FMC: Different Strokes for Different Folks

Summary

Issue

FMC is hot and topical - but, what exactly do we mean by 'FMC'? What is it, who will it benefit, and which technology should operators back? Multiple FMC technologies have emerged in recent months, but what ones will be chosen to generate future business services?

Current Perspective

FMC is neither a single technology, nor a single 'approach,' but an ever-expanding universe of vendor-driven solutions targeting a multitude of billable access opportunities. Given all the industry fanfare of late, it's easy to forget that FMC is also a market in its infancy, with an as-yet-undefined potential for evolution and service development. Technical obstacles abound, not least of all, the lack of dual-mode WLAN/GSM handsets and interoperability standards, as well as the more 'soft' obstacles: end user discomfort with unproven technologies, the dearth of case studies from which to extrapolate realistic TCO models, and a widespread enterprise mistrust of hype. Despite these problems, an FMC landscape of alternative products and solutions is slowly starting to emerge.

For the purposes of this analysis, we will define FMC as a solution which attempts to push voice and/or data between fixed and mobile networks in a single exchange. To this end, we've identified six different approaches to FMC: CTP (Cordless Telephony Profile), UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access), SIP over WLAN, Software-based Data FMC, PBX Mobility Extensions and Hosted Mobile PBXs. Each FMC type demonstrates a different set of characteristics which will help define sector appropriateness initially.

FMC: Sector-appropriateness

Each of the above solutions has distinct strengths and weaknesses (listed below in Table 1: FMC Approaches), which, to some extent, determine sector-appropriateness. In the short-to-mid-term, we'll see providers index these strengths and weaknesses against the distinct demands of customer sub-sets. In the mid-term, operators may look to mix-and-match technologies to target the enterprise user in a wider selection of environments, or create hybrid solutions out of two or more of the below (for early examples of this approach, see analysis below). The immediate future of FMC is segmentation into differentiated sector propositions. However, there are likely to be some quite wide margins for innovation into the mid-term, in which service developers, rather than technology vendors, will take the lead in evolving composite propositions to target the business user 'everywhere.'

