J Noll, V Ribeiro, S E Thorsteinsson, “Telecom perspective on scenarios and business in home services”, Eurescom Summit 2005, Heidelberg, 27.-29.4.2005 page 1/9 Telecom perspective on Scenarios and Business in Home Services Josef Noll 1 , Vitor Ribeiro 2 , Saemundur E. Thorsteinsson 3 1 Telenor R&D, N-1331 FORNEBU, NORWAY 2 Portugal Telecom Inovação S.A, Rua Eng. José Ferreira Pinto Basto, 3810-106 AVEIRO, PORTUGAL 3 Síminn (Iceland Telecom) Ltd, Research Department, Armuli 25, IS-150 REYKJAVIK, ICELAND 1 josef.noll@telenor.com, 2 vribeiro@ptinovacao.pt, 3 saemi@simi.is Abstract The home network can be thought of as an extension of the telecommunications network reaching the customer wherever she is standing, sitting, lying or moving around in her home. According to this vision, there is a huge potential for service providers to offer their services into home networks. Early adopters have already home networks installed and there is a good variety of home networking products on the market. The current state is however far from a mass-market acceptance. In this paper a view on near- future home services scenarios is given. The services are classified into four main groups, entertainment, social inclusion, personal enrichment and home automation. This classification is based on previous work in national and international projects as well as the current research on next generation networks (NGN) and future services. Furthermore, this was supported by a questionnaire devised by the OSIAN project and submitted to a group of early adopters. Nearly all over Europe telecommunications networks support the introduction of advanced new services, however without an integrated multi-services approach supported by a common platform. The main goal of the Eurescom project OSIAN is to define scenarios that utilise the already available customer premises equipment for new innovative home services. Technology is in place, but has only reached the early adopters. In order to reach the mass market, telecom operators (Telcos) have to take the role as service enabler. This includes the guarantee to provide services, which “work first time and ever”, and which provide “value for money” for the customers. OSIAN has identified a home infrastructure to meet the customer and operator demands. The infrastructure is based on a split gateway, with a public access to the Internet and a bridged mode, which connects to the operators’ service infrastructure. The paper identifies the most promising services in the four domains and presents the principle infrastructure. 1. Introduction This paper provides a view on future home services scenarios and business aspects, as seen from telecommunication operators. Operators from Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Norway, Portugal and Switzerland have discussed their view in the P1401 OSIAN project on “how to make future home services happen”. To achieve this objective a generic comprehension of the research done on the future telecommunication networks was performed, and Home Services solutions were analysed. Technologies and devices for homes are entering the market, and Nerds 1 have them already at home. From here it is however a long way to have successful home services for the common user. Satisfying the needs of different users in alternative homes will not happen through a “one size fits all” infrastructure. Having compared the user needs with technology offers, the OSIAN view concentrated on four service groups. The service groups are “Entertainment”, “Social Inclusion”, “Home Automation” and “Personal Enrichment”. A more detailed description of these service group’s characteristics is given in the following section. To enable these services the current infrastructure, both at home and in the operator’s networks will need modifications. Alternatives are discussed, addressing both the size of the residential gateway (RG) and the degree of control of the RG. 1 We have extended the user characterisation “Nerd” to include Early Adopters.