Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Wireless Week: Trends in press-to-talk technology

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 05 May 2004 19:47:07 -0400

May 4, 2004 1:00PM ET

Trends in press-to-talk technology
Hosted By: BigTalk / Wireless Week 
Craig Farrill

Join Kodiak Networks CEO Craig Farrill for a  May 4 BigTalk 
discussion on trends in press-to-talk technology. If your query 
didn't get answered in Farrill's question-packed January 21 BigTalk, 
submit your questions early.

Activity in press-to-talk (P2T) services has increased dramatically 
this year--deployments, technology trials, vendor announcements and 
press coverage are all increasing. P2T is one of many premium voice 
services that could prove popular with subscribers and highly 
profitable for network operators. U.S.-based carriers Nextel and 
Alltel are proof of this claim. Nextel continues to enjoy record-
breaking revenues and newcomer Alltel has signed up more than 50,000 
customers since announcing its Touch2Talk service in late January. 

Craig will be available to discuss emerging trends in P2T 
technologies and differentiated, real-time voice services that can 
ignite customer interest and fundamentally change the current 
environment of declining ARPU. 

Craig Farrill founded the CDMA Development Group, and in 1996 Craig 
launched the first commercial CDMA system in a major U.S. market. 
Prior to co-founding Kodiak Networks in 2001, Craig was managing 
director at inOvate Communications Group, an early stage venture 
capital firm focusing on investments in the wireless industry. 
Previously he served as CTO for Vodafone AirTouch PLC. 

Please note: BigTalk discussions are editorially moderated. Guests 
reserve the right to choose or decline specific questions.
 
  BigTalk Discussions 

Craig Farrill: Hello Everyone--This is the year for global 
deployment of high-performance voice services. Already, tens of 
thousands of wireless subscribers in six countries are using 
advanced press-to-talk (P2T) service. All of the top equipment and 
handset companies have entered the market. Carriers worldwide are 
testing technologies and exploring the potential for premium, real-
time voice services to drive up usage and gross margins. This is 
just the beginning. Instant voice services could reach 30 percent of 
the world market in three years. Let's talk about the implications 
of this fundamental new trend for subscribers and network operators. 
(By the way, the volume of questions from my BigTalk in January was 
so high that I couldn't answer all of them at that time. I may take 
the liberty of inserting some here to make sure we cover interests 
of all viewers.) 

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Portland, OR: Which market segment (eg blue, white, or gray collar, 
families, teens, etc) have you found to be the optimal for your 
service? 

Craig Farrill: We feel voice is a service that applies horizontally 
to all market segments. All of us have many different roles during 
any given day--a parent, spouse, employer, employee--and the 
communications tool that meets the most challenging of our needs can 
then be available to us the rest of the day. Our sense is that push-
to-talk and, more broadly, instant voice, is a horizontal service 
applying across the board. 

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S Hightower, Philadelphia, PA: Motorola seems to be the primary 
manufacturer of these PTT devices are there any other phone 
manufacturers that are looking to create these devices for wireless 
carriers? 

Craig Farrill: A number of manufacturers recently announced handsets 
with PTT functionality at the March CTIA show, including Kyocera, 
LG, Samsung, Nokia, and others. Kodiak is currently working with 
more than a dozen GSM and CDMA handset manufacturers worldwide to 
incorporate the Kodiak instant wireless voice client into their 
product offerings. For example, we are collaborating with Orange and 
multiple suppliers to develop a series of models ranging from low-
end and mid-range to high-end. As handsets are produced with the 
Kodiak client, these models will be available to other carriers 
around the world.  

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Ravi Parikh, NYC: Will PTT support low and mid-range "feature" 
phones (in addition to smart phones), and if yes, when and from 
which brands?  

Craig Farrill: As I mentioned, we are very focused on entry-level 
and mid-range feature phones because they represent most of the 
market. The majority of the handset manufacturers are pursuing 
development of feature phones as well as smart phones. 

