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Victoria Shannon International Herald Tribune

Novenber 24, 2003

Marc Rouanne, chief operating officer of Alcatel's mobile communication group, says that video over telephones or videophony is one of his highest priorities. Last week, Alcatel, the biggest seller of high-speed digital subscriber line, or DSL, equipment, purchased the network unit of PacketVideo, a California company, to round out its offerings. Rouanne spoke with Victoria Shannon of the International Herald Tribune at Alcatel's Paris headquarters about the integration of phones and video.

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[Q.] What technology does PacketVideo add that you were missing?

[A.] There are two types of video content: the classical Webcam image that moves a few frames per second, and the small video attachment or video message. PacketVideo has made them usable. They have a smoothing built into their encoding, so that it's smoother video over today's 2.5-generation networks [also known as GPRS, or general packet radio service]. It's still very slow, but that's why we need third-generation networks. PacketVideo is also significant in terms of the R&D and know-how it brings to us.

Today, we feel our portfolio of video technologies is solid, but obviously we will stay alert to opportunities. One of the big drivers for the future of Alcatel is video. We started with video over DSL. We invented that a couple of years ago. We created the market, and there is a very big interest in that. We are seeing an acceleration of the willingness to use video on mobile and on Wi-Fi [wireless broadband].

Video is a lot of different things. You have the classical broadcast, or video over DSL. But there are a lot of other things, like video streaming, the capacity to see a video image on either the PC or on the terminal. We're starting to see a lot of work, a lot of interest, on video over GPRS. This is coming.

The other thing we are seeing a lot is everything that is linked to video-mail, that is, you leave a message that shows a video. There is a lot of excitement around that. In a lot of places people think of video on mobile as, If I talk to you, you see me. But actually that's not where the push is. The push is on remote vision, remote assistance for small companies plumbers, health care, insurers to be able to show something remotely and ask for support, diagnostics. You'd be surprised by the number of applications that people find that if they can see or show things, they can change their business model.

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[Q.] What can make that easier?

[A.] Surprisingly, a lot of the things we've developed for DSL do not even see the difference between DSL and mobile. Not all of it, but a lot of the things. For example, if you leave a video-message, it's the same between a PC and a phone terminal. And then you have some engines that we've adapted, but the storage will be the same.

If you have a voice-message, whether it's on the fixed line or a mobile line, most of the time it's on the same server. It's the same with video. You'll have a little adaptation to put it on the screen, but that's easy to do now. So all the videoconferencing, the video message, even streaming, a lot of those things can be adapted. So what we're seeing is that video over fixed is pulling video over mobile.

Now, the second step, once we make it work and used in the broadest sense which is already the case in Japan, by the way we will have to make sure that there is market adoption, and it's going to take some time. Alcatel believes in steady growth, not in poof, overnight because people will have to get used to it: What will I do with this? Do I like it? Do I show myself?

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[Q.] And, How much am I willing to pay?

[A.] Exactly. Operators will try it, it will work, it won't work, people won't buy it, somebody will discount it, and bundle it all over time. But we see a lot of excitement, and it's much easier than people thought in terms of servers, protocols and everything. And it's being driven by DSL, which is good news because there we know it already exists.

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[Q.] But think about how long videophone has been talked about.

[A.] But videophone is more than one thing. One-on-one mobile videophony is not such a big thing. It is a little more interesting than on the still phone because on the still phone you don't call someone, you call a phone, no matter who's behind the phone.

Still it's not the big thing. The big thing is streaming, video- messaging, it's remote vision, remote assistance.

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[Q.] We're not talking about taking a phone and watching a movie.

[A.] No. And we don't like this kind of hype, where people say on the phone you will do everything. What we think is that the service will depend on the terminal. TV is going to be TV that's it. DSL, depending on the screen you have, will do different things. You will have services adapted to where you are and what you want. People may have access to TV channels on their phones to know what's going on, but it's going to be a little add-on, a gadget, for a few minutes, and that's it.

Alcatel is not a consumer goods company, so we need to stay very agnostic about what the demand is going to be. Our job is more like bringing the software and the intelligence in the network to adapt to what people need.

(C) 2003 International Herald Tribune. via ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved

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