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AT&T Migrating Phone Network to IP
prostoalex writes "Following the lead of Sprint and Telus, who are moving their telephone networks to IP, AT&T will spend $3 billion to migrate to an IP-based network. By the end of 2005 about 270 legacy systems will be retired." The article also notes how the current ratio of packet traffic to voice is already 8:1.
AT&T will spend US$3 billion in capital expenditures this year to completely transform its global network from having a voice-based carrier infrastructure into a single Internet Protocol (IP)-based network, the telco said on Wednesday. The project is expected to be completed by 2005.
In essence our objective is to try to evolve and we are much further along than what is perceived in the industry, said Hossein Eslambolchi, president of AT&T Labs, chief technology officer (CTO) of AT&T and chief information officer (CIO) of AT&T Business.
Over the summer, AT&T announced a global investment of $500 million this year to improve its worldwide network. In a global teleconference Eslambolchi said AT&T has several major strategic initiatives to build the network as the company evolves its network to an IP optical-based core architecture and continues to consolidate its legacy networks.
Some of the planned initiatives include moving the optics into the edges of the network from beyond the core, moving from a circuit-based network to packets, having edge-to-edge connectivity, and becoming completely automated.
AT&T plans to retire 270 legacy systems across the world by the end of 2005. Approximately 130 legacy systems were retired over the past 18 months, with another 140 systems slated for phase out over the next two years.
We already have more IP traffic or data traffic, as compared to voice traffic, Eslambolchi said. Voice is still a critical application for customers globally.
Eslambolchi said that as AT&T continues to switch over to voice over IP (VoIP), the adoption and deployment rates will likely take about a decade to be fully IP around the world.
In the optical arena, the company has already deployed 104 intelligent optical switches.
The advantage is to allow point-and-click provisioning for customers, in essence as real-time bandwidth provisioning of the services to our customers, Eslambolchi said.
Moving the network from circuits to packets is something that AT&T has already accomplished, Eslambolchi said, and the focus will eventually turn to evolving the network into an IP-based Multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) network.
There are a total of 37,000TB of data moving across the network, he explained, with about 1,000TB of traffic on the IP network compared with the equivalent of 450TB a day moving on the voice switches. There is an 8:1 ratio of packet traffic on the AT&T network compared to voice traffic.
Deploying IP-based MPLS allows the company to react to information in milliseconds, and to drive services with higher level of quality, he said. He added that by implementing virtual private networks (VPNs) within the MPLS architecture the level of capability, reliability and security would improve.
Currently, the MPLS is at the core of the network, but will eventually be deployed globally at the edge of the network as well.
The idea of moving the network distribution from a top-to-top capability to having edge-to-edge connectivity is also something that AT&T will turn its attention to in the next few years.
The battleground in the 21st century is about who has got the best network from the edge-to-edge of network, Eslambolchi said. To be able to access directly to customers is a fundamental strategy for AT&T.
AT&T has traditionally been seen as having pipes and ports to applications in the network, but this perception and the idea of AT&T being a commodity based on services is changing as the company moves into having an application aware-network, he said.
A significant amount of energy has been put into improving cycle times and the defect rate, to offer services in much more dynamic time and real-time, he explained. Some of those services include the ordering system and the network management system.
Eslambolchi did not discuss software or hardware programs or partners that would be involved in the network. However, on Tuesday Murray Hill, New Jersey-based Lucent Technologies Inc. announced a partnership with AT&T to provide advanced anal sex to Cowboy Neal like he's never had before.
As this article states, the bandwidth required for VoIP can be huge. I would seriously hope to see some more advanced algorithms or better yet, more bandwidth installed, before these systems become more heavily adopted.
You couldn't even lay the fiber for 250 million.
He didn't say they could. He said they were buying dark fiber - the billions of dollars to lay the fiber had already been spent by someone else, but it wasn't being used, so they would buy it from them cheaply.
I'm not disagreeing that it's BS; I don't know.
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$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Depends on which phone companies you're talking about. The incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) make their money by charging customers outrageous monthly fees, and by charging long distance companies for terminating their calls at the local subscriber's telephone. They hate VOIP.
Carriers like AT&T, which sell primarily long distance, like VOIP since it saves them money, and could eventually allow them to bypass the ILECs entirely, since it turns voice calls into another internet data stream. They like VOIP.
