The global telecoms community seems to have put its faith in IMS as a solution that will help bring together the telecoms and Internet worlds - fixed and mobile, voice and data, personal and enterprise - in a way that has not been possible to date.

Industry watchers also seem convinced that the future role of IMS is assured. For example, analyst firm Yankee Group has said, "In the next 18 months, carriers will implement IMS platforms largely for specific applications, creating beachheads for its market penetration. Beyond that, IMS will become a standard service environment for wireless operators and for creating converged mobile and fixed services."

Ericsson is leading the field in IMS technology, expertise and business-focused services and solutions, and intends to capitalize on that position as fixed and mobile operators around the world develop and roll out multimedia services.

What sets Ericsson apart from its competitors in the IMS sphere is the ability to provide a complete end-to-end IMS solution for both fixed and mobile operators. This makes Ericsson IMS a cornerstone for future converged networks, where end users will be able to access similar multimedia applications regardless of their device. The use of a single platform for both fixed and mobile networks is not a new concept. Ericsson's AXE switching system (the world's most widely-deployed), was designed for both fixed and mobile environments, although different application systems are used.

From an end-user perspective, the benefits of the Ericsson IMS multimedia offering are that it allows for several virtual phone lines over one broadband connection, and it enables the end user to have a richer communication experience through, for example, video telephony. Similarly, small and medium enterprises can use the IMS solution as a virtual hosted PBX, such as IP-Centrex. The benefit for the enterprise is that it gets full access to PBX services without having to own and maintain a PBX. In addition to the traditional PBX services, the enterprise also enjoys the same multimedia feature set as residential users.

Ericsson has already deployed its wireline IMS-based application package (Engine Multimedia) with a large wireline operator. The solution allows for the rapid introduction of revenue-generating multimedia services such as Instant Messaging and Video Telephony, and provides wireline broadband operators with the opportunity to offer bundled-service packages in addition to the bit-pipe connection.

In essence, the IMS solution helps bring Internet applications such as presence, buddy lists and peer-to-peer communications into the telecom world. Its implementation will signal a fundamental shift in the way telecom services are created and delivered, and will help bring about true fixed-mobile convergence for the next wave of multimedia applications.

The IMS standard has been defined by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP/3GPP2) and is being embraced by other standards bodies including ETSI/TISPAN for addition of more wireline-centric issues. It enables operators to deliver multimedia services based on IP and Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), which provides the standard signalling mechanism for all these services and is used to set up the different communication sessions.

IMS not only enables new IP-based multimedia communication services, it also enriches existing circuit-switched services. Over time, it will enable the same set of services to be available to users across different access networks and device types, with consistent look and feel and ease of use.

The standard supports multiple access types – including GSM/GPRS/EDGE, WCDMA, CDMA2000, wireline broadband access and wireless LAN. Furthermore, IMS can function in an access-aware network, so that services are adapted to the users’ current access network and bearer characteristics. It ensures that the calling and called parties service preferences interact to provide the best common experience for each session.

What does IMS mean for users?

Users today are more individualistic, independent, informed and involved than ever before, and they welcome services that appeal to their emotions as well as their practical needs. Multimedia communications services have a key role to play in meeting users' need to 'close the gap' between them - by making the communications experience much more like interacting face-to-face. IMS enables both exciting new multimedia services and enhancements to existing services that make them more personalized and immediate.

IMS-based services enable communications in a variety of modes – including voice, text, pictures and video, or any combination of these – in a highly personal and controlled way. IMS will help provide a seamless, consistent experience across multiple access technologies, devices and locations – whether wireline or wireless; narrowband, wideband or broadband; business or personal. It also enables subscribers to manage their accessibility – or their ’presence’ – better, so that they can control how, where, when and by whom they can be reached. (Ericsson ConsumerLab research has shown that users value simply being able to see in advance who they can contact, and how.)

One early example of an IMS-based service is the Push to Talk over Cellular (PoC) standard service that enables users to get in touch with individuals or predefined groups of users at the push of a button on their mobile handsets. Presence – seeing in advance who is available for a call – is an integral part of such push to talk services. The implementation of IMS-based PoC-standard push to talk will also enable handset diversity and reduce restrictions on available contacts (through interoperability).

Another interesting application that will drive revenue in the enterprise market is IP Centrex, also known as a virtual hosted PBX solution. Combining IMS multimedia services with IP Centrex can create advanced collaboration services suitable for targeting enterprises of all sizes. The combined solution will host a complete set of personal and group services, with the addition of multimedia support like video communication, conferencing, collaboration, presence management, instant messaging, integration with office Personal Information Management (PIM) systems and support for remote workers.

