News Release

20. November 1998, Heidelberg, Germany

Telecommunications Information Networking Architecture Consortium (TINA-C) and EURESCOM announce a milestone for the TINA industrial deployment.

Heidelberg, Germany, November 20, 1998— TINA-C has completed its quarterly meeting, hosted by EURESCOM Two announcements at the meeting marked a milestone for the TINA concepts and specifications which is now moving from prototypes and trials to commercial products, as well as to acceptance as a framework for the evolution of telecommunication networks.

Starvision Multimedia of Canada described its latest release of the Services Creation and Management System that is based on TINA-C specifications.

A presentation by Sprint, the third largest long distance carrier in the United States, described the use of TINA in the evolution to its target network, popularly known as ION.

Use of TINA specifications for the service layer, and for Gateway control functions to be supported by MGCP (formed by merging SGCP and IPDC) for Voice over IP application was also discussed with its proponents who are active in the standardisation processes (IETF and ITU-T).

Why has TINA become hot after a long preparation time? Because TINA provides solutions that help to solve the present main issue of Telecom and IP : how to develop seamless services and operations over an increasing technology fragmentation and technology future uncertainties. Using the TINA architecture, generic services can be provisionned seamlessly over IP (VoIP, Internet data), over ATM (VoATM, Broadband data), over IP on ATM, and over fixed and mobile voice networks.

TINA-C is a consortium that groups the world’s large telecommunication network operators and ISPs (AOL/Cegetel, AT&T, BT, DT, FT, NTT, Sprint, Telia….), along with their main telecom and IP equipment/service manufacturers (Alcatel, Bay Networks/Nortel, Bellcore, Fujitsu, Lucent, Siemens…) .

EURESCOM is the European Institute for Research and Strategic Studies owned and operated by 23 European telecom operators. EURESCOM is currently performing serveral projects that consider the applicability of the TINA architecture in telecommunications networks scenarios of the future.