Signalling and interworking challenges for quality of service in the next-generation network

A key challenge for next-generation networks (NGN) is the standardisation of a quality-of-service (Qos) solution that supports voice telephony and other real-time services with assured quality levels, requiring end-to-end signalling that must work across multiple IP-based networks. This paper summarises representative industry efforts to standardise IP network QoS signalling capabilities for NGN, and identifies one very fundamental area-the standardization of technology-independent IP QoS signalling requirements-where focused industry effort is urgently needed.