Says Pieter de Villiers, CEO of Clickatell, "We have always aimed at making sending a mobile message as quick, easy and cost-effective as possible. The SMS hubbing project will definitely make it quicker, easier and more cost-effective for operators to connect, and allow them to provide their customers with superior messaging services, as well as increase revenue from their network investment."
SMS hubs dramatically streamline the process of SMS inter-working among operators in the world, traditionally done via bilateral relationships. By connecting to an SMS hub, an operator gets access to all the other mobile networks connected to that hub and other connected regional hubs.
This solution ensures that operators and their customers will benefit from a high level of service quality, and protection against spam, security, billing and settlement, while maintaining the independence of each operator to determine its own pricing structures.
As well as simplifying the connections between GSM networks, the hubs will enable access to and from non-GSM operators, including conversion to and from CDMA technology. The hubs will also remove potential access protocol issues by allowing translation between IP and SS7.
Clickatell's experience in aggregating and optimising mobile network routes for SMS delivery, as well as its SS7 capability via its own carrier grade messaging infrastructure, enables it to be a primary hubbing partner for operators.
The GSM Association concluded a full-scale pan-continental hubbing trial during September 2006 as part of its Open Hubbing Connectivity Project. The trial involved various SMS hub providers, including Clickatell, demonstrating inter-working and taking responsibility for all billable revenue on SMS traffic sent via the hubs.
With more than one trillion text messages sent globally last year, and international traffic growing rapidly, operators will benefit from instant access to global messaging delivery. In addition, they can use their networks to terminate traffic from other operators around the world via the hubs.
Commercial services, conforming to the GSMA's SMS hubbing model, are set to go live before the end of the year.
"This second, more extensive phase of the Open Connectivity project has proved to be a resounding success, with the hub-based approach delivering a consistently high level of inter-connectivity, capable of dealing with operators' large-scale SMS requirements," says Alex Sinclair, the GSMA's chief technology officer.
"We are confident that the system will deliver significant commercial and technical benefits for the operator community, and improved service levels for their customers."
