A handful of equipment vendors and US CDMA operator Verizon Wireless have banded together to take IP Multi-media Subsystem (IMS) technology to the next level.

Verizon, together with Cisco, Lucent Technologies, Motorola, Nortel and Qualcomm, is working to develop enhancements to the emerging IMS architecture.

The next generation architecture has been termed A-IMS (Advances to IMS) and aims to provide solutions to implement next generation services in current networks, as well as creating a foundation for the efficient roll out of both SIP and non SIP-based services in future networks.

The current outputs of the task force are a concept document and an architecture document that are being provided to industry players. The task force companies plan to make necessary standards contributions in the immediate future.

Paul Mankiewich, chief technology officer, Lucent Technologies Network Systems Group said: “We recognise the benefits of this collaboration, particularly in terms of multi-vendor interoperability, as we move into an all-IP mobility world. This effort continues to enable the delivery of blended voice, video, data and multi-media applications, what we call Blended Lifestyle services, to mobile end users.”

Nokia learned that Qualcomm has filed a complaint with the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) asking the commission to open an investigation into the alleged infringement by Nokia of six GSM standard related Qualcomm patents. Nokia is currently evaluating the filing and will respond as necessary.

As disclosed by both parties, Nokia’s obligations to pay royalties to Qualcomm under the current license agreement will expire on April 9, 2007. Nokia and Qualcomm are in active negotiations to extend, or replace, the current agreements.

The ITC request is the third legal action taken by Qualcomm against Nokia in the past eight months. While we are still evaluating Qualcomm’s latest action it appears that most of the patents which are the subject matter of Qualcomm letter to the ITC are believed by No kia to be covered by Qualcomm’s prior agreements to license on fair and reasonable terms and are thus not properly subject to a request by Qualcomm to the ITC.

These repetitive legal actions, over GSM technologies that have been in the market for many years, reflect Qualcomm’s concern over the current 3G UMTS patent negotiations. These actions demonstrate that the conditions applicable to ongoing negotiations between Nokia and Qualcomm have substantially changed since the early 1990′s. At that time Qualcomm held a dominant patent position in IS-95 standard and was able to impose that position on the industry.

Since the early 1990′s Nokia has built a leading wireless intellectual property portfolio by investing over EUR 25 billion in research and development. Today Nokia’s intellectual property portfolio consists of over 10,500 patent families. A s a world leader in the development of wireless communications technologies, with over 220 essential patents in GSM alone and far more essential patents than Qualcomm in 3G UMTS standard, Nokia holds a very strong patent position.

QUALCOMM announced it has successfully demonstrated the full mobility of high-quality, high-capacity voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) calls across multiple test environments, including mobile, pedestrian and fixed, enabling operators to migrate voice services to Internet protocol (IP)-based platforms for a common service platform. The field tests, which involved 62 simultaneous calls, were conducted over CDMA2000 1xEV-DO Rev. A in one sector within a single 1.25 MHz channel — in a fully mobile configuration. The test network demonstrated capacity gains approximately 30 times greater than mobile analog voice and results from a fully loaded commercial network could be somewhat lower. QUALCOMM used commercial-ready application specific integrated circuits in both handset and prototype networks. These field tests validate the quality and capacity of full mobility VoIP over EV-DO Rev. A and pave the way to large scale commercial trials by network operators.

“Operators globally have committed to the rapid deployment of CDMA2000 EV-DO Rev. A. These tests prove EV-DO Rev. A’s capability for delivering high-capacity, high-quality VoIP over 3G mobile broadband networks,” said Dr. Roberto Padovani, chief technology officer of QUALCOMM.

VoIP over EV-DO Rev. A leverages session initiation protocol, commonly referred to as SIP, in combination with a number of advanced techniques to achieve quality of service comparable to traditional landline voice. These techniques include:

– Comprehensive Quality of Service features, which enable operators to provide multiple services on a common packet data platform;

– Advanced call-hand-off algorithms, which ensure seamless operation in the mobile environment;

– Mobile receive diversity and equalization, which improve network capacity and user experience; and

– Enhanced speech-processing algorithms, which improve network capacity and ensure high voice quality.

The full mobility success of these VoIP field tests represent another step toward the convergence of IP and mobile data services with landline wide area IP networks, as QUALCOMM helps bring its customers’ IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) strategies to fruition. Operators will be able to efficiently merge their wireless and wireline networks based on IMS, allowing them to realize unsurpassed cost and operational efficiencies over current deployments. By basing all communications services on an IP network, operators are able to use their network capacity in a much more flexible manner, through the dynamic allocation of capacity to an ever-increasing array of 3G services, such as:

– Push to talk, which is VoIP offered as walkie-talkie-like service;

– Packet-based video telephony, which combines realtime video with VoIP; and

– Simultaneous VoIP calls and data sessions.

“QUALCOMM is committed to innovating on the 3G roadmap and will drive the leading edge of airlink enhancements converging onto one IP interface,” said Padovani. “High-capacity, full-mobility VoIP is a significant milestone in this vision for the evolution of mobile broadband networks. It will enable operators to supercharge their service packages by offering customers a rich mix of voice and data, and end users will have a heightened multimedia experience from the resulting realtime audio, video and data streams their service providers offer.”