Since NTT announced that they were going to start NGN (Next Generation Network) field tests in December 2006, a large amount of NGN-related information has started to flow out. IT and network companies, in particular, took it as the start of a big change in the business environment; some of them made major changes to their business strategy. NEC is one of the companies actively moving forward in sync with the arrival of the NGN era.
Mr. Norihiko Kunishima, Senior Vice President
On September 27th, NEC held a press conference on their NGN-related business activities and announced that they are expecting about 400 billion yen in sales over the next three years. In order to achieve that, they reorganized their divisions, aiming to reform the company structure so that manufacturing and sales can be made a single entity; in addition, in order to deal with the diversification of demands and increasing sophistication of technologies, engineers are shared with other divisions. They say that they are close to ready for the NGN era.
NEC's concept of "NGN"
Then, what exactly is NEC's concept of NGN? Generally speaking, NGN refers to all packet-based/IP-based networks that are adopted as a replacement for existing ATM-based communication networks. In addition, international standards for it are being developed at the ITU-T. Also, NGN can sometimes refer to sophisticated and high-performance next-generation networks that use various new standardized technologies.
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Up until now, a common approach has been "vertical integration", where one company provides everything from infrastructure to services for a certain type of network. For example, cell phone services are provided by cell phone service providers, data communication services are provided by ISPs, land-line phone services are provided by NTT, etc. However, NGN will be based on "horizontal integration," where everything becomes IP-based, and a common infrastructure is used by all services depending on their need.
However, NEC's concept of NGN is not limited to just ITU-T's international standards; it includes IT/network integration solutions where infrastructure, services and applications, which are provided to companies, individuals and society, are integrated.
Services that can be implemented using NGN
Mr. Norihiko Kunishima, Senior Vice President, explained what people expect from NGN; he says "If I am to use catchwords, they are 'security and safety' and 'convenience and comfort'. If I further break them down, they are high dependability, large volume, high security, mobility, hand over, open and flexible, and low cost."
There are three areas that NEC is targeting for its NGN-related business: carriers, who provide network infrastructure; service providers; and service users, such as companies, individuals and society.
To carriers, they sell hardware and software products as well as provide network construction services. To service providers, they sell hardware products such as servers and storage devices; they also expect that the number of large-scale system construction contracts will increase.
Some examples of "NGN"They introduced some examples of "NGN" businesses: NTT DoCoMo's "Push to Talk" service, a cell phone-based voice communication service among multiple users; Nippon Television Network's "NTV2 VOD" service; and a platform for "One-Segment Broadcasts", a digital broadcast for mobile, though the company's name was not mentioned.
