10.0 TL1 and OSMINE certification

Equipment vendors aspiring to sell their equipments to ILECs  should be aware that supporting TL1 in itself is not a panacea. An important milestone they have to pass is OSMINE  compliance to ensure that their equipment can reliably interoperate with existing Telcordia  OSSs in the targeted service provider network(s). OSMINE is a service offered by Telcordia and can cost NE vendors well over a Million dollars and take over a year to complete.

OSMINE comes as an unwelcome surprise for some, especially for those who come from the IP (data) domain. Considering the fact that successful completion of OSMINE is just a stepping-stone to getting access to the golden ring of ILEC market, the associated opportunity cost is pretty high. During the CLEC heyday, it was not uncommon for NE vendors to forego the OSMINE efforts (it is worthwhile mentioning some were not even aware of such a process) in lieu of pursuing the growing CLEC market. However, since the collapse of the CLECs, OSMINE is becoming a requirement to survive.

During 2001, established NE vendors such as Cisco, Ciena, Fujitsu, Lucent, Tellabs, and Nortel made significant investments on the OSMINE front. The total investment from these companies alone was over a 100M. Startups such as Metro-optix, Coriolis Networks, Astral Point (now a part of Alcatel) have embarked on OSMINE as well. Many others are in the process.

Though OSMINE process is expensive and time intensive, proper planning and implementation of TL1 interface makes OSMINE process much easier. For more details refer SR-683, Process Description of Operations Systems Modifications for the Integration of Network Elements (OSMINE) and also visit  www.telcordia.com