Pipeline Publishing, Volume 4, Issue 7

	This Month's Issue:
	On The Horizon

The Next Chapter for Fall VON

By Trevor Hayes

Everyone I talked to at VON in Boston agreed that VON was somewhat quieter than usual. Some blamed Halloween: anyone with children, grandchildren or other tiny relatives would feel obliged to stay at home and celebrate with family. This was news to me: a pumpkin in Boston looks pretty much like a pumpkin at home. Not that there were many pumpkins on the floor of the VON expo. The crowd was somewhat thin on the ground too, compared to previous VONs.

Jeff Pulver deserves a lot of credit for starting the VON show series. The early VON shows were polemical. They helped to raise VoIP consciousness and played a part in driving VoIP more into the mainstream. Now that IP and SIP have become mainstream technologies, there are sessions on these and related topics at every telecom trade show. Many of the same vendors turn up in booths at all of these events. In a crowded trade show market, events need some distinctive features and a well-defined community to serve.

In its early days, VON provided a great VoIP forum – where else could you go to discuss these things? Even now, in its more grown-up and staid manifestation, VON still stands up quite well as a venue for networking and getting some sense of where the industry is going. Yet, the people I talked to tended to agree on at least one thing: by contrast with the VON of only a couple of years ago, the show is no longer the unique forum it once was: is it evolving into just another trade show?

I asked a few delegates and exhibitors what they found exciting at this Fall VON. “Not much,” was the usual answer. But was there food for thought? Yes, because even if the show was rather staid, people in this industry can always think up something interesting to talk about. Prompted by VON sessions, or by random conversations with VON attendees, I’ve picked out several topics that I found interesting.

People (at VON) are still talking a lot about fixed mobile convergence. Carriers still see FMC as a revenue opportunity, or at least a loyalty factor. Consumers really would like to have one number, multiple devices – and lower bills, which sort of goes against the revenue opportunity idea. FMC is worth money to businesses, but this seems to be being delivered by third party applications deployed within the enterprise rather than by the carriers. Consumers, if they’re smart and have nothing better to do, can also build their own FMC, after a fashion, and save a few dollars, but most probably can’t be bothered. Some people find it hard to keep their Facebook profile up to date, never mind restructuring their personal communications ecosystem using all that VoIP/SIP stuff. Now if Apple would sell it in a shiny white box, that would be different.

In its early days, VON provided a great VoIP forum – where else could you go to discuss these things?

Do femtocells enable FMC? Even after attending the VON session, I’m not too sure. Femtocells are small mobile cell sites in a box (not necessarily white and shiny) that mobile carriers hope people will install within their homes and offices. Each femtocell is connected to the outside world via the customer’s own broadband Internet access. The panel at the femtocell session seemed to agree that there are distinctly different regional drivers for femtocell deployment. In the U.S., the case for femtocells seems to be based on the need to boost within-building reception. (In other words, the phone companies haven’t built enough cell sites to deliver reasonable signal strength inside every home and office.) In Europe it is more about delivering 3G data services. (In other words European companies spent too much on 3G licenses so they’ve economized on backhaul.) In Asia, it’s about filling in gaps in rural and low-income areas. (Those people already have broadband?) No one talked much about delivering compelling new levels of seamless FMC, which may not be as easy as it sounds.

Cellular companies all over the world love the idea of femtocells. Femtocells, from the wireless carriers’ perspective must be a good thing if they reduce capital and operational costs and increase customer stickiness, all at the same time. But so far, the story is all about why the cellular operators want femtocells. The trick will be to actually make customers want these things, and maybe even pay for them.

Every show I go to, I hope that someone will explain how IMS is more than the sum of its parts. No luck this time, once again. Not that the individual parts – SIP, for example – aren’t useful. But what – over and above those constituent parts – is this thing called IMS? Life is too short to work that out. Childishly, I’d like a child’s guide.

PBXs are much easier to understand. Unfortunately according to Bill Gates, as reported recently in Network World, the PBX is dead. With a whole area of the VON floor

article page | 1 | 2 |

© 2006, All information contained herein is the sole property of Pipeline Publishing, LLC. Pipeline Publishing LLC reserves all rights and privileges regarding
the use of this information. Any unauthorized use, such as copying, modifying, or reprinting, will be prosecuted under the fullest extent under the governing law.