In a volatile world of communication technologies, the 10th Convergence India 2002 international conference is set to chart a course for the industry as it turns the spotlight on 'Next Generation Convergent Communications'. The conference will be held between 6th and 8th March 2002, at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi. Pramod Mahajan, the Hon'ble Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Communications and Information Technology will inaugurate the event.

The event will feature an exposition that will showcase futuristic telecom and network infrastructure and a conference which will offer innovative keynotes and practical guidance from speakers of outstanding caliber and international repute. The conference will be held concurrent to the exhibition. It is designed to be an integral part of the exhibition and aims at providing a forum to experts and delegates from a vast cross-section of the industry to share their views, interact and explore the new opportunities arising as a result of technological advancements.

Global leaders in the field of telecommunications, IT, space communications, broadcast & media will congregate at the forum to share their views on emerging trends, technologies, and services. The conference will feature discourses from experts, paper-presentations, informative seminars, and innovative workshops.

The conference speakers and tracks

Day one
The conference will commence with a panel discussion presided by MS Verma, Chairperson TRAI. The stellar speakers on the panel include Dr. Irwin Mark Jacobs, Chairman & CEO, Qualcomm Inc., USA, Dr. Rolf Bergmann, Vice President, Andrew Corporation and Ramu V. Potarazu, President & COO, Intelsat Global Services Corporation.

Dr. Irwin Mark Jacobs will be the keynote speaker at the first session of the Convergence India 2002 conference on March 6, 2002. He will speak on the revolutionary CDMA (Code-Division Multiple Access) technology. This conference session on CDMA v/s GSM will be chaired by RRN. Prasad, Member TRAI, who is a member of the Telecom Commission and Ex-officio Secretary to the Government of India.

Punit Goenka, Group President & CEO, ASC Enterprises Ltd. will speak at the afternoon session of the conference that focuses on satellite communications. Another distinguished speaker at the session is KS Mohanavelu, VP-TRO, ASC Enterprises Ltd., who will discuss the emerging trends in access to orbit-spectrum resources.

Paul Tuvey, Director, Inmarsat will voice his views on the proliferation of new technologies.

Deepak Mathur, General Manager, South Asia, Americom Asia Pacific, will also share his views on emerging trends in satellite communications, along with David Robson, Marketing & Sales Manager, Eutelsat.

The second track on the first day will feature an interesting workshop on VoIP with Irfan Ali, Chairman & CEO, CommsWorks, USA.

Dr. Yoram Stettiner, VP Advanced technologies, AudioCodes, will address the august gathering of technology-experts. He has over 20 years experience in DSP (Digital Signal Pocessing) research and engineering. His research experience has emphasis on algorithms for speech processing and high speed data modems, and in telephony over packet networks. Tong Mun Loo, Senior Vice President, Pacific Century Matrix, will also speak at the session.

Day two
The second day of the conference will commence with an informative session on broadband Internet. The Corporate Vice President of Motorola Inc., Matthew J. Aden, will deliver the keynote address.

Zeenext's CEO, Dev P. Naganand, will join Matthew Aden in this session. Naganand heads all access businesses of Zee Network Group companies including Siticable Network Limited, E-connect India Limited, and Zee Interactive Multimedia Limited.

Sharad Srivastava, Country Manager-India, Seagate Distribution Singapore Ltd. and Guenter Kring, CEO, Pacific Century Matrix (HK) Ltd., will also speak at the conference along with Suresh Vaswani, President, Wipro Infotech Group, Ashok Juneja, CEO, Bharti Broadband Networks Ltd. and Rajesh Kheny, MD-Asia Pacific Marketing & Sales, Tyco Telecommunications.

A workshop on VSATs will be conducted which will interest all in the telecom sector. Transmitting information to and from remote sites is possible with VSATs (Very Small Aperture Terminal) which operate where other communications options may not be available or cost-effective. VSATs are a well-established telecom solution, with more than 500,000 terminals installed in more than 120 countries. Girt Simons, President, Newtec Asia Pacific will be speaking at the session.

Day 3
The last day of the Convergence India conference will invite discussions on 'New Developments in Wireless' with emphasis on 3G. David Potts, Director- Worldwide (OMAP), Texas Instruments, will deliver the keynote at the session. Dr. Rolf Bergmann, