Fast Forward: Ken Epps

As the telecom industry is making its migration to IP multimedia subsystem frameworks, BayPackets is playing a role at the service layer of these IMS architectures, but CEO Ken Epps is looking at it from the perspective of someone who previously served in executive roles at both AT&T (the old one) and Williams Communications. He recently spoke with Telephony's Dan O'Shea about the challenges and benefits of IMS.

On the challenges carrier face in assembling end-to-end IMS-compliant networks: We had pitched a guy at BellSouth about being part of their VoIP infrastructure, and what he said about IMS is that all the companies that come to see him tell a good story, and their stuff works. He said, ‘We bring them in and find that our problem is the exponential nature of all these companies and components. We thought it would take a few weeks to figure out who to use, but it takes months. And the problem I have with using a lot of different smaller vendors is that if something goes wrong, I don't have just one neck that I can choke.’ That's why I think carriers will be best served by an end-to-end solution. Individual components can be part of that. When it all plays out, BayPackets is trying to address IMS as part of larger, end-to-end solutions. Another problem that carriers have is with the risk involved in counting on a lot of smaller vendors, but now you see the bigger vendors, like Lucent, Ericsson and Alcatel, getting involved, and that “de-risks” IMS for service providers.

On wireline companies deploying IMS: What we've observed is that BT and some of the North American wireline companies have been active with IMS. Part of this is because of market forces, with mobile substitution being a big competitive factor. The other thing is that these wired guys — BT and AT&T, but also rural guys like CenturyTel and Alltel — have gotten the experience of deploying next-generation IP backbones, and this is a natural path for them. With many of the wireline companies, it's a defensive move to offer a fixed/mobile converged service.

On making IMS part of an offensive strategy: A defensive example of a converged service is a flavor called the single-number service. We helped Verizon launch that a while back, and they used it as a way of retaining customers with a phone that was cordless and wireline at home and went bi-modal outside the home. The question is can they turn that around and make it a more offensive strategy? To do so, I think you need to be able to offer the service on the cellular phones that people want and already use and not just a special bi-modal phone. There's an opportunity for these companies to stand up and be on the offensive with converged service and trade on their brands a little more because they have the trusted brands. But some companies are harnessed by legacy technology and others by legacy thinkers. I think some of them need a near-death experience — once that happens, they will innovate like nobody's business.

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