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Brad Smith, Wireless Week, Highlands Ranch, Colorado: Hi Craig. I'm 
curious what you see for presence and availability in P2T? Is that 
in the works and how important is it? Thanks. 

Craig Farrill: There is a big difference here. Put 
simply, "presence" is the indication that a customer's phone is 
switched On or Off. Availability comes more from the Internet 
instant text messaging model--indicating not only that a customer's 
phone is On, but also whether the customer is available to receive a 
call right now. Availability can include multiple statuses or 
levels, such as "do not disturb," "in a meeting," "traveling," 
or "on holiday." Availability is one of the most important features 
that I've seen in years. It enables people to see a visual display 
on the handset screen of changes in a person's status. Kodiak 
introduced the first commercial instant voice system with 
availability. Results have been a dramatic increase in usage. 
Customers tell us that viewing another person's availability on the 
phone gives them more reason to call friends, family, co-workers and 
customers. As more people have availability, we anticipate that 
increased usage will further accelerate. 

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josh baylin, washington,dc: Does the performance of your product get 
worse in a packetized environment vs the circuit switch performance 

Craig Farrill: There are fundamentally two kinds of PTT services: 
services with Quality of Service (QoS) and services without QoS, 
both generally using a shared data channel approach. The Motorola 
IDEN system used by Nextel has QoS, as does the Kodiak RTX system. 
VoIP over GPRS or over CDMA 1x Data systems involves shared data 
channel resources. As data channels become more widely used for 
photos, email, SMS and PTT, congestion will appear. Therefore delays 
will occur in PTT calls and these delays will be variable and 
lengthen over time.  

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Joseph Dover, Delaware: Why does CDMA PTT, have a much longer delay 
than the NEXTEL version? 

Craig Farrill: I believe the delays you are referring to are for the 
initial call set-up time and call latency, which is the time between 
voice volleys. The Nextel solution was purpose-built for the PTT 
application, therefore has the industry's lowest call set-up time 
(between 1-1.5 seconds) and intra-call latency of approximately 
450ms. CDMA VoIP has a far longer call set-up time (between 7-9 
seconds) and an intra-call latency of 2-4 seconds.  

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Jim/Raleigh/NC: What carriers are going to be using Kodiak's P2T 
solution in the near future? 

Craig Farrill: Kodiak currently has more than 60 NDAs signed with 
carriers worldwide and is conducting trials on five continents. The 
company anticipates that it will be announcing more carrier 
deployments before the end of the calendar year.  

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Juan Carlos Cueva, Lima, PERU: Some of the main infrastructure 
providers (Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola, ...) have plans to produce PTT 
infrastructure and terminals. How is Kodiak going to compete with 
them -- because these manufacturers want to sell platforms and 
terminals and not only platforms? In other words, how advanced are 
Kodiak developments to produce handsets which could be used with 
Kodiak Platform? 

Craig Farrill: Kodiak focused on enabling cellular and PCS operators 
to add PTT capability to existing GSM and CDMA systems. 
Additionally, we focused on improving speed, performance and feature 
richness beyond the level available in the market today. For 
example, the Kodiak system includes instant calling, instant 
availability and instant conferencing, a combination of services not 
available from any other supplier. By combining these three voice-
related services, companies like Orange and Alltel have been able to 
realize advanced voice service offerings which would not have been 
available with a single infrastructure supplier. Kodiak systems 
interconnect to all other infrastructure suppliers, thereby enabling 
carriers the flexibility to bridge between multiple infrastructure 
vendors. Handsets from any manufacturer perform equally well on the 
Kodiak system. We bring multiple handset brands and models together. 
Carriers benefit from an array of form factors and price points to 
reach a larger number of PTT customers. Taken together, these 
advancements provide carriers with the ability to offer premium GSM 
and premium CDMA services that go beyond basic walkie-talkie or push-
to-talk concepts. These premium services translate into significant 
additional revenue, operating profit and customer retention. 

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Tom, New York , NY: Is there another wireless carrier that you feel 
will beat Nextel or at least come close? 

