Migration to the public network: Computer telephony takes root

Originally focused on enterprise network call centers, computer telephony is beginning to find a home on the Internet and public networks, last week's Computer Telephony Expo in Los Angeles revealed.

Northern Telecom introduced a telephony application programming interface (TAPI) driver for Centrex that offers functionality traditionally provided by PBX systems. For example, the driver enables the phone numbers of inbound callers to generate "screen pops" containing useful information about each caller by call center personnel. A new carrier-class debit system from Harris Corp. that uses a Windows NT server also is TAPI-based.

Increasing carrier interest in Internet protocol (IP)-based voice service is helping drive computer telephony's migration.

Franklin Telecom's Tempest IP gateway targets Internet service providers that want to offer long-distance service over the Internet. Because a gateway is required at each end of the call, some smaller ISPs may pick a relatively small area in which to offer service, or they may target city pairs between which long-distance volumes are high, said Diane McCarthy, Franklin's director of marketing.

Clarent Corp. introduced its VPN Telephony Suite to allow service providers to offer IP voice over virtual private networks (VPNs). Clarent already has supplied IP telephony equipment to international carriers wanting to offer low-cost consumer long-distance service, said Heidi Bersin, Clarent's vice president of marketing. Those carriers requested the VPN offering for their business customers.

Such an offering also should appeal to domestic carriers building IP networks, she said.

The desire to connect IP networks with conventional voice networks is driving demand for carrier-grade SS7 servers, such as the one offered by DataKinetics.

"Any connection you want to make into a public network today is mostly via SS7," said David Fletcher, DataKinetics' technology director.

Last week, Dialogic Corp., a leading supplier of computer telephony components, announced it will service and support the DataKinetics server.

Such products are required for solutions for improving IP telephony voice quality that depend on SS7 information, said Jerome L. Krasner, group manager of telecom and embedded systems for Venture Development Corp.

EC QUESTIONS MERGER The European Commission last week said it will investigate the effect of the proposed merger between MCI and WorldCom, citing concerns that the combined company would have undue control over the Internet.

WEISWASSER LEAVES AMERICAST Stephen Weiswasser, president and CEO of americast, will resign his posts on March 31. Jody Greenstone Miller, currently executive vice president of operations, has been named acting president and CEO of the cable programming venture. Weiswasser, who joined the company from ABC, will continue to consult with americast.

The spotlight was on practical applications of Telecommunications Management Network technology-rather than on battles over protocols-at the second annual Global TMN Summit in Orlando.

The event drew more than 500 people-up 25% from last year's attendance-along with Bell companies, new competitors and equipment vendors.

"The emphasis is moving away from basic tools, protocols and the rest of the low-level, technical aspects of TMN and is being focused where it belongs: on practical business solutions," said Matt Izzo, director of advanced solutions at Objective Systems Integrators. "The fact that the people in attendance come from such a variety of segments of the industry bodes well for TMN's acceptance."

Among the announcements made at the summit:

* ObjectStream Inc. unveiled Mediator RTOS, a software development kit for embedding mediation into equipment such as wavelength division multiplexers, add/drop multiplexers, digital cross-connects, asynchronous transfer mode switches and digital subscriber line network elements. The product runs under a network element's real-time operating system and enables the equipment to be controlled and provisioned in any network management environment.

* Vertel and Hewlett-Packard have expanded the availability of their TMN product suite (see story on page 8). The companies demonstrated a mediation device that integrates Transaction Language 1/ASCII devices with multiple operations support systems using Q3.

* Bull Worldwide Information Systems demonstrated an operational mobile network management solution developed by Audilog and based on Bull's TMN Master platforms.