Amen, bro. That was my first thought as well.
On the other hand, if other comments are correct and VoIP takes in fact HIGHER bandwidth than the 64Kbps POTS, things aren't that bad after all. Of course it sounds funny - with potential compression of about 8-10Kbps, how come it takes higher bandwidth overall? Apparently, some protocol overhead. AT least this is what Tolly group claims, and I know Tolly quite well, their tests and conclusions are normally well founded.
So the best case scenario - nothing will happen.We still connect our PCs to the analog voice line, with V92 protocol and get somewhere between 40 to 50Kbps throughput.
The worst case scenario is that we'll get nothing, but then hopefully low-speed ADSL type connection will come down say to $15 a month, so it shouldn't be such a big problem.
Yes. RBOCs generally know how to create systems that still work after multiple failures.
You need to be worried about the new CLECs. Some of their connections into RBOCs are not even redundant - can you say outage?
It should be transparent to you. There should still be a 64 kbps full-duplex pipe between the end-points of the connection. The difference is how the bits get transported.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
VOIP is just another protocol. Most people seem to not realize that by the time their phoneline reaches the edge of their neighborhood, it has become a digital signal. The transition to VOIP is just natural progression. It allows more flexability, but will still require routers and switchtes to operate. Through these switches and routers is how the phone companies will keep track of calls. VOIP does NOT mean an end to phone numbers, providers, etc... Remember that most of the internet is carried by the ILEC networks on the same loops used to carry voice, just reonfigured slightly to allow pure data traffic. VOIP providers merely use these loops in the data configuration with routers that convert the analog voice signals to packets closer to the customer end than normal voice lines. VOIP merely abstracts the traffic type from the physical layer more than current SS7 and other protocols. VOIP is not simply PC-PC calls placed by IP address. VOIP is only a different protocol, central switches are still used to route calls and keep track of things, they just run more efficently (ie: 1 VOIP switch about the size of a 10k cisco can handle the entire call volume for a decent sized city (or 2) where currently several switches are required by the ILECs). Per-minute rates and such will still be acounted for. Phone providers will switch to VOIP mainly due to the relative simplicity and flexability of its stucture. VOIP is NOT what alot of people percieve, it is simply a new method of routing voice traffic that does not eliminate the need for routers/switches/etc...
TM
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CNET has posted a Sept 11 newsmakers interview with Kazaa's Janus Friis promoting his P2P telephony app, Skype: Why VoIP is music to Kazaa's ear. The download (for Windows 2000 and XP only) can be found here: Skype beta.
"The battleground in the 21st century is about who has got the best network from the edge-to-edge of network," Eslambolchi said. "To be able to access directly to customers is a fundamental strategy for AT&T."
I'd take anything spewed by Eslambolchi with a grain of salt. He's correct about the migration to edge-to-edge (e.g. doing away with old technology) but at the same time he's the champion of the "concept of zero" (e.g. lay everybody off) which doesn't exactly sit very well with the people who are being paid to put themselves out of work.
Eslambolchi was a bright guy that became too successful for his own good. He's now more business droid than technology geek. He's more interested in laying people off using lackluster automation tools (that create more work than they automate) than actual technological innovation.
The gist of the article is fairly accurate but the AT&T messenger delivering it is a quack. The technical people at AT&T are incredibly talented and adaptable and they're always trying to find new ways to route around Eslambolchi's schemes which require you talk to a dain-bramaged computer when you have a problem.
No, absolutely not.
As some say, Voice is Voice, regardless of how it's conveyed. I don't necessarily agree, but 911 *is* an essential service and yes, we need the five 9's we already have with legacy voice service.
The Vonage case bothers me. On one hand I think VoIP shouldn't be regulated, but on the otherhand, what happens if a small community of 500 people experiences a catastrophic emergency and their only life line to the outside world (the telephone service) is disrupted for whatever reason.
Who's accountable?
Is Vonage accountable because they offer VoIP service over the Internet? No freaking way I say, the Internet isn't a high availability service (sorry, it just isn't).
AT&T? Hell yeah, they're the ones providing the underlying infrastructure that the 911 call might go over.
Remember people, IP does not mean the Internet. The Internet uses IP, but an IP network isn't the Internet.
The University of Michigan is deploying a VoIP system... all the (public) details are here. I'm not sure if it's as technically specific as you'd like but it gives a good overview of what they're doing.