Ericsson Unveils Mobile Triple Play Vision

Ericsson has unveiled its vision of a future where telephony, voice and broadcast as well as mobile and fixed-line networks have converged into a single infrastructure that gives consumers and businesses unprecedented levels of mobility and independence.

The company's vision, called "Mobile Triple Play," is underpinned by the rapid evolution of mobile technologies such as WCDMA and HSDPA. Under Mobile Triple Play, the cellphone becomes an indispensable hub connecting home and office devices and providing end-users with rich, multimedia services wherever they are.

Says Pieter van der Westhuizen, Key Account Manager, Global Account MTN, Market Unit sub-Saharan African at Ericsson, "Triple play is when we bring together telephony, Internet and broadcasted media, such as TV, in one common infrastructure. The same high bandwidth services that today are provided in fixed networks are demanded by consumers regardless of time and location - consumers want the independence that mobility offers and the same experience whether being at home, mobile or in the office."

Van der Westhuizen says that Mobile Triple Play will build on existing consumer behaviour, evident in the way that end-users make use of broadcast services and broadband connectivity. Mobile TV is already a reality in the form of broadcasted TV and on-demand TV shows that have been adapted to the mobile screen. Ericsson is currently developing mobile TV products based on 3G, both for broadcast and unicast.

The evolved version of WCDMA and HSDPA, offering mobile broadband with data rates similar to fixed broadband, will enable Mobile Triple Play in the same way as broadband technology enables triple play in the fixed network environment. Ericsson is working with leading operators in Africa to make Triple Play through mobile broadband possible for subscribers by the end of 2005

HSDPA should be launched for commercial use by the end of 2005, and trials are already underway at a number of operators worldwide. By the end of this year, the first HSDPA-enabled consumer devices, PC cards that give notebook users high-speed mobile Internet access of up to 3.6Mbps, should be widely available. HSDPA smartphones should follow in 2006.

"Ericsson's leading position in 3G and technology leadership has enabled an early advantage in HSDPA. Ericsson was the first to showcase live HSDPA over a commercial system and we further confirmed our leadership in HSDPA at the 3GSM World Congress in Cannes held earlier this year, where Ericsson demonstrated HSDPA running at speeds of 11Mbps," says van der Westhuizen.

Ericsson's IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) will form another core component of the Mobile Triple Play networks of the future. Evolution to all-IP service delivery is a natural step of both fixed and mobile communications and IMS is a key component of the long-term network evolution towards all-IP.

IMS provides a dynamic architecture in which new services can be added, expanded or removed in line with demand. It works across multiple fixed and wireless links, and provides a control layer between the transport and services layers, allowing end users to initiate multiple services from within a single communication session.

"Ericsson's mobile softswitch solution is the first step on the way towards an all IP-core network. By introducing mobile softswitch the operators can evolve smoothly towards IMS and all-IP while protecting their investments and cutting operating expenses by half," says van der Westhuizen."

Posted to the site on 7th June 2005