The evolution of the New Generation Intelligent Network (NGIN) driven by the new technology standards, brings more openness, addresses effectively the new Telco market business models and allows CSPs to reduce significantly OpEx and CapEx as compared to legacy IN solutions. NGIN allows for voice and data services to be delivered over multiple networks, enabling convergence and providing users a seamless experience. Featured Article Intracom Telecom INTERVIEW newsletter September 2011

1. Introduction
The telco explosion during the 90’s,
characterized by rapid technological
change, evolving industry standards and
changes in customer requirements as
well as the deregulation of markets, has
stimulated the demand for sophisticated
telecommunication Value Added services.
Increasing competition forced operators
to focus on the timely delivery of attractive
communication services. At that time,
Intelligent Network (IN) was introduced
to meet this objective, generating new
sources of revenue for Communication
Service Providers (CSPs).
IN is not a network; it is rather an
architecture which separates the
“service logic” and associated data from
the telephony network, enabling the
establishment of an open layer for uniform
applications creation, deployment and
management. It is attributed to the need
of telecom operators to offer quick,
flexible and cost-efficient telco oriented
applications controlled and administrated
centrally.
The first drop of IN services (Number
Translation) focused mainly on
the development of the necessary
“intelligence” required to launch new
business models like free of charge (800)
or shared cost numbers (801), primarily
targeting small/medium business
customers. The use of non-geographical
“easy to memorize” access numbers
nationwide, enabled a new set of “smart”
routing methods on top of the new
advanced charging options. For example,
Pizza x is accessible through a single 800
number dialed by all users in Greece;
Freephone IN service logic connects the
user to the closest Pizza shop, located
near home.
The telco market really embraced the new
services. The new business models were
widely adopted as an excellent marketing
tool, allowing a small or medium-size
company to be promoted with minimum
investment.
NGIN: The Intelligent Transformation
The Explosion
Although Number Translation services
continued with more and more advanced
routing and charging options over the
years, the big IN boost will come with
Prepaid. The advent of IN based prepaid
calling widened the subscriber base of
telco operators by further enabling the
penetration of mainly mobile voice and
messaging into population segments,
that were unable to maintain a contract
based connection. IN based Prepaid
revolutionized the way end-users were
being charged for the services used.
For more than two decades, the wide
acceptance and evolution of IN services
offered telco operators new weapons for
the highly competitive market field, in
terms of new applications, features and
marketing tools. It has heavily influenced
the standardization process performed by
telecommunication associations leading
the lasting development of voice and
messaging telco standards.
The Downturn
As networks evolve, the demand for transi-
tion from separate networks to converged
next generation networks which support
wireline and wireless access to any com-
bination of voice/data/video communica-
tion services is increasing. This is also in-
fluenced by the constantly declining ARPU
derived from the classic voice services,
thus, creating needs for new complex busi-
ness plans and pricing models that will en-
able operators to differentiate themselves
in the market.
Operators started to consider the limita-
tions imposed by the monolithic design
of legacy IN and Prepaid systems, as well
as the high operational, maintenance and
upgrade costs.
By mid 2000, the future of IN was pre-
dicted as short and uncertain. Proprietary
interfaces and obsolete service creation
languages & tools contributed to this
uncertainty. Furthermore, Legacy IN was
not ready to cope with the increasing data
and multimedia services, neither with the
new charging models (data and content
charging) introduced with the IMS.
In the field of charging and billing, the
battle started due to the inefficiency of
the legacy IN based Prepaid systems.
Convergent charging platforms claimed
readiness to address this need by
providing access to all services in a
consistent unified environment and
by consolidating charging and billing
capabilities on one single rating engine,
Vaggelis Foukalas (BSS & IN Manager, Telco Software, Intracom Telecom)
Featured Article
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2. regardless of the payment method. Billing
systems started to be integrated with IN
platforms to enable real-time charging.
The market trend at the specific moment
was to have synergies or even acquisitions
between postpaid/prepaid billing vendors
and NEPs for the delivery of a convergent
charging solution rather than a solution by
one vendor.
As a response to the aforementioned
Classic IN constraints, IMS architecture
was offering a brand new approach to the
multimedia application layer as well as to
traditional charging. However, this very
promising prospect to migrate to a pure
IMS core infrastructure was replaced by
a long term plan for IMS and legacy core
network (including IN) co-existence.
The Transformation
Economic realities as well as the risk and
complexity of a full migration to IMS, have
made it clear to most of the Tier-1 and Tier-
2 operators, that they would have to stay
with multiple, heterogeneous services and
platforms for a long time. Applications
redevelopment to run in a pure IMS or SDP
environment is considered in most cases
as a luxury mainly due to the complexity
of the “classic“ IN services, as well as the
huge integration effort required.
