Highlighting the complex fashion in arriving at standards for the wireless industry, Paul Mankiewich, the chief technology officer of Lucent Technologies Inc., joked that the various standards organizations also have had difficulty figuring out a standard on where to meet. Until recently, that is, when they agreed on Hawaii.
Consensus continues to be the touchstone of standards organizations’ activities as they pursue standards for third-generation networks.
“Ultimately, the overriding issue facing the industry for future standards is the need to increase the speed of standards development while assuring due process and high quality standards,” said Jane Brownley, who gave a presentation on the standards process at the Universal Wireless Communications Consortium conference recently.
Individual companies with specific interests push their technologies through their standards organizations and the standards organizations in turn examine them in the light of particular parameters. What the standard organization arrives at is forwarded to Partnership Projects.
The Partnership Projects are 3GPP and 3GPP2. The 3GPP standards organization partners include ARIB of Japan, CWTS of China, ETSI based in Europe, TIA in the United States, TTA in Korea and TTC of Japan. The 3GPP2 partners are ARIB of Japan, CWTS of China, TIA in the United States, TTA of Korea and TTC of Japan.
“Currently, the Partnership Projects as well as other standards and industry fora such as TIA TR45.3 and UWCC are working on the development of modifications to the five radio interfaces as well as on the development of specifications for the next generation core networks,” said Brownley.
Future networks requiring standards include terrestrial radio interfaces like cdma2000, UMTS, wideband CDMA as well as public networks, the Internet Protocol ATM backbone optical core, broadband wireless, Internet, small business/residential access and large business access.
“The dynamics of establishing third-generation standards have been driven primarily by the International Telecommunications Union IMT-2000 requirements and initiatives as well as needs of the global market place and business strategies,” said Brownley.
Although the marketplace is the best enforcer, Brownley compared the process of creating a standard to making a sausage involving various narrow interests balancing their visions with that of the industry at large.
This is how it works. A company or interest group submits its initiative to the engineering committee or subcommittee of a standards organization like the Telecommunications Industry Association, whose standards for communications technologies are used in the United States and abroad.
If the idea carries with the committee based on technical parameters that are open to worldwide acceptance, a project initiation notice is prepared and circulated for ballot to identify unresolved issues and establish consensus. The next step is to circulate the standards proposal throughout the industry. It takes about two years between when the forum identifies the need for a standard, submits it and undertakes a review and evaluation.
Brownley identified the key issues facing the industry relative to future standards efforts as the variety of migration paths from 2G to 3G, enhancements to 3G standards, the global allocation and management of spectrum, the convergence of all IP-based core networks, how to optimize IP networks to work with the various air interfaces, and how to align wireless and fixed wireless architectures.
The industry also wants to inter-work 3G fixed wireless and wireless local area networks as well as define standards beyond 3G.
She said the core networks-which have not been defined-are referred to as ANSI 41 core network, an evolved GSM MAP core network and an IP-based core network.
“The interests of the various standards bodies have been well balanced in the development of standards for the 3G radio systems and associated core networks,” Brownley commented.
