Portugal Telecom Inovação Approach Towards an Integrated

The traditional IN conceptual model (INCM) is being questioned regarding applicability to the next generation network infrastructure. Although the enormous efforts conducted by ITU-T to refine the INCM, trough successive capability sets (CS-1,2,3,and CS-4 on the move) it appears that the more flexible IETF proposed architectures and protocols are effectively being considered as an alternative. The key issue is related with the fact that the vision of a centralised network architecture where the Service Control Point owns the intelligence is no longer enough. Tomorrow networks will share the intelligence between the terminals, the network access devices, the softswitches, and multiple application servers with standardised interfaces for internal or external service support and provisioning. Starting with an overview of the traditional NGIN platform this document illustrates the steps given by Portugal Telecom Inovação, in order to be prepared for deployment of services for next generation networks. As an example the Internet Call Waiting and Completion service, developed on top of the NGIN+ targeted platform, will then be presented. I. THE NGIN PLATFORM The NGIN platform is a traditional IN platform (compliant with CS-1 revised) with components that cover the majority of the functional entities described in the IN conceptual model [1] namely: • a Service Control Function (SCF) that allows services to be executed on the platform • a Specialized Resource Function (SRF) which integrates with an Intelligent Peripheral (IP) used for user interaction (voice prompting and user data collection) • a virtual Service Switching Function (vSSF) which allows this architecture to be deployed on non-IN structured networks, by emulation of an SSF • a Service Creation Environment (SCE) based on the concept of Service Independent Building Blocks (SIB’s) • and of course provisioning tools dependent on the type of services deployed over the platform. The layout of the topology is based on centralized components, the Service Control Points (SCP’s), that by interaction with one or more Service Data Points (SDP’s) are responsible for service execution. The events responsible by service instantiation on top of this platform are exclusively SS7/INAP generated events. The NGIN solution is usually deployed over a high availability cluster with the necessary software and hardware component redundancy, to assure that in case of failure of one of the components it will not disturb the availability of the service [2]. Supported over NGIN platforms, and deployed in several countries (Portugal, Brazil, Morocco, Botswana, Cape Verde, Angola), several IN services for fixed and mobile networks are now operating, with particular emphasis on Prepaid Mobile services, with more than 6 million subscribers at the end of 2000. II. DRIVING FACTORS PUSHING IP/PSTN SERVICE