Wrote a bit about Telecom's NGN variant here: http://computerworld.co.nz/news.nsf/UNID/C740B2DD592E9EDDCC256F58000FBD33 I'm curious as to what the NOG thinks of this approach. If I look at: http://www.iec.org/online/tutorials/next_gen/ an NGN is defined as: "The next-generation network seamlessly blends the public switched telephone network (PSTN) and the public switched data network (PSDN), creating a single multiservice network. Rather than large, centralized, proprietary switch infrastructures, this next-generation architecture pushes central-office (CO) functionality to the edge of the network. The result is a distributed network infrastructure that leverages new, open technologies to reduce the cost of market entry dramatically, increase flexibility, and accommodate both circuit-switched voice and packet-switched data." Is it fair to assume that pushing CO functionality to the network edge requires an end-to-end managed solution? -- Juha