MultiService Forum adds IPTV to GMI 2008

The MultiService Forum today announced the details of the Global MSF Interoperability event, GMI 2008, an event for multi-vendor interoperability testing for end-to-end practical network deployment. After going on hiatus last year, the MSF will pick up where GMI 2006 left off and is expanding to include new test scenarios for IPTV, quality of service and service-oriented architectures.

The purpose of next year’s event will be to verify selected high-value services, such as IPTV, that can take advantage of IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) architectures. The MSF cited plans to test IPTV service integration and interoperability to help assess the maturity of existing IPTV solutions and identify gaps in the current industry standards.

In addition to IPTV, GMI 2008 will test QoS control for multi-service IP networks serving both fixed and mobile clients, as well as the interoperability of a SOA gateway with the core IMS capability. According to the Forum, GMI 2008 will test specific services, but the primary intent is to “validate the service enablers that will unleash the creativity of Web services developers.”

“GMI 2006 convinced us of the growing maturity of IMS as a basis for fixed/mobile convergence,” Roger Ward, president of the MSF, said in a prepared statement. “Of course, for commercial large-scale network implementations, the devil is always in the details, and it is here that the MSF continues to provide a significant opportunity for industry collaboration as the technology continues to mature.”

Kristin Harris, vice chairperson of MSF’s marketing awareness and education committee, said that the goal for GMI 2008 is to “collaborate and move the industry forward,” as well as to give operators more flexibility in interoperability.

MSF is a global association of service providers and system suppliers committed to developing and promoting open-architectures. Its 2006 event was held in October and drew over 500 test engineers and support staff from three continents and four countries. GMI 2008 will be held in the fourth quarter of next year.