The i3forum and the Open Visual Communications Consortium (OVCC) are merging. The new organization aims to increase it scope and its membership as it focuses on telco transformation and video communications.
i3forum, established in September 2007 to drive development of international IP interconnections among telecommunications providers and fight fraud, announced in February 2016 the expansion of its previous scope to include other advanced technologies such as IPX, IMS, NFV, APIs and IoT. The i3forum’s membership includes top telecom providers.
OVCC, whose board level founders included AT&T, BT, Orange Business, BCS and Polycom, has focused on the development of a global, standards-based visual communication network specification defining the technical and commercial terms required to implement a ubiquitous video service, supported across multiple carriers and equipment providers. OVCC’s mission has been to grow the overall business use of visual and collaborative communications globally through a secure network of interconnected service providers.
“With members from the world’s largest video providers, both OVCC and i3forum for years have independently promoted global network compatibilities, best practices, standards and innovation,” said Clive Sawkins, president of the OVCC. “As the communications industry continues to grow exponentially and globally, the merged organization will combine efforts and resources to help service providers, carriers and enterprises deploy and consume services safely across network boundaries, between public and private clouds, and over the public internet.”
“Bringing OVCC and i3forum together creates an organization with a broad scope and a unique ‘end-to-end’ capability that encompasses the underlying IPX network and services such as unified communication,” said Philippe Millet, i3forum president and vice president of partnerships at Orange. “It is the perfect response to the evolution of the industry, and will allow members and industry stakeholders to look more broadly at challenges and opportunities, foster new ecosystems and enable the transformation of the industry.”
http://i3forum.org
http://www.ovcc.net/
