AT&T Not Seriously Committing to PBT Instead of MPLS

Implications: 1. AT&T appears to be only intellectually curious about PBT for now. 2. However, there is recognition by some in the pro-MPLS camp that there is a risk of the abusing the standard beyond what it is meant to do. 3. Further insights on a second vendor competing for Fujitsu’s DWDM business at AT&T have become known.

Analysis: There is no evidence of a dedicated effort at AT&T to seriously move to PBT. It is believed by the MPLS supporters at the carrier that a reasonable number of classes of service is pretty supportable – including segmenting real time and non-real time – and ensuring that they get addressed and delivered. The potential problem is in going crazy in establishing so many levels of classes of service that it becomes cumbersome or even impossible to administer.

MPLS is certainly not the panacea for everything. Whenever a new standard becomes popular in the telecom industry, it gets punished by being used in situations beyond the initial intent – and this propensity has become the biggest danger for MPLS. For example, there is a lot of interest in tunneling voice and private line services over MPLS. With AT&T having a private line infrastructure in place, it seems silly to force a lot of that functionality in the MPLS world.

In addition to the manufacturers pushing the envelope too much on MPLS, people at

AT&T, who are deeply involved with supporting the standard, have a vested interest to make sure that it is successful – including ensuring their own survival at the company. They back the “manna from heaven” concept because there can only be so many top priorities at the service provider.

Regarding the second DWDM supplier at AT&T, the extent of the RBOC’s commitment to it is still not clear. What is becoming more evident is that there are supply concerns by the carrier involving Fujitsu, which motivated AT&T to look at another manufacturer. While there are apparently no issues with Fujitsu’s product, there is some apprehension about the vendor on resource and support matters moving forward.