3G. Wireless Communication Solutions

Internet telephony over mobile phones is on the way but don’t expect many commercial offerings until operators have made a key network technology enhancement, probably toward the end of 2007 or later in most parts of the world, according to a senior executive with Lucent Technologies.

The problem with providing VOIP (voice over Internet Protocol) service over mobile handsets today is the uplink, which is too slow to support quality voice calls. To increase uplink speeds, operators of GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) networks, which dominate Europe and many parts of Asia and Latin America, will need to upgrade their networks with HSUPA (High Speed Uplink Packet Access) technology.

How that timing fits into VOIP-over-mobile plans of Skype Technologies and the Hutchison 3 Group (Hutchison 3G) is unclear. At the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona last month, the two companies announced a partnership to provide the world’s first commercial VOIP service for mobile phones. Though Hutchison operates an IP-based network, it has not rolled out HUSPA.

Read more VoIP Go Mobile

The maker of BlackBerry email devices - RIM has acquired Ascendent Systems, a leading provider of solutions that simplify voice mobility implementations in the enterprise.

It is a SIP standards-based software solution that augments existing PBX (Private Branch Exchange) and IP-PBX (Internet Protocol Private Branch Exchange) systems and supports heterogeneous telephony environments to “push” voice calls and extend corporate desk phone functionality to mobile users on their wireless handset or any wireline phone. Ascendent will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of RIM. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Ascendent Voice Mobility Suite is a feature rich solution that provides single number reach, consolidation and access to a single voice mail box, and extends desk phone functionality such as PBX dial tone, call transfer and hold, 4 or 5 digit dialing and conference calling capabilities to mobile users. It provides a consistent experience across a mix of telephony systems and simplifies the migration to newer IP-PBX systems. The solution is also SIP-enabled for VoIP and supports BlackBerry WLAN deployments. Ascendent’s solution has been especially well-received by enterprises with heterogeneous telephony environments and customers that also deploy BlackBerry.

For more SIP-enabled for VoIP and Supports BlackBerry WLAN and also Rich Tehrani’s Blackberry NTP Legal Analysis