Written by: Håkan Eriksson, Senior Vice President, Chief Technology Officer, and head of Group Function Technology

Full Service Broadband will deliver any service you want to the screen of your choice, regardless of whether you are using fixed or mobile access. In technical terms, this means access using GPON, VDSL or both over fiber and copper for fixed access, and HSPA, LTE or both for mobile access.

While keeping fixed and mobile access separate, Fixed Mobile Convergence (FMC) enables you to reach the same services, over the same All-IP Network (controlled by the same IP Multimedia Subsystem, IMS) regardless of whether you use fixed or mobile access. Sometimes you will even use the same terminal in both environments - for example, when you use a laptop with built-in WiFi for fixed access via ADSL or built-in HSPA for mobile access.

By "screen of choice" we mean the large plasma screen you have at home - for example, for high-definition IPTV (most likely delivered over GPON); your laptop - for example, for browsing the internet (most likely delivered over LTE); and your mobile phone - for example, for mobile TV or music downloads (most likely delivered over HSPA).

To make this possible at a reasonable cost, we need economy of scale, which can solely be achieved with a standardized approach and using standards that can be employed to solve more than one problem. IP is one example of a standardized approach.

While telecom applications have long been known for their reliability, quality, security and interoperability, thanks to robust protocols developed over many years, the move to IP poses new challenges with respect to these established traits. The only standard that has been developed to ensure interoperability as well as ease of implementing new applications is IMS. While the name highlights its applicability to multimedia, there are two other "multi" aspects that are equally important, namely multivendor and multi-operator, which ensure interoperability. Carefully standardized APIs make certain that designers of new applications need not have detailed knowledge about the entire IMS specification. The article Communication Services - The key to IMS service growth describes this in greater detail.

There has been considerable discussion about what the killer application for 3G will be - but this question has never been raised for ADSL. The answer is as obvious as when telephony went mobile. The only difference is that, now, broadband is going mobile. The clearly dominating standard in Mobile Broadband is HSPA. This standard is constantly evolving with more and more features and enhancements that yield ever-greater performance. You can read more about this in HSPA Evolution - Boosting the performance of mobile broadband access.

With triple play (telephony, internet and TV) going mobile (sometimes referred to as Mobile Triple Play or quadruple play) we see the need for an efficient and standardized solution for mobile TV. Some solutions are vertical, dedicated mobile TV solutions. Ericsson, however, recommends that mobile TV be built as an application on Mobile Broadband to give greater flexibility and economy of scale. HSPA combined with MBMS gives the most flexible and cost-effective solution for mobile TV. If this interests you, you'll want to be sure to read Mobile TV over 3G networks - Service and enablers evolution.

And while Mobile Broadband is very much a mobile version of Fixed Broadband, we must also acknowledge some differences, especially when the device in use is not a laptop but rather a mobile phone. Internet applications often rely on the ability to download applications or clients to a PC or laptop. Thanks to standardized Java interfaces this in now also possible on mobile phones. See MIDP3 - Mobile device media power train, which discusses this topic in some detail.

When it comes to internet applications, the difference between mobile phones and PCs is not solely technical. Indeed, user behavior and user expectations also differ. The article Chat on a phone, not a PC clone: IMS-based mobile community services illustrates this aspect, by reporting on research Ericsson has done in this area.

As we all know, the role of technology is to enable user applications, where chat is but one of many examples. In Ericsson's User Service Performance Framework we present what we are doing to ensure that the network performs in accordance with predefined KPIs, designed and defined to meet user expectations.

Finally, we must acknowledge that even though ours is generally regarded as a relatively environmental friendly industry, telecommunications do in fact contribute CO2 emissions. Ericsson has taken an innovative approach to the entire life cycle of our products and services. In Reducing CO2 emissions from mobile communications - BTS Power Savings and Tower Tube you can read about Ericsson's power-reduction features in the BTS and our complete and innovative concept for building telecom sites.