Executive Summary

IPTV is an important element of a multiservice triple or quadruple play strategy for carriers globally. One of the problems they face is that these simple bundling strategies rely on discounting as the main benefit provided to subscribers. This strategy places a negative on the profitability of these services and like any other pricing strategy, is relatively easy to match by competitors.

There is a widespread consensus about making these multiservice bundles richer by adding applications and especially extending these applications so that they operate across different services. In this report we are partilcuarly interested in how IPTV services can be extended to support fixed and moble applications. This will then make the bundle of services more valuable and provide opportunities to increase their profitability.

Use of the IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) architecture and SDPs (Service Delivery Platforms) are expected to be an important part of this strategy. Both can significantly improve the ability of service providers to introduce and operate these new applications and services.

As mentioned earlier, the traditional method for introducing new services has been to develop a complete set of infrasatructure elements for each new service as shown in the architecture per service diagram on the left side of Figure 2-2. There are separate subscriber databases, separate interfaces to billing systems, separate customer care systems, and separate provisioning systems for each application. This increases both the resources and the time required to deploy new applications. In addition, every new application increases the complexity of the network because of the interactions required between it and the existing applications. This same problem is addressed in a largely complementary way by Service Delivery Platforms as discussed in Section 4.

Figure 2-2: Per Service vs. Common Architecture

Source: Lucent

IMS was designed to include the elements that had been proved to be common across multiple services in mobile networks as shown on the right side of Figure 2-2. This strategy is intended to save costs by reducing the effort to develop new services, reduce the hardware required to support these services, and to reduce redundant functions across services.

This report is part of the IP TV Tracking Service published by the Multimedia Research Group, Inc.

1          Executive Summary
1.1       IPTV Network Architecture
1.2       IMS and IPTV
1.3       IPTV IMS Services
1.4       IPTV and SDP
1.5       Implementing IMS and SDPs with IPTV
1.6       Recommendations

2          IPTV and IMS Architectures
2.1       IPTV Architecture
2.2       IMS Architecture
2.2.1       IMS Architecture
2.3       Strategies for Combining IMS and IPTV
2.3.1       Integration of IPTV into IMS
2.3.2       Common Network Resource Control
2.3.3       Common Subscriber Management
2.3.4       Service Interworking
2.3.5       IPTV IMS Devices

3          IPTV IMS Services
3.1       IMS Services
3.2       IPTV/IMS Communications Applications
3.2.1       Basic Calling Services
3.2.2       Supplementary Calling Services
3.3       IPTV/IMS Community Applications
3.3.1       Static Community Applications
3.3.2       Dynamic Community Applications
3.4       IPTV/IMS Personal Applications
3.5       Interactive Content Applications

4          IPTV and SDP Architectures
4.1       Evolution of Network Applications
4.2       Service Development Platform Architectures
4.3       Combining IMS and SDP Architectures
4.4       AT&T's IPTV SDP Archictecture

5          Strategies for Implementing IMS and SDPs with IPTV
5.1       IMS Strategies
5.2       SDP Strategies
5.3       IPTV Strategies
5.4       The Convergence of IMS, SDPs, and IPTV
5.5       The Payout from IMS and SDP in IPTV services

6          Opportunities, Risks, and Recommendations
6.1       Opportunities
6.2       Risks
6.3       Recommendations

7          Appendix I: Companies Interviewed for this Report

Table of Figures

Figure 1-1: IPTV Network Architecture
Figure 1-2: IMS Architecture
Figure 1-3: Service Delivery Platform Architecture
Figure 2-1: IPTV Network Architecture
Figure 2-2: Per Service vs. Common Architecture
Figure 2-3: IMS Architecture
Figure 2-4: Service Interworking Between IPTV and IMS
Figure 3-1: IPTV Location Based Services
Figure 3-2: Interactive IPTV Data Services
Figure 4-1: Evolution of Network Applications
Figure 4-2: Service Evolution
Figure 4-3: Service Dellivery Platform Architecture
Figure 4-4: Service Delivery Platform Software Architecture
Figure 4-5: Combined IMS Service Delivery Architecture
Figure 4-6: AT&T IPTV SDP Architecture

Table of Tables

Table 7-1: Companies Interviewed for this Report