Service brokers link legacy, NGN

Participants in the recent Multi-Service Forum GMI2008 demo – which included many IMS elements and was at least partly focused on the delivery of IPTV over IMS – reported similar requirements to bridge legacy networks and NGNs, even at the basic signaling level. For instance, Acme Packet said its session border controllers were used at various spots in the network to manage handoffs between old networks and new. “For a long period of time, systems like ours are going to be mediating between existing networks and the ‘next’ network,” said Seamus Hourihan, Acme Packet’s vice president of marketing and product management.

Service brokers fit best within incumbent large Tier 1 carriers with legacy networks making the move to NGN in the next several years, said Yankee analyst Partridge.

Vendors with service broker products including Aepona’s Universal Service Platform; AppTrigger’s Application Session Controller; Convergin’s Accolade SCIM platform; and a joint platform from jNetx and Atos Origin called the NGIN convergence platform, Partridge said. In addition, larger, established vendors are adding service-broker capabilities to their existing application and signaling platforms, including Tekelec, Telcordia and Alcatel-Lucent.