AppTrigger ties new services to old networks

In the past, AppTrigger has positioned its so-called application session controller – which sits between new IP and legacy networks – as a way to enable existing, revenue-producing apps to run on new IP-based networks. Today it added new capabilities that ensure that providers building new IP and IMS-based services can also deploy them in the “other direction,” or to subscribers on legacy access networks.

The new capabilities are available as part of AppTrigger’s Ignite Application Session Controller 10.0 and that product’s ServiceExtender solution. The platform ensures that services built on new IP-based networks aren’t “siloed” in much the same way legacy apps often were, by enabling all apps to reach all subscribers on all access networks, said Patrick Fitzgerald, AppTrigger’s vice president of global sales and marketing.

“The question is, ‘How do I leverage assets that are already there? I’ve already created enhanced services; is there a benefit in going and recreating all that into an IP world? ’” Fitzgerald said. At the same time, as operators begin to experiment building new IMS-based applications, “we see a lot of requests to make those new apps accessible to legacy subscribers.”

The idea of providing a “middle tier” that would sit between old and new networks and help manage protocol and signaling interworking is gaining traction, as carriers try to build legitimate business cases for next generation networks. “The ability to bring revenue-producing legacy applications forward to NGN/IMS and vice versa is becoming a critical component of the NGN business case,” said Yankee Group analyst Brian Partridge.

“What service providers find exciting about IMS is the decomposition of the network,” said AppTrigger’s Fitzpatrick. “The fundamental problem with IMS is that it was built on a white blank sheet of paper with the assumption that it was going to be the sole network. But there’s always going to be legacy infrastructure to manage and work with and there’s always going to be the ‘next’ next network. Service providers are always going to deploy a little bit of everything; a service-extender software layer makes it possible for them to do that without creating new siloed horizontal service islands.”

More vendors are starting to deliver solutions focused on the network interworking, including traditional vendors like Tekelec and Telcordia as well as startups with more of a service delivery platform focus, like Convergin, Aepona and Telenity.

AppTrigger supports this approach by providing a combination of signaling and application interworking capabilities along with key media functionality. The new ServiceExtender capabilities are based on a scripting toolkit that enables service providers to adapt the platform based on their specific application, vendor and hardware needs.

To illustrate how the platform could be used, AppTrigger’s Fitzgerald gave the example of a wireless service provider creating a new IP-based parental control application. To make that application work on legacy networks, there needs to be a way to communicate presence and location from a network that by design “doesn’t speak IP,” he said. In that scenario, the AppTrigger platform would handle the protocol and message flow interaction to enable the two worlds to work together, he said.