[VL2006] - 77: There Goes the Cellular Neighborhood . .
ViewsLetter on VoIP
vl2006 at ViewsLetter.com
Thu Feb 18 14:32:22 EST 2010
VL on VoIP <www.viewsletter.com>
*There Goes the Cellular Neighborhood*
By William Flanagan
Did you notice?
It wasn't a big bang, just a mixed series of product introductions,
service announcements, and speeches that appear to point the way for the
voice network of the future.
* If you want fast Internet access on fiber to your premises, be
prepared to give up powering your phone from the central office
battery and settle for 99.9% uptime rather than the "five nines"
of the PSTN (Verizon FIOS). The difference is about 8 hours per
year of outage.
* Carriers who resisted voice over frame relay recently agreed with
equipment makers on a standard for handling voice over IP on 4G
(LTE) /*data*/ networks (Voice over LTE, VoLTE; GSM Association).
* The telephone company that isn't a telecommunications service is
working with Verizon to put an always-on VoIP client on cell
phones that can use a 3G or 4G data plan for worldwide voice calls
(Skype).
* 4G radio service--either LTE, WiMAX, or both--will soon cover the
globe with enough capacity for a video feed to every phone at once
(thus providing bandwidth for a few billion phone calls, too).
* SIP trunking gains respect as an enterprise service.
The common thread is that each item depends on Voice over IP. Each item
reinforces the others. The trend to "all IP" is, if possible, /gaining/
momentum. Ten years ago I didn't consider an IP network suitable for
everything, particularly not voice telephony. Now the standards have
developed, network capacity is vastly increased, and a new generation of
users values mobility above reliability.
So here's a take on where we're going.
The avalanche of traffic moving to IP networks (including MPLS and their
supporting Layer 1 optical components) likely will sweep away not only
circuit switching for voice but also the POTS land line. Why pay to
install and maintain copper loops any more? The upside for speed over
copper, despite the leaps in DSL performance, will never exceed the
capacity of 4G wireless. What carrier really wants to pay to power those
stationary lumps of low functionality called desk phones? Eventually
what we've heard for years will be true: There's no real need for a
dedicated voice network; voice is just another form of traffic on the IP
network. Voice (and real-time video conferencing) will need low latency
so the network will have to prioritize these packets, but we know how to
do that.
Why put in any cable, even fiber, if 4G radio links can provide adequate
capacity and acceptable availability? Instead, drop in a picocell/WiFi
router, with an LTE/WiMax uplink, for phone, fax, Internet, TV, gaming,
burglar/fire alarm, etc. The very product showed up while I wrote this
edition: http://www.greenpacket.com/dl_devices.html. Some devices will
have their own 4G radios/modems.
Truck roll? Let the customer buy and activate the picocell like a cell
phone. Repairs? Bring the device into the phone store to swap for a new
one. That will be hard on the unions.
Legacy Cellular? Yeah, it will hang on, the way circuit switching did. A
few people will use it because they like the simple 2-function handsets
with the large numbers on the screen. HSPDA will be enough from many
machine-to-machine applications.
E911? GPS in the picocell or the handset tracks locations, stationary or
mobile. This service will require additional infrastructure to route
calls to the proper answering point.
Long distance? How the world has changed. Recall that AT&T, when forced
into divestiture, had the choice between Long Lines and the Local
Exchange Carriers. They chose to stick with LL--oops. The AT&T name
survives today only because the LEC that bought it chose to keep the name.
Costs of cell phone plans today are determined almost completely by the
number of minutes of local air time. Distance no longer matters within
the US. Skype on a phone does almost the same for international calling.
So what's the future business model for long haul transmission? Perhaps
it will look like some other forms of transport:
* Early highways in the US started as private tollways. A few still
operate that way, but most roads (including toll roads) are owned
and maintained by some governmental body.
* Subways in New York City and many other locations started as
entrepreneurial enterprises, generating profits for their owners.
During hard times, profits stopped; owners walked away or ceded
the "lines" to the government.
Let's make some assumptions about the future: all transport is IP; net
neutrality on the Internet requires equal access to all comers; LECs are
based almost entirely on IP over wireless local loops. Won't that make
the Internet the natural (least expensive) choice for backhaul from
"cellular" base stations? Most of the traffic will be "Internet" or
data, much more than voice. There might be some extra margin in charging
more for prioritized voice/video packets, but the bulk of traffic (data)
won't need that level of service.
Will any private corporation want to bother with LD? Even today,
carriers contend that net neutrality will make the Internet
unprofitable. If true, carriers could decide to sell their long haul
facilities. The buyer of last resort? Some new government or non-profit
agency set up to run the public Internet. Carriers could lease back
capacity for base station backhaul. The new "public corporation" will
restore the concept of "common carrier" to telephone service.
A few carriers would probably keep a private wide area network, to offer
premium services. But it would be a content distribution service, rather
than a telephone company.
Hey you copper thieves! Bring it on! You're making way for the future.
Just leave my neighborhood alone until 4G is fully deployed.
NEXT ISSUE: provisioning VoIP as a service.
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