Craig Farrill: Alltel is worth looking at. In its earnings 
announcement last week, Alltel reported more than 50,000 new 
Touch2Talk users in the first two months of service availability. 
Early indications are that Alltel is attracting customers from other 
carriers. 

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Sergio Leone, Milan, Italy: How do you think Ptt will take off in 
europe, considering congested gsm network and circuit switch based 
technology of Kodiak solution? Thanks in advance! 

Craig Farrill: The demand in Europe will be very strong. Early 
experience with Orange indicates that TalkNow actually reduces the 
load on the existing GSM network by shortening call length. This 
frees up capacity in busy urban areas and increases revenue at the 
same time. Since there is no national or international Nextel in 
Europe, carriers like Orange can gain a greater portion of the 
European market. 

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Neeraj Gupta, Santa Monica, CA: When is Orange in Europe planning to 
launch your service, and do you know how much they will charge for 
the service? 

Craig Farrill: Orange announced its Talk Now commercial service on 
January 13th and has deployed in the UK, France, the Dominican 
Republic, Guadalupe, and Belgium. The company plans to deploy 12 
markets by year's end. National rate plans vary by country, 
therefore we suggest you contact Orange directly regarding specific 
pricing.  

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Wayne, Ft. Lauderdale Florida: Some technical reports indicate that 
Kodiak's PTT solution require more network capacity than those 
offered by Togabi, Winphoria, etc. Is that true? How does Kodiak's 
maintenance or cost of ownership stack up against its competition? 
Can Kodiak's solution be used to replace digital trunking systems? 

Craig Farrill: No, in fact using the voice channels is actually more 
efficient than using VoIP over data channels since voice channels 
require no IP headers or overhead. Please contact me directly to 
discuss cost issues for specific systems. As to your third question--
absolutely. GSM and CDMA cellular operators in Latin America and 
Asia can add the Kodiak RTX to their existing network and provide 
national and multinational PTT services cost effectively. 

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Jennifer Centner from Philadelphia, PA: How many persons work at 
Kodiak and where are you all located? 

Craig Farrill: We have more than 120 employees in four locations 
around the world--San Ramon, Calif.; Plano, Tex.; Bangalore, India; 
Swindon, UK. 

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washington,dc: Do you see any opportunity to convert US carriers not 
using your rtx system (verizon, Sprint) to Kodiak? If so, how much 
is the incremental expense 

Craig Farrill: The Kodiak system can be added to any existing GSM or 
CDMA network at any point in time. Each network solution is 
customized to the operator's unique needs. 

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Matt, Columbus, OH: Hi Craig, What about interoperability? How long 
do you think until we have that where customers from different 
providers will be able to talk to each other? Also what hurdles do 
they need to overcome for this to happen? Thanks, Matt 

Craig Farrill: Kodiak totally supports interoperability now and in 
the future. For example, today we offer a roaming gateway product 
enabling a GSM user to use his PTT service anywhere that he can roam 
today. We also plan to offer an industry-standard PoC server, which 
can be added to Kodiak's RTX System, enabling carriers to serve both 
PoC- and Kodiak-enabled handsets. Further, Kodiak plans to implement 
IMS interfaces, enabling carriers to add IMS handsets to their 
premium GSM and PoC service family. Kodiak also supports PoC server-
to-server capability. This will enable a Kodiak customer to push-to-
talk with any other industry-standard PoC customer in the world. 

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JeffreyJost, Charlotte, NC: You have positioned your P2T as a 
premium service, but P2T is most often seen as a "cheaper cousin" to 
normal voice. Can you discuss why your P2T is priced higher or the 
same price as normal voice? 

Craig Farrill: The keys to carriers offering a premium P2T service 
are high voice quality, low latency, group communications and 
conferencing. In other words--a premium performance, quality, full-
featured service. The customer gains quality, speed, availability 
and advanced features. 

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Chuck Baltimore, Md: Of all the PTT technologies, who do you see out 
performing the others and why? Since many phone manufacturers have 
announced adding PTT to their future phones, when can we see PTT 
becoming mainstream? 

