CableLabs (Cable Television Laboratories, Inc.) has completed its Technical Report for a new IP-based cable telephony architecture, the PacketCable Line Control Signaling System (LCS) Architecture. The Report outlines a standardized approach for delivering cable telephony services using LCS while providing a path toward the development of the PacketCable end-to-end IP network. Cable operators will use the LCS architecture and protocols to deploy IP-based cable telephony services today, allowing for migration to a full PacketCable architecture in the future.

The report was created to facilitate the rapid time-to-market deployment of LCS products and services for the IP-based cable telephony network. The LCS implementation is intended to impact the existing PacketCable specifications as little as possible, while broadening the capabilities of PSTN connectivity via a GR-303 interface. TollBridge played an instrumental role in developing the architecture, which was a collaborative effort of PacketCable members including cable operators, suppliers and CableLabs staff.

The LCS architecture is extremely important to cable operators as they begin to deploy telephony services and multiple broadband applications over their existing cable infrastructures. It provides them with a future-proof migration strategy that protects their current investments, provides revenue generating opportunities and prepares them for the end-to-end IP networks.