Value-added services in the converged network

Now that the local market is open to competition, incumbent local exchange carriers as well as competitive LECs must not only follow the technology curve, but find a way to ride the wave of network convergence and offer innovative value-added services if they want to maintain their market share. Over the past decade, the intelligent network has been used to support value-added services. New APIs are being designed for the creation of value-added services spanning multiple domains (wireline/wireless, voice/data, public/enterprise). These APIs will not only ease the development of value-added services, but will also open service creation to third parties.