SuperComm 2003 show guide

SuperComm 2003 starts June 1 in Atlanta, bringing together the telecom industry at one of its most challenging times. We bring you a guide to the must-see events at the show.

SuperComm 2003 starts June 1 in Atlanta, bringing together the telecom industry at one of its most challenging times. To help steer service providers, their customers and equipment manufacturers through the obstacles that bankruptcies, a difficult economy and political uncertainties have created, SuperComm has prepared 52 educational sessions divided into six categories: applications, services and content; broadband networks and services; wireless networks and services; carrier IP networks and services; network and information security; and optical networks and services.

The show also includes six full-day sessions on IP network security, broadband service delivery, next-generation optical networks, mobile IP and data services, IP convergence and next-generation broadband networks.

For those who want to see equipment demonstrated, more than 500 exhibitors will display their wares at the Georgia World Congress Center. The floor opens at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of the show. Here are some highlights.

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

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Monday, June 2

VoIP in the enterprise: Is it really a smooth ride?

3:45 to 5:15 p.m.

Voice-over-IP networks have appeal as a possible way to save money and streamline networks, and are the main driver for convergence in many businesses. But what is the proper architecture? How do you ensure quality of service? Is there justification for expecting VoIP to yield more productivity from workers? What is the effect on administration of corporate nets? VoIP standards, architecture, predeployment testing, in-service monitoring and management for enterprise VoIP services also will be discussed. Scott Atkinson, president of ICSI Consulting Services, will chair this panel, leading Laura Thompson, vice president of marketing for Sylantro Systems, and Alan Clark, president of Telchemy.

Information security – large enterprise imperatives and solutions

8:15 to 9:15 a.m.

Never has corporate network security been more of a concern, prompting businesses to spend more protecting their assets even in the face of cutbacks. Industries such as banking and healthcare also are under new regulations to protect their networks and data. This session focuses on steps the largest corporations are taking to boost network security. Hear from panelists William Hancock, chief security officer for Cable & Wireless, and Christopher Leach, CTO of IT, Bank One.

Enterprise networking and services: New market realities and business drivers

9:30 to 11:15 a.m.

Corporations face new business demands that require new technical solutions, and new technologies offer new business opportunities. This panel looks at these phenomena from the point of view of service providers, vendors and corporations to decide if it’s time to hunker down and keep current strategies or to start over. Chairman of the panel is Jacob Jakobson, president of Smart Solutions Consulting. He will be joined by Eric Bruno, vice president of Verizon’s Enterprise Services Group; Latif Ladid, vice president of Ericsson Telebit; Eugene Lee, vice president of Enterprise Marketing at Cisco; and Mark Winther, vice president of worldwide telecom at IDC.

Needs met and missed for enterprise users

11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.

This session lets representatives from two areas blow off steam about e-business and its effect on customers, internal organization, ROI and other factors. It will be a reality check and a brainstorming session headed by Stephanie Atkinson, an analyst with Frost & Sullivan, with panelists Renee Herr, director of telecommunications and chief network officer for the Georgia Technology Authority, and Charles Gerlach, executive consultant for business value at IBM.

Storage-area networks: A new service model for enterprise data management

2 to 3:30 p.m.

With increasing needs for backing up storage in centers that can be hundreds of miles away, businesses are turning to optical SANs. This session will consider how best to extend SANs over optical networks and new regulations that are prompting adoption. Limitations and capabilities of storage technologies also will be discussed. Philip Edholm, Chief Technologist, Enterprise Networks at Nortel, will chair this session, which includes Don Swatik, vice president of the global solutions group at EMC; Jack Hunt, director of storage marketing at Nortel; Zeus Kerravala, director of e-networks and broadband access at The Yankee Group; and Herbert Congdon, global fiber product manager for Tyco.

Tuesday, June 3

Is there a business case for the enterprise Metro Ethernet?

9 to 10:30 a.m.

LAN capacity has increased 100- to 300-fold in the last decade, while metropolitan networks have seen only a sixteenfold increase. The result is a bottleneck. But service providers only recently have begun to attempt to provide Ethernet services over native Ethernet transport. Will metropolitan Ethernet break the bottleneck and prove to be the revolution in new service delivery? Nan Chen, president of the Metro Ethernet Forum, leads a panel that includes Ralph Santitoro, director of network architecture, Nortel; Craig Easley, director of solutions marketing, Riverstone Networks; Michael Kennedy, co-founder, Network Strategy Partners; and Robert Smith, senior director, Data Transport and Connectivity, BellSouth.

Keynote: “State of the Telecom Industry,” David Dorman, chairman of the board and CEO, AT&T

8 to 8:45 a.m.

Dorman will discuss how the unsteady economy, while wreaking havoc on the telecom industry, has not changed the fundamental imperatives of the industry’s players – meeting customer needs. He’ll talk about how near-term customer goals and incremental improvements in network operation will lead to a “cybernated network,” where ingrained intelligence and innovative use of directories and Multi-protocol Label Switching will foster a single, self-managing multiservice infrastructure.

Innovations in e-business: How will they shape the enterprise industry?

10:45 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.

Success of e-business translates into the success of the enterprise, yet e-business management is rife with challenges. E-business attempts to integrate technologies, evolving standards, collaborations, processes and business concerns across national boundaries with differing business laws. These speakers, from different businesses, regions and backgrounds, will hash out the issues and resolutions to e-business and its role in the enterprise. Lundy Lewis of the University of New Hampshire chairs the panel, which includes Ming-Chien Shan, senior manager, Enterprise Collation Technologies, HP Laboratories; Masayoshi Ejiri, vice president and chief scientist, Fujitsu; Cliff Faurer, senior manager, Telecommunications Management Forum; and Pradeep Ray, professor, University of New South Wales, Australia.

Luncheon keynote: F. Duane Ackerman, chairman and CEO, BellSouth

12:15 to 2:15 p.m.

Ackerman will discuss strategies for communications success in this age of shrinking voice profits, curtailed capital spending, increased competition from alternative service providers, regulatory hurdles and pressures to migrate to a data-centric business model.

Infrastructure and enabling technologies

2:30 to 4 p.m.

This panel will discuss integration challenges and techniques for providing a reliable, secure and high-performance service across thousands of hot spots. But once the networks and back-end systems are integrated, issues in delivering and billing for an end-to-end broadband wireless service must be addressed. The moderator is Bob Panoff, principal at RPM Strategy. Panelists include Parham Momtahan, vice president of research and development, Bridgewater Systems; Eugene Chang, vice president of strategic business development, Funk Software; James Blakley, director, application enabling software, Intel; Martin Suter, vice president of business development, MeshNetworks; Sai Subramanian, vice president of product management and strategic marketing, Navini Networks; Brian McCann, senior manager of solutions marketing, Portal Software; and Osman Duman, vice president of marketing, Ulticom.

Service provider business models

4 to 5 p.m.

Service providers have to develop new partnerships to deliver physical access, mobility, long-haul transport and content to broadband wireless customers. Panelists will discuss real-life experiences and methods for fairly compensating partners for their respective investments to enable profitable growth. Eric Zimits, managing director at Granite Ventures, moderates the panel that includes Tamara Steffens, vice president of carrier sales, Boingo; Terry Prickett, CEO, Com Solutions & Systems; Anurag Lal, vice president of business development, iPass; Bob McIntyre, vice president of sales and marketing, Open Point Networks; Lovina McMurchy, director of new ventures – Wireless Initiatives, Starbucks Coffee; and Dan Lowden, vice president of marketing, Wayport.

Wednesday, June 4

Interoperability of 802.11 with other wireless networks

11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

This International Engineering Consortium panel looks at key issues surrounding design and use of public wireless hot spots. Topics include how to combine carrier and Internet security and authentication, managing a hot spot, how to settle for roaming charges in the 802.11 world and new services. Dossevi Trenou, marketing manager at HP, will chair the session, which includes Timothy Allwine, director of VeriSign, and Gopal Dommety, senior technical leader, Cisco.

Cable has it all

8:15 to 9 a.m.

The potential effect of cable networks on voice and data services is enormous. The advent of IP voice standards for cable and its ability to deliver broadband data and entertainment have traditional phone carriers taking notice. The scope of cable’s promise is so great that two of the industry’s luminaries are tag-teaming this keynote address. Patrick Esser is the executive vice president of operations for cable giant Cox Communications. Backing up Esser is Richard Green, CEO of CableLabs, the consortium that is responsible for standardizing cable technologies.

The state of the union of metro Ethernet

9:15 a.m. to noon

This Metro Ethernet Forum session aims to educate attendees about standards for the technology that is intended to deliver broadband services such as SANs within fiber-rich metropolitan regions. Presentations, including a service provider case study of delivering services via metro Ethernet, will shed light on the technology. Presenters include Nan Chen, president of Atrica; Bob Klessig, director of engineering, Cisco; and Nav Chander, director of product marketing, Coriolis Networks.

Local-loop evolution to support services

2:15 to 3:45 p.m.

This session examines ways to alter the local loop to deliver broadband and next-generation services. It also will explore next-generation service bundles. Panelists will consider competing broadband access architectures, including converged access gateways, integrated access devices and the deployment of DSL in existing gear. The session also will include a service provider’s presentation on the business realities of supporting broadband services, evolving networks and a rundown of lessons learned trying to deliver converged access services. Leita Lewis, a senior marketing manager at Nortel, heads the panel, which includes Jon Glass, director of product management, Catena Networks; and Albert Wong, managing director, New World Telephone LTD.

Wireless – data and video on the move

5:15 to 6:45 p.m.

With broadband wireless connections, worker connectivity can be expanded immeasurably, or so say those involved in bringing this technology to reality. Experts will predict what shape broadband wireless services and networks will take. Chaired by Scott Erickson, Lucent’s senior vice president of marketing and sales, the panel is rounded out by Jeffrey Belk, senior vice president of marketing at Qualcomm; William Clift, CTO of Cingular Wireless; James Grams, senior vice president of multimedia network systems at AT&T Wireless; Kevin Kahn, an Intel fellow; and Hong Liang Lu, president and CEO of UTStarcom.

Thursday, June 5

Plenary panel: Broadband applications – driving the economic recovery

8 to 9 a.m.

Vendors and service providers discuss their techniques for facilitating the development and delivery of revenue-generating broadband services and applications. This panel provides a unique global perspective on next-generation services that make money for corporations, carriers and vendors alike. Dennis Straub, vice president of global business development, broadband access products SBU at Thomson, leads a panel that includes Paul France, head laboratories, Internet & Data Design Centre, BTexact Technologies; Bernard Debbasch, vice president, VDSL products, GlobespanVirata; Edward Kennedy, president, operations and executive vice president, Tellabs; and Martine Lapierre, vice president and CTO, Carrier Networking Group, Alcatel.