Telecommunication Standards Update

Geneva, 19 March 2004 — ITU is a world-wide organization which brings governments and industry together to coordinate the establishment and operation of global telecommunication networks and services. Telecommunication Standards Update, to be issued regularly, aims at keeping media and the corporate world abreast of key developments in the field of global standards-setting.

The DVD Forum has provisionally adopted ITU-T H.264 AVC Video codec as mandatory for the upcoming HD-DVD Video specification for DVD players. DVD Forum defines DVD format specifications, and is a voluntary association of more than 200 companies from the consumer electronics, information technology and entertainment industries. ITU-T H.264's adoption by the Forum is an important step on the way to H.264 becoming the leading video codec in this major consumer market.

H.264, ratified in 2003, surpasses earlier video standards in terms of video quality, compression efficiency and resilience. In a significant number of test cases, coding efficiency with H.264 improved by two times or greater. In addition to the potential for better image quality, improved data compression offers advantages in terms of greater media storage, meaning that it is possible to put more video files onto media such as DVD.

The ITU Study Group responsible for optical networks has completed another step in the development of a family of standards that will allow service-providers to deploy all-optical networks with the adoption of a series of new standards. Called ITU-T G.984 series, the new standards build on the existing and widely adopted G.983 series Recommendations relating to broadband PONs, by providing unprecedented network capacity.

Increasing capacity to gigabit levels should more than satisfy foreseeable customer demands. G-PON (used to connect residential and SME premises in an all-fibre network) maintains the same optical distribution network, wavelength plan and full-service network design principles of G.983. As well as allowing for increased network capacity, the new standards offer more efficient IP and Ethernet handling.

All-optical networks will allow service-providers to deliver applications such as video-on-demand, streamed video, on-line games and VoIP.

ITU-T Study Group 15, the leader in standardizing xDSL and optical access technologies, is organizing a workshop to bring together the main players and standards development organizations (SDOs) in network access technology.

The All-Star Network Access workshop, to be held Geneva, 2-4 June, promises to provide an overview of all access technologies including traditional copper, (x)DSL, wireless, metro-ethernet, satellite, fibre to the home (FTTH), CATV and powerline.

Confirmed keynote speakers include BT Group Technology Officer, Mick Reeve and Hans-Ulrich Schön, Vice President, Siemens AG, Carrier Products. These key industry players will be joined by many other important representatives of government, manufacturers, service providers and SDOs at the event.

Operators, manufacturers and administrations who make up the membership of ITU have called for work on next generation networks (NGN) to take renewed priority. NGNs will form the basis for the future of all telecommunication services. As a start-point, a recent meeting agreed on a working definition for the oft-used but ill-defined term.

Chairman of the ITU-T Study Group meeting, Brian Moore, said that the group's last two meetings had seen increased attendance, primarily because of the inclusion of NGN on the agenda and growing interest in the topic within the telecoms industry. The meeting saw a proposal for a next generation network (NGN) Study Group to centralize ITU's work on the topic.

The agreed working definition of NGN is: a packet-based network able to make use of multiple broadband, QoS-enabled transport technologies and in which service-related functions are independent from underlying transport-related technologies. It offers unrestricted access by users to different service providers. It supports generalized mobility, which will allow consistent and ubiquitous provision of services to users.

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