Table 1: FMC Approaches

FMC Solutions	Background	Strengths/Weaknesses
CTP (Cordless Telephony Profile)	Short-range wireless standard limited to the Bluetooth air interface. Allows a Bluetooth-enabled mobile phone to carry voice/data to a Bluetooth access point, comparable, in many respects, to DECT. Like UMA, CTP is sometimes touted as an interim solution to IMS-based FMC. However, the technology is vastly overshadowed in Europe by UMA. Services: Korea Telecom’s One Phone, launched Q2 2004 with Samsung handsets: Cheap calling within range of Bluetooth access point, cellular calling outside.	Key weaknesses:  • Limited to Bluetooth air interface  • Lack of support from European service provider community
UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access), also known as GAN (Generic Access Network)	A 3GPP-backed short-range wireless specification for the transfer of voice/data from licensed (cellular) spectrum to unlicensed (WiFi, Bluetooth) via dual-mode GSM/WLAN handsets, over a WiFi hub installed in the office/home. Like CTP, UMA is often touted as an interim solution to IMS (although others insist it represents a ‘stepping stone’ to IMS). Unlike CTP, which is limited to the Bluetooth air interface, UMA can be used with ‘any’ unlicensed air interface, such as Bluetooth, WiFi or others. Europe’s first ‘FMC’ voice service launched in 2005, BT Fusion, using UMA with Bluetooth. Vendors: Kineto Wireless, Motorola, Nokia, Ericsson. Pipeline services: TeliaSonera’s OnePhone, T-Mobile US, Telecom Italia, Rogers Wireless.	Key strengths:  • Can be deployed ahead of IMS implementation  • Offers cheaper tariffs within designated home or office ‘zone’  • Implicit cost-savings in pushing voice traffic over IP (cable/DSL)  • Offloads mobile operator traffic  • Solves problems when exterior mobile signals fail to penetrate inside structure Key weaknesses:  • Dependency on supply of dual-mode WLAN/GSM handsets as a mobile voice solution  • Lack of scale for dual-mode handsets likely to keep pricing high  • Can only allow for three simultaneous voice calls  • No voice over data packet prioritization  • Unproven migration with IMS strategies  • Additional CPE equipment investment (hub in home/office)
SIP over WiFi	A logical progression from CTP and UMA. Allows the transfer of voice/data over any WiFi access point via SIP protocol from a dual-mode handset. Unlike UMA/CTP solutions, SIP over WiFi FMC solutions have a far wider mobility proposition, encompassing IMS deployments. Services: neufCegetel’s Beautiful Phone. Pipeline services: BT’s Enterprise FMC, T-Com’s One Phone.	Key strengths:  • Ability to port calls to any SIP client: IP phone, softphone, WLAN/GSM phone with SIP client  • More natural fit with carrier IMS strategies  • More easily embellished with PBX call management features  • Offloads mobile operator traffic  • Solves problems when exterior mobile signals fail to penetrate inside structure Key weaknesses:  • Dependency on supply of dual-mode WLAN/GSM handsets as a mobile voice solution  • Service provider must define WLAN PoP applicability  • Additional CPE equipment (hub in home/office)
PBX Mobility Extension	Allows end users to access IP PBX functionality from 2G or 3G mobile device, as well as desk phone – allows vendors/users to ‘mobilize’ existing solutions. Solution providers: Avaya, Nokia, OnRelay, Telepo, Traverse Networks, Ascendent Systems/RIM, Ericsson, Cisco.	Key strengths:  • Less dependence on the supply of dual-mode handsets with a far larger range of handsets in the short-to-mid term  • Call-back variants allow for substantial voice roaming cost-savings  • Provides vendors with useful migration argument for IP PBX sale  • No substantial CPE investment  • Allows enterprise to leverage existing IP PBX assets for additional 'mobility' productivity gains Key weaknesses:  • Limited in the number of call management options available in comparison with full PBX system  • Market still in development  • Proprietary solutions  • Vulnerable to indoor mobile radio signal reception problems
Hosted Mobile PBXs	Mobile Centrex-like solution, allows an enterprise to outsource telephony functions (fixed and mobile) to a third party/carrier. Marketed as an alternative to PBX telephony systems for remote offices in which the installation and maintenance of a separate PBX system is seen as too costly. Vendors: Broadsoft, Speakanet, Sylantro.	Key strengths:  • Especially good at addressing small/remote office requirements  • Up-front costs in deploying solution  • Offers standard PBX functionality Key weaknesses:  • Largely unproven business model/proprietary solutions  • Weaker call cost-cutting proposition  • Difficult sale  • Does not solve indoor radio capacity or reception problems
Software-based RAS	This approach to FMC is a work in progress. In the last three to four years, global service providers have developed their own proprietary client software to allow an end user to access a wide array of bearers: Dial, Ethernet, DSL, WiFi and cellular UMTS/CDMA/EDGE from a single device. Benefits from the fact that most laptops today already feature embedded WiFi, and can be utilized with an external cellular data card. Services: BT Global Services (MobileXpress), Orange Business Services (Business Everywhere), AT&T (Enterprise Mobility), iPass (iPassConnect), Fiberlink (Extend 360) and Verizon Business (Enterprise Mobility).	Key strengths:  • Clear market requirement for a multi-bearer approach to remote access  • Easy fit with ‘Software as a Service’ model  • Easy to administer, easy to use Key weaknesses:  • End user security concerns: requirement for endpoint management for mobile fleet

Future FMC Services

Many of the above technologies have already 'made it' into service portfolios. BT Retail is currently marking its UMA-based FMC product, BT Fusion, for consumers. PBX vendors such as Avaya and Ascendent/RIM are marketing services which extend PBX features to the mobile workforce. All the key global carriers today offer a RAS product. FMC is with us today, but how will these early FMC pioneer services develop?

We believe that the industry's insistence on linking FMC technologies to sector-specificity may be misplaced, and that service providers which insist on pigeon-holing technologies as 'consumer' or 'SME' propositions are underestimating their competitors' capacity for product innovation. Clearly, technologies and solutions can be tailored to meet the competitive prerogatives of the provisioning party. The clearest example of this is the way in which UMA is widely viewed as a consumer-centric affair. Certainly, most UMA pilots today are being developed for residential applications, but that's largely because UMA's key advocate, BT, initially chose to set into motion a consumer-centric business model. Market watchdogs tout the lack of PBX-like call management capabilities and handoff between multiple WLAN access points as evidence of its inappropriateness as an enterprise solution, yet this isn't entirely fair to the technology.

UMA is potentially capable of supporting both features, yet BT chose to furnish its flagship UMA product (BT Fusion) without either. However, this is not an unalterable course. Although the industry expects that PBX-centric solutions will take the lead in provisioning FMC in the enterprise, it isn't entirely unfeasible to imagine such a solution in competition with a range of several different FMC voice technologies (e.g., UMA-based FMC, PBX Mobility Extensions and VoIP-enabled Data Software RAS) for large corporate business at some point in the future. What's more likely, however, is that these various approaches will start to be seen as complementary. In Europe, we're already seeing examples of the way in which providers are starting to think of these distinct technologies as potential 'hybrids' - a 'convergence' of convergence solutions.

