Web Services based SOA for Next Generation Telecom Networks

Summary form only given. Network operators are now on a journey towards a next generation network (NGN) built on horizontal "planes", moving away from traditional vertical structure networks for fixed voice and data communication networks. IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) is a part of wider network transformation to next generation (NG) networks. The IMS core network has a common IP based transport plane and a common signalling or control plane, and it can be accessed by different access networks. IMS provides a control layer based on an end-to-end based session initiation protocol (SIP) that can control a session and remain agnostic of the access network. This innovation in the telecom industry where more intelligence is moving to the edge, can be closely linked to another innovation in the IT industry, where applications are being rendered as re-usable components, or services as we may refer to them. Such components, when made available on the Web are referred to as Web services. IBM's service enablement solution in the NGN space is based on three strategic tenets. First of all, it makes use of the common IP transport plane and the Web services realization mechanism as a backbone for composite services within a single session. This would help network operators to generate revenue in a converged telecom network. Secondly, it uses Web services to automate the entire lifecycle of a service. This leads to automation of the service delivery platform (SDP), which in turn allows third party application providers to deploy services by using the services exposed by network provider. Finally, as premium composite services are deployed to the end user, he/she would have a higher quality of experience (QoE). IMS provides a per-subscriber control of QoS as part of QoE. As the subscriber uses various composite services, the IMS ability to control QoE/QoS, becomes a huge differentiator for IMS over just uncontrolled access over the Internet. In other words, IMS QoE encompasses QoS, enhanced GUI and IMS composite service, and not be just the experience of using the composite service. This paper discusses how IBM's SDP solution leverages SOA principles and uses a Web services based platform to implement composite services, addressing all stages of the service lifecycle - service creation, service deployment, service delivery and service management. We shall also discuss how this platform has been implemented in AT&T, USA