First-mover advantage

Ericsson is establishing a strong lead in the IMS market. While several vendors have announced their intention to develop IMS-based products, Ericsson is already shipping solutions based on the IMS architecture. Ericsson already has IMS deployments and trials with 25 fixed and mobile operators, for services such as Push to Talk over Cellular (PoC), Combinational Services, IP Telephony and IP Centrex.

As market analysts Current Analysis stated in a recent report, following a briefing from Ericsson, “Ericsson is demonstrating that it has established an early lead in the still emerging IMS market. The public airing of the company's product plans and roadmap provide evidence that the company is further advanced than most – if not all – competitors in the wireline space.

"Ericsson has demonstrated that it understands that the real opportunity in the IMS infrastructure market is not in the delivery of the piece parts of the infrastructure but in the consistent delivery of new applications and professional services.

"Ericsson is focusing much of its IMS strategy on service creation and professional services. Considering that service providers, especially wireline service providers, are still feeling their way around the IMS architecture, professional services are likely to play an important role in wireline/wireless convergence."

Ericsson recognizes that breaking down technical barriers is only part of the battle in delivering converged multimedia services. Service providers are looking for end-to-end solutions that tackle the business issues as well.

The IMS standard itself addresses the multimedia communications opportunity from an end-to-end perspective, from handset through network layers to system. It is clear that only a few suppliers will be able to deliver end-to-end solutions, and operators are forming relationships with a small number of partners that have these end-to-end capabilities.

Ericsson has defined a roadmap for evolving to an IMS-based infrastructure that enables operators to move to an access-aware environment with little or no impact on existing operations. At the same time, Ericsson are focusing on IMS-based service creation, and working with end-users to determine the types of services that consumers and enterprise users will find attractive and are willing to purchase. Having a developer’s kit tailored to IMS will increase the range of available services, reduce time to market and simplify the market entry of new application providers.

As one of the major players in mobile handsets (through Ericsson Mobile Platforms and the Sony Ericsson joint venture), Ericsson is able to offer a true end-to-end solution. This knowledge of consumer devices and applications gives us a knowledge base that few other competitors possess.

It is important that IMS vendors can support multi-vendor network environments, integrate into existing networks and interwork with different vendors’ terminals. Standardization solves some of these issues, while vendor competence in supporting evolution and in building and integrating complete solutions solves others. Having a deep understanding of consumer needs, networks, the mission critical systems, and the interfaces between different layers are key competencies.

Migration starts here and now

For fixed and mobile operators, there are benefits to be gained from introducing IMS into their networks today, together with longer-term benefits of a secure migration path to all-IP architecture that will meet end-user demands for new enriched services.

IMS not only provides a standardized, well-structured way to take advantage of horizontalization, legacy interworking and convergence. It is also an enabler for significant cost savings and performance improvements, through the integrated delivery of multimedia communications services, the bringing together of fixed and mobile operations, and the creation of a single infrastructure for voice and data. Above all, IMS provides a future-proof architecture that simplifies and speeds up the service creation and provisioning process.

The horizontal architecture of IMS enables operators to move away from vertical 'stovepipe' implementations of new services – eliminating the costly and complex traditional network structure of overlapping functionality for charging, presence, group and list management, routing, operation and maintenance and provisioning.

Along with PoC standard services for mobile implementations, there are (or soon will be) IMS-based IP Telephony, IP Centrex and supplementary services for wireline broadband implementations. Other multimedia services such as Combinational Services that combine voice and different media streams will follow.

With an IMS solution for wireline implementations, an operator can directly offer IP Telephony, while also using IMS’ key building blocks (the common functions and service enablers) to enrich the IP Telephony service with multimedia capabilities such as videoconferencing, presence management, buddy lists and instant messaging.

The possibilities for future multimedia communications services are endless. On the mobile side there are already ongoing standardization around the concept of combinational services – which enable users to add different types of media, such as pictures or video clips, during an ongoing call.

IMS offers an unprecedented opportunity for fixed and mobile operators to take advantage of horizontal network architecture in a service-oriented, revenue-focused way. It represents a vital key to unlocking the market for multimedia services by enabling emerging technologies to work together in a user-centric way. Ericsson is one of the few vendors able to bring together the products, services and expertise to create end-to-end IMS solutions.