Craig Farrill: PTT services with quality of service (QoS) lead the 
market and create value for carriers. Virtually all phone 
manufacturers will enter the PTT business within the next year. 

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Rick R., Lafayette, CA: Will users be able to manage their own group 
lists? It seems carriers must still do this for users today. 

Craig Farrill: You're right. The latest systems include group 
management on the handset as well as a Web interface. 

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Eric NY, NY: Besides instant availability and instant conferencing, 
what do you see as future enhancement to Kodiak's P2T offering? 

Craig Farrill: In addition to the three real-time voice service 
families--instant calling, availability and conferencing--instant 
voice messaging enables users to send messages as soon as possible 
or as scheduled to individuals or groups. In addition, PoC service 
and IMS services also will be added to the Kodiak family as soon as 
standards are finalized. 

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Reilly Marack, Providence, RI-: Can you talk more about your roadmap 
for how you will migrate from your current technology to a standards-
based packet solution? 

Craig Farrill: Kodiak has deployed fully commercial systems today 
and is poised to add capabilities as standards evolve in the future 
for PoC and IMS. 

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Orange County, CA- Kurt Hindman: How do you calculate the Spectrum 
consumption for your current solution? 

Craig Farrill: Probably the most straightforward way to calculate 
spectrum usage is to look at channel occupancy. The average cellular 
call today is up to 160 seconds, but the average Kodiak P2T call is 
20 seconds. Eight P2T calls can be completed in the space of a 
single cellular call. From a radio network point of view, that is 
the equivalent of an 8 times increase in capacity. P2T calls are 
short, frequent interactions between people and result in increased 
capacity on GSM and CDMA systems. 

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Chris Ebert: Hi Craig, First time Big Talk user so not sure if this 
is duplicate for you or not. Do you see carriers (for example, T-
Mobile) leveraging your PTT technlology to allow subscribers to 
communicate over public/private WLAN on the relevant Wi-Fi enabled 
device (laptop, pda, phone/smartphone)? 

Craig Farrill: Yes, the early market for PTT is focused on phone-to-
phone communication. With the advent of more broadly available WiFi 
over the next few years, PTT will enter those networks as well. 

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CJ Park, Chicago, IL: Does a carrier need to make any changes to 
their network or OSS to use SMS for contact and presence 
information? 

Craig Farrill: No, the Kodiak system uses the existing network and 
SMS for availability. 

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Stuart, Davie, Fl.: Kodiak claims a call setup time of 2-3 seconds. 
In a typical press-to-talk session, one of the parties may wait 
several seconds before responding to the other party. How long a 
pause is tolerated by the Kodiak system before the call drops and 
the users incur another call setup delay? 

Craig Farrill: Kodiak has the lowest intra-call latency in the 
industry--150 milliseconds and does set up calls in 2-3 seconds 
commercially today. The pause you're referring to between parties of 
a call is eliminated in the Kodiak system by the use of the voice 
channel approach and provides a much more natural conversational 
experience than other solutions. 

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Howard Arfin , Ausitn, TX: Does a carrier need to install and RTX at 
each MSC, and if not, what transport type is used for the 
transmission between the RTX and the MSC?  

Craig Farrill: No, RTXs are generally installed at a regional or 
national level and can be connected using IP or PCM transmission 
facilities. 

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Ken, Springfield, MO: What do you think is the future of 
interoperability of P2T between carriers? 

Craig Farrill: We look forward to interoperating with P2T networks 
provided by other vendors. We look forward to a multi-carrier PTT 
environment in which instant calling can become a large part of 
daily life. 

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Craig Farrill: Thanks for participating in this highly interactive 
discussion. We know that interest in premium voice services is 
heating up worldwide. A time of renewed innovation and customer 
interest in wireless has begun. Carriers, suppliers and customers 
will all benefit. If you have additional questions you would like to 
have answered or thoughts to share, please email me through my 
office, care of [email-masked].  

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http://www.wirelessweek.com/index.asp?layout=big_talk_discussion&talkid=361

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