It's fair to say that convergence today is happening on many different levels within the communications industry. Solutions, technologies and services are 'converging,' but so are customer-facing support teams, product development teams and portfolios. Carriers with multiple network assets (e.g., Orange Business Services and Telecom Italia) are looking to fold their operations together to target business users as 'integrated operators' within their respective footprints. Others (e.g., BT, Vodafone, COLT) are looking to 'partner' with network operators to flesh out their portfolios. All these players are seeking to evolve into 'Total Communications Providers,' to wring the maximum revenue out of the enterprise, whilst simultaneously putting loyalty 'hooks' into the enterprise through the provision of multiple services. FMC is a reflection of this new industry 'single-sourcing' prerogative.

On another level, our lives are converging. One side-effect of 'mobility' is that a growing proportion of the workforce is undertaking work assignments outside of the office environment, and that includes 'the home.' Today's FMC solution landscape tends to be fragmented, with clearly-defined relevance to these distinct locations. UMA-based solutions such as BT Fusion target consumers at home. PBX Mobility Extension solutions seek to extend PBX features to workers in the wide-area, future SIP over WLAN voice FMC solutions are expected to target enterprises looking for 'campus roaming' services. However, one key opportunity for the Total Communications Provider lies in its ability to target a business user 'everywhere,' via multiple bearers, and it is no co-incidence that integrated portfolios are now demonstrating a keener appreciation of the importance of physical location. Increasingly, service provider portfolios are starting to segment into three areas, with solutions for workers 'in the office,' 'in the wide-area' and 'in the home.'

We believe FMC services will evolve in such a way to cut across these distinct environments. But there are already one or two early signs that service providers are looking to bundle and integrate distinct technologies to target users across these territories. In France, Orange Business Services Business Everywhere users can deploy this RAS solution in tandem with a WLAN LiveBox at home, a flagship residential solution for the provider. In this example, the LiveBox becomes a connectivity option for the Business Everywhere user at home. This approach seeks to provide a solution to meet a growing social reality - the steady erosion of the traditional divide between 'office' and 'home' (or, put another way, the home environment as an extension of the office). In another example, BT is looking to align its SIP over WLAN FMC Enterprise product, set for pilot rollout later in the year, with its flagship software-based RAS Solution (MobileXpress), to allow large corporates and MNCs a single interface for both multi-bearer access and a VoIP SIP client for voice calls on the road, or indeed, at home.

Future business-focused FMC solutions could start to exhibit technology composites, to allow service providers to identify and capture revenue from a wider selection of billable working scenarios. To this end, FMC, more than any other communications technology before it, will allow the industry to explore and exploit new realities in work-life today. Future FMC services represent a wide-open opportunity for providers to innovate to this end.

Recommended Actions

Vendor Actions

. All RAS providers should consider adding a 'home connectivity' option to their multi-bearer remote access portfolios - taking as a blueprint, for example, the alignment of Orange Business Solutions' Business Everywhere with LiveBox connectivity at home.

. Attempts to push UMA into the business market - even for small SOHO deployments - will be a difficult sell without the inclusion of a few basic call management features, such as short-code dialing. The anticipated arrival of homezone-as-business services (homezone SIM + Mobile VPN + value-added service bundles) in Europe over the next few months will exacerbate competition for business-appropriate, 'zone'-based mobile services.

. Global Mobility providers (BT Global Services, AT&T, iPass, etc.) should consider aligning SIP over WiFi FMC solutions with their own global mobility RAS solutions (MobileXpress, Enterprise Mobility, and iPassConnect, respectively). The introduction of voice mobility (VoIP) with data-centric RAS is an obvious next step for this market.

. Providers shouldn't feel shy about mixing 'FMS' and 'FMC' strategies. Propositions managers, especially, should listen carefully to enterprise requirements - sometimes, the simpler, all-mobile voice solution may be the most appropriate.

User Actions

. Small businesses looking for a 'zone'-based solution such as FMC UMA are advised to wait the market out for SIP over WLAN solutions to appear. This 'second generation' of dual-mode WLAN/GSM solutions will be better tailored to business requirements.

. Businesses looking at 'homezone'-style all-mobile solutions as an alternative to FMC UMA solutions should be aware of the limitations of cellular performance in steel-enhanced office buildings. End users should first demand a trial period.

. Large enterprises interested in FMC solutions should be realistic in their deployment schedules. The supply of dual-mode handsets and related technological glitches make SIP over WLAN FMC an unrealistic proposition for this year.

. All end users should question their provider closely about their device management (or 'End-Point Management') capabilities. Mobilizing the enterprise opens up a whole new can of security worms.

Mission: to be the voice of the customer for the evolution of Wireless Broadband and Convergence.

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