Lasting Legacy

Enhanced services are as much opportunities to fail as they are to succeed. Sure, prepaid and voice mail are hot right now, but what happens if they cool off in a year or two? And what about all that expensive hardware ripped out and replaced to accommodate those services?

Just as worrisome is relying on a single vendor for those services' hardware and software.

"A lot of cost is associated with vendor dependence," said Monica Packi, Excel Switching wireless industry specialist. "Once you buy into that vendor, then you've got to get everything from that vendor or buy a whole new platform."

One solution is programmable switches, which make implementing enhanced services more about loading software and less about adding hardware. They're also a way to avoid single-sourcing.

"Look at how Microsoft changed the industry by allowing third-party software and functionality," Packi said. "I think that's kind of the way we see this going."

Where it's quickly going is a day when carriers can choose their voice-mail service from one vendor, caller ID from another and prepaid from still another.

"You can really pick and choose best-of-class services," Packi said.

Programmable switches and open architecture are important because enhanced services are key differentiators as competition increases. Flexibility and ease of programming shortens time to market and lowers development costs.

"That's where we're going because we think that's where the operators want to be," said Tim Mason, Excel wireless product manager. "They don't want to buy additional hardware every time they add a new application."

Thinking Ahead Increasing cooperation between switch manufacturers and third-party developers also points to a time when carriers can test new services to determine market interest.

"In the near future, we're going to have a pool of our developers that offer these plug-and-play services, so as a carrier you can say, 'Do I want this? Let's try this,'" Packi said.

But even trial runs are no time to find out the enhanced services don't mesh well with the rest of your infrastructure. The best way to avoid conflicts is to assess the switches' and services' features and determine how they'll fit into your existing network. Jeffrey Buck, AG Communications Systems technology and planning manager, said carriers often underestimate the complexity of their networks. To avoid making the same mistake:

* Ferret out possible conflicts with legacy hardware or software.

* Consider the number of ports the adjunct system requires. Voice mail is an example of a service that can consume dozens of T-1 ports for media resources.

* Let the switch be the resource manager. If the adjunct unit fails, the switch can reroute calls to another resource.

* Make sure new features don't overburden the switch and limit its call-switching capacity.

*Above all, remember why you're buying programmable switches in the first place: as an investment in the future. That means choosing a vendor that is thinking ahead.

"Carriers should look for a basic set of core features that come as standard and a list of available features that they can mix and match depending upon their needs," said Christopher Daigle, Nortel senior manager of product marketing. "They can view the current ease of implementing those optional features as an indicator of where their vendor is taking them as a customer. So if today they can easily pick and choose from a varied list of optional features, then they understand the ease of provisioning. That can give you an indicator that the vendor is thinking ahead."

Another indicator is R&D work on emerging trends or mandates, such as E-911, LNP and CALEA.

"We concentrate on a lot of the regulatory requirements that are coming down," Daigle said, "especially in the United States."

Communications also is key. The more closely a vendor works with carriers, the better an understanding it will have of how carriers bundle services.

"We're dependent upon our carriers to tell us what their business models are," Daigle said. "It's kind of a 2-way street. We have to work with our customers to understand their business."

Future Perfect Over the next decade, programmability will expand to the radio portion of the base station, where digital signal processing (DSP) will use an open hardware platform to accommodate a variety of protocols and services. Under this approach, called software-defined radio (SDR), a carrier could upgrade its receivers by reprogramming the filters' coefficients, and the latest vocoder would be only a software upgrade away.

"The thing that's probably driving it on the base-station side is that a base station is an asset that these guys want to last 30 years or more," said Jim Kokal, software-radio product manager for DSP developer Blue Wave Systems. "Consequently, protocol of the month starts driving them crazy."

A flexible, open platform that wrings every bit of service out of a common platform also is key to making the transition to third generation and IMT-2000.

"I think carriers are very interested in it," said Jeffrey Reed, a Virginia Tech associate professor, who teaches a course on SDR. "They're tired of swapping out hardware. They would prefer to do software updates."

One SDR proponent is BellSouth Cellular, which has spent the last few years promoting the technology as a solution at both the base station and handset.

"In essence, it's sort of the computer model applied to wireless," said Stephen Blust, BellSouth Cellular senior manager of strategic technologies. "Today, when you want to do multiple modes and multiple bands, you 'Velcro' together pieces inside the phone to give you that capability. As long as you're in just a couple of bands or modes, it's not necessarily a bad way to go. But as the options expand beyond that and you begin to look at a global phone and some of those issues, then it does make a difference."

Blust is among those who want SDR in second-generation handsets as soon as 2000. SDR could get a boost from the growing demand for multiband, multimode and hybrid satellite-wireless phones.

"That's where the handset solution tends to fit better in the nearer term," said Blust, who also chairs the Software Defined Radio Forum. "Customers don't buy technology. They buy services and capabilities. We've got multiple standards. Let's find out how to use technology to make all those technologies transparent to the end user."

One of the more compelling reasons for SDR is that accommodating multiple protocols translates into new revenue streams from roaming fees.

"People aren't going to adopt software radios because they're a neat technology," said Blue Wave's Kokal. "They're going to adopt them because they answer some of the business problems they have."

Another of those problems is adding a protocol that offers more efficient use of spectrum but also requires major hardware upgrades.

"The real advantage to the operator is in life-cycle costs," Kokal said. "You don't save the money up-front, but, boy, can you save a lot in the future."

Just how much is difficult to pin down. As it debuts over the next few years, SDR equipment likely will cost at least as much as conventional hardware. But that investment might be offset by decreasing labor costs because upgrading means swapping more software than hardware. Another motivator is knowing that competitors won't be able to roll out new services as quickly or cheaply because they have to upgrade hardware.

SDR vendors also will be taking a risk, which they could leverage by offering attractive financing rates. They could afford to offer those rates because repossessed equipment could be reconfigured easily for another carrier that uses different protocols.

"There are a lot of angles that come up that aren't obvious at first glance," Kokal said.

Whether those angles are compelling enough to convince carriers to invest in bleeding-edge technology remains to be seen. But like programmable switches and IP-based networks, SDR could be an idea whose time is quickly coming.

"Several years ago, when you said SDR, you'd get blank stares and huhs?" Blust said. "Now, there's a lot more work in the field. It's almost a matter not of if but just when."