Ovum: BT appoints Alcatel as principal contractor for enterprise FMC

Jeremy Green and Richard Mahony at Ovum write that "Alcatel has been announced as the prime contractor for BT's enterprise fixed-mobile convergence (FMC) service, to be launched in Q1 2007. The service will make use of dual-mode WiFi/GSM phones, and will be based on SIP rather than UMA."

Green and Mahony state that "BT's appointment of Alcatel should come as no surprise. The French vendor is already the integrator for BT's UMA-based consumer and small business FMC solution, Fusion, which was launched last summer. Alcatel is also one of eight suppliers involved in BT's 21st Century Network (21CN), and the new FMC service is one of the first to be based on the new network's capabilities."

They find it surprising that even though the product is not yet ready, "BT has disclosed a surprising amount of detail. It will be a centrex-like solution, hosted in the BT network, but capable of being integrated with the enterprise's own PBXs. BT will launch with the capability to interwork with the dominant suppliers - Nortel, Avaya and Cisco were all mentioned - with others to be added later."

Green and Mahony add, "the dual-mode devices will be capable of being addressed by either a cellular number or a fixed extension number - and there is the option to use both numbers. The presence capabilities of the 21CN, together with information from the HLRs of BT's MVNO mobile network partner Vodafone, will be used to route calls over the cheapest network, and to ensure that MT calls don't have to 'trombone' via the PBX when the mobile is registered on the GSM network. Calls will be carried over the WiFi network whenever coverage is available, and calls between two devices both registered on WiFi will be free. The devices will also work over end-users' home WiFi networks, and BT will try to add hotspot coverage as soon as possible.

Green and Mahony conclude that "BT expects to work with device manufacturers and Alcatel to develop FMC client software. Interestingly, the company does not seem to be daunted by delays in standardising voice call continuity in 3GPP, which other prospective suppliers have told us are holding up efforts to ensure that handover between GSM and WiFi can be supported. At launch, says BT, the service will support handover from the WiFi network to the public mobile network, but not in the other direction; users coming into WiFi coverage will continue their calls on GSM."