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Hosting an Interoperability Event

July 15, 2007 By Kfir Pravda 1 Comment

By Oren Libis

It is now final. My company will be hosting the next face-to-face interoperability event for the 3G-324M activity group on October 8-12, 2007. It has been a bit over a year since we hosted our last event and it seems like I am getting the hang of it.

As we are planning our next event, there is this shopping list of issues that we will be taking into consideration:

  • Location
    Need to find a big enough place to accommodate the group. A table for each company, with some space between them.
  • 3G coverage
    We have to make sure that there is good 3G coverage in the location of the event and that it can hold a capacity of 10 or more video calls simultaneously.
  • ISDN lines
    BRI and PRI. There are those that don’t have direct access to the 3G network, or those companies that would like to test their gateways, so we need to provide ISDN access as well.
  • Connectivity of 3G and ISDN
    Now that there are two separate networks (3G and ISDN), we must check that you can call from one to the other and vice versa.
  • Wireless LAN
    Everyone wants to use the internet during this week. Might as well provide good access to it.
  • Lunch
    The army walks on his stomach and engineers can’t think without sugar. We have to make arrangements for lunch each day – in different restaurants, with English menus.
  • Social event
    We’re hosting the event, so we need to give people some good time. Last year it was Jerusalem – this time it is still open. Any suggestions?

There are additional issues such as banners for the event, visa invitations, and restaurants for the evenings…

This event is definitely going to be around MONA call setup time, H.264 video codec and AMR-WB speech codec again, but I have a pretty good feeling that these should go even better than the last time for our group. I can’t wait to meet all of the guys here in Israel!

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About the writer: Kfir Pravda
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3G-324M – From Connectivity to Services

June 26, 2007 By Kfir Pravda 2 Comments

By Oren Libis

Today, 3G-324M is used for video telephony and it is deployed in Europe and Asia, and many many handsets. China is now joining the bandwagon as well, with their TD-SCDMA network.

At the IMTC, we have been covering the adoption of 3G-324M over the last several years, especially from the point of view of the handset. This includes interoperability testing between two points, each running 3G-324M. During that time, we focused on making sure that channels are opened properly, and that video codecs are negotiated reasonably. From there, we moved on to handling call setup time. Along the way, other technical issues were dealt with and solved.

Today, I feel confident that the technical issues of video calls between two handsets are solved. The level of interoperability we have achieved within our group is high. I am also quite impressed by the level of interoperability that the newest addition to the standard – H.324 Annex K (also known is MONA) enjoys. I had my doubts, but during the last SuperOp! event on April, I was able to interoperate quite well with several vendors – no small achievement for a new specification that several companies are implementing independently.

And this led me to think about what’s next in store for our Activity Group. 3G-324M is relatively limited. You can use it to open multiple multimedia channels between two points, and this is mainly used to execute video telephony calls. You can try adding text, adding more codecs or trying to increase the bandwidth, but I believe the next challenge for the 3G-324M AG will be services.

As 3G-324M is used by operators to offer interactive video services to customers, our primary concern should be making sure that 3G-324M is as flexible as possible for services. We already have basic calls up and running well. But there are other technical aspects that didn’t get as much attention as they needed. Deploying a video ring-back tone service, for example, is a technical challenge due to the way 3G-324M is defined. This is an issue that makes the deployment of such a service so expensive to operators. From my conversations with service providers, I believe that there are a lot more services that subscribers would like, but we don’t handle well enough. So we have our work cut out for us.

If you are an operator or if you are in the business of developing services for operators, I suggest you join the IMTC 3G-324M Activity Group. The time has come to make 3G-324M services a reality.

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About the writer: Kfir Pravda
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TD-SCDMA Video Telephony and Interoperability

June 15, 2007 By Kfir Pravda 2 Comments

By Oren Libis

In the IMTC 3G-324M Activity Group we handle interoperability for video telephony. The companies participating in this group focus on WCDMA, though other networks can be easily supported as well.

Recently, we have noticed that China is working more quickly on building its TD-SCDMA network building – most probably because of the Olympic Games planned for next year. TD-SCDMA also enables use of 3G-324M for video telephony like WCDMA – you get a 64kbps circuit switched connection in both directions of your call and you use it to transmit H.324 bit streams.

If we try to predict what’s in store for the TD-SCDMA industry, it seems like the IMTC can offer a lot to China in terms of experience with 3G-324M interoperability. We know the companies, the technology, and the facilities that test video telephony. We handled standardization when it was required and have seen more and more products conform to the 3G-324M standard and improve interoperability.

As TD-SCDMA embarks on its first steps as a live network, I am sure that vendors will face the same interoperability problems that we faced in the beginning of WCDMA. But this time, there are lessons to be learnt from our experience developing and deploying WCDMA handsets and services. My feeling is that interoperability between TD-SCDMA and WCDMA is also important.

I would like to invite all TD-SCDMA vendors out there to join us in the IMTC. Benefit from the vast experience we have accumulated and be part of our efforts to promote the use of 3G-324M in mobile handsets. There’s a lot of work to be done. We’re here to help.

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About the writer: Kfir Pravda
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IMTC Blog Author – Oren Libis, Co-Chairman of IMTC 3G-324M Activity Group

June 18, 2006 By Kfir Pravda Leave a Comment


Oren Libis is a veteran project manager and developer in the area of 3G, VoIP and multimedia streaming protocols and standardization. His experience includes project management and development, with a strong background in 3G-324M.

He actively promotes call setup time improvements and standards within the ITU-T framework and serves as co-chairman of the IMTC 3G-324M Activity Group. He was one of the original developers and holds several joint 3G-324M patents, including ACN and MONA call setup techniques, widely adopted by the mobile industry. As a senior project manager at RADVISION, Oren serves a large and growing number of 3G-324M handset manufacturers who deploy RADVISION technology. He can be reached at orenl@radvision.com.

About the writer: Kfir Pravda
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