The first generation of evolved IN
systems with expanded capabilities
and functionality incorporating IMS
architecture and implementing the
standard IMS interfaces as add-ons, was
now a reality. It was possible to use the
same services within an IMS context.
Reaching late 2000, the transformation
of classic IN systems and the migration
to NGIN became imperative, mainly
due to hybrid network and the need to
provide interoperability between various
types of new and legacy applications
that were deployed over diverse network
infrastructure. NGIN allows for voice and
data services to be delivered over multiple
networks, enabling convergence and
providing users with the perception that
there is just one single network.
Furthermore, the transformation to NGIN
which is based on new technologies
adoption (Java based design, commercial
HW,IMSinterfaces),bringsmoreopenness,
and requires dramatically lower OpEx and
CapEx as compared to legacy solutions.
Traditional IN Prepaid is not standing
in the corner of this but plays a key role
in this transformation. Prepaid systems
are transformed to convergent charging
solutions enabling attractive propositions
for advanced tariff packages and
sophisticated bundling of services for both
pre- and post-paid users, and build loyalty
through promotional discounts & bonuses
and personalized customer interaction.
Today CSPs are still facing many
challenges, evaluating the adequate
migration path for the support of future
business needs. The market for NGIN is in
an evolution stage, moving forward from
legacy IN systems to NGIN platforms &
applications.
The NGIN market is continuously growing,
presenting one of the rare lucrative areas
in telecommunications, as it is expected
to reach the level of 1 billion USD on
worldwide scales by 2013.
The NGIN evolution is influenced by two
major drivers which are further analyzed
below: Service Orchestration (Brokering)
and Cloud.
Telco Services Orchestration
The demanding objectives of consolida-
tion, convergence and service innovation
plead for the adoption of service oriented
architecture into the Network Real Time
service domain. Services orchestration
introduced by the IMS, refers to the inter-
actions among several independent ser-
vices in a single call or session, allowing
breaking a service into several re-useable
smaller building-blocks. A typical orches-
tration scenario is a prepaid subscriber
who is also subscribed to the Home Zone
service.
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Figure 1: NGIN market growth 2008-2012 (Source: OSS Observer part of Analysys Mason)

3. Most of today’s NG Value Added Services
are expected to bring the ability to orches-
trate in real time NGIN, IMS and legacy
services.
Orchestration will deliver complementary
features to the functionality offered by the
existing services. It will make possible to
combine them with multimedia and web
services delivering thus, an advanced user
experience.
NGIN enters the Cloud
Cloud based transformation of the classic
IN business models currently in use, is
another key influencer of the short/mid-
term NGIN evolution.
By introducing new trends like “anytime,
anywhere, any device” services and apps,
flexible payment schemes and innovative
operational and managing tools, the Cloud
is expected to dominate the telco field in
the near future.
Cloud enables new marketing methods
and tools allowing the CSPs to further
penetrate the Small Medium Businesses
(SMB) market. As already mentioned, a
significant portion of VAS/IN generated
revenue comes from SMBs. Telco service
providers already started delivering valu-
able communication services to business
customers on a scalable, on-demand, pay
per use fashion.
By adopting the new Cloud business mod-
els, CSPs take advantage of the potential
savings and efficiencies, therefore, cre-
ating new opportunities for strong long-
term engagement with their SMB custom-
ers. Valuable classic IN applications like
Number Translation, are expected to be
offered sooner or later in the cloud deliv-
ery models.
More and more NGIN applications are
adapted to allow for the Communication
as a Service (CaaS) cloud business model,
as security issues are resolved and trust
builds.
Intracom Telecom’s NGIN
During the last years, Intracom Telecom is
widely recognized as a leading developer
and supplier of NGIN solutions delivering
complex turn-key projects in Southern/
Eastern Europe and Balkans.
Major operators in this area have selected
Intracom Telecom for its NGIN solution,
thanks to its top quality development,
production, deployment and integration
capabilities, and its local presence in
these markets.
Figure 2: NGIN and IVR applications ready for CaaS models
Leveraging on the strategic partnership
with HP since 2001, Intracom Telecom is
today one of the few companies worldwide
with a comprehensive NGIN portfolio in
the area of Real Time Charging, Intelligent
Routing, Location & Roaming, Virtual
Private Network, Messaging & Signaling.
Intracom Telecom’s strategic goal is to at-
tract new customers beyond the limits of
the certain geographical area. Meanwhile,
the company plans to have all existing
customers that today operate legacy IN
systems fully migrated to the NGIN world
of innovative services, to enable them
to reduce subscriber churn and generate
new revenue streams. Intracom Telecom
intends to continue its investments in re-
search and development to always keep
up with the latest industry standards and
enrich its NGIN portfolio with high qual-
ity products and services addressing the
technological advances in the area of Real
Time Orchestration, Cloud CaaS business
models, providing “anytime, anywhere,
any device” services and apps.
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 More on our NGIN portfolio >>