "It is a fundamental requirement to deliver pre-paid and that is why it is built into the fabric of our system."

Comverse is working with an as yet unnamed partner for the post-paid portion of the billing. Its real-time component is expected to reduce the revenue leakage common in a post-paid environment and advance the trend of empowering both post-paid and prepay customers with the ability personalize their service as well as analyze, control and manage their own accounts.