* An interview with Terry Matthews, founder of Mitel and Newbridge Networks
Larry recently had the chance to discuss trends in convergence with Sir Terence (Terry) Matthews, chairman of Wesley Clover. Wesley Clover is in the business of building businesses as an active investor, and its portfolio includes a broad range of technology, leisure, and real estate investments.
Matthews currently also serves as chairman of Mitel and March Networks. In 1994, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, and in the 2001 Queen’s Birthday Honours, he was awarded a Knighthood. Prior to joining March Networks, Terry founded Newbridge Networks in 1986 (Newbridge was acquired by Alcatel in 2000), and he co-founded Mitel in 1973.
Matthews started the conversation by remarking he had recently received notice that the flagship TDM multiplexer (the 3600) originally developed at Newbridge had reached the $5 billion sales mark – an achievement Matthews attributed in large part to the strength of the product’s management system. He then observed that, despite all the advances in convergence, IP-centric networks, and IP-based applications “companies still lack the visibility, management, and control they need not just for the network but for the services and the applications — anything with an IP address needs oversight.”
Matthews continued by suggesting that one of the biggest impediments to a proper management system is the need to scale. For example, he noted that at Bridgewater Systems (one of his portfolio’s investments) the company’s subscriber-centric policy management system now needs to account for 100 million client end-points – a feat that can only be accomplished with what he called a “honking big directory.”
Another challenge he sees is how to approach routing “content” rather that simply routing IP packets based on a source and destination address. The key, he believes is to approach the delivery of content from a “layer eight” approach —looking at the solutions as “applications plus” rather managing a simple packet destination.
Next time, we’ll continue the discussion with Matthews’ observations on why convergence will “never go back”, the next big thing in convergence, and his take on the most important consideration with converged networks.
