Fujitsu Telecommunications Europe Limited, the leading supplier of high performance telecommunications solutions, recently revealed the initial findings of a research project designed to focus attention on effective bandwidth management in the open network marketplace. Conducted jointly by the Advanced Telecommunications Laboratory at Queen's University of Belfast, in collaboration with the University of Ulster at Coleraine, the research was unveiled during the recent World Telecommunications Congress event incorporating the International Switching Symposium (WTC/ISS2000). A biannual congress organised by the industry itself, WTC/ISS2000 was held this year at the International Convention Centre in Birmingham from 7-12 May. A Gold Sponsor of WTC/ISS2000, Fujitsu hosted a highly acclaimed technical visit to its European headquarters, where it demonstrated a wide range of state of the art solutions for the creation, management, deployment and operation of advanced services.

Entitled "Agent Technology in the Open Network Marketplace", the joint research project is focused on devising new methods to maximise data delivery policies. Keith Jones, Chief Engineer of Fujitsu Telecommunications Europe, explains: "Standard IP networks normally offer "Best Effort" data delivery policy, and at link congestion, time-sensitive services such as real-time video and voice, will be severely affected. Fujitsu has been sponsoring a PhD student at each of the two universities to research new methods of improving bandwidth management, looking at a variety of resource reservation technologies such as Resource Reservation (RSVP) and Differentiated Services. These appear to promise a better provision for network services, where the required amount of Bandwidth (BW) can be allocated to support the desired Quality of Service (QoS). Ideally, a network provider wants to give the required BW or QoS to all its clients, but this is hard to achieve due to a finite network capacity. We believe, therefore, that pricing remains the best and the fairest solution to the effective distribution of bandwidth."

"During the WTC/ISS2000 technical visit, our findings attracted considerable attention, with our two second-year students - Ho Wk(UU) and Hung Tzi Chieng (QUB) - deserving praise for their innovative approach and highly entertaining communication of the project's focus to delegates. This involved presenting a futuristic scenario as a network strategy game called BONDS (which stands for Brokering Open Network Differentiated Services) in which end-users can negotiate with network providers re issues of pricing and QoS during connection time. In the project, the students employed complex network models to act as a rapid prototyping environment for developing mobile agent behaviours. Our objective was to illustrate how agent technology can assist the end-users and network operators in a dynamic real-time complex environment. We will be continuing our collaboration with Queens and the University of Ulster Universities, with this initial project providing a platform for future research into the application and validation of agent technology to next generation network management and control."

The research groups at the University of Ulster and Queen's University Belfast have developed an excellent working relationship with Fujitsu. The joint project was led by Professor Gerard Parr, head of the Telecommunications & Distributed Systems Group at Coleraine, and by Dr Alan Marshall, director of the Advanced Telecommunications Laboratory at Queen's, Belfast. The relevance and depth of their combined expertise, together with the supervision they have shown their students in this fast developing area, are critically important to the continued success of this initiative.

The Fujitsu name is renowned globally for its innovative IT, telecommunications and micro-electronics solutions. Ranking as the 52nd largest company in the world, it embodies the converging worlds of IT and telecommunications, providing a global capability that integrates the growing convergence of data and telecommunications - for today and the future - with every facet of information services. Fujitsu is an Internet-focused IT solutions provider and is at the forefront of the Internet revolution at many levels - from owning the largest ISP in Japan - @Nifty - to its leading edge development of SONET equipment, holding a major market share, particularly in the active North American market. Comprising over 500 group companies and affiliates, the Fujitsu family includes many acknowledged industry leaders and household names - such as ICL, Amdahl and DMR Consulting. With 188,000 employees around the world, Fujitsu is uniquely positioned to unleash the power of the Internet, helping its customers to succeed in this dynamic and ever more competitive communications marketplace.

Currently employing 1,230 staff around Europe, Fujitsu Telecommunications Europe is a strategic division of the Telecommunications Group, Fujitsu Limited, Japan - one of the world's largest communications equipment suppliers. Fujitsu's customer base includes wide-ranging contracts across the breadth of modern telecommunications networks. Focused on providing strategic end to end solutions, Fujitsu offers a complete turnkey service - from project planning, community liaison, cable laying and civil engineering, to complete installation, implementation and ongoing maintenance. Fujitsu Telecommunications Europe has a range of research and development facilities, located at the Birmingham headquarters, also operating as part of Fujitsu's global manufacturing resource. The company has a long-established track record for product and service innovation, with extensive expertise in the field of leading edge optical transmission and telecommunications switching technology. This ranges from the development of the most advanced Photonic Network Solutions; to Passive Optical Networks; Fibre Access Systems; Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH) networks; Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) solutions; Radio Access Systems and IP Applications; in addition to its TMN-compliant Network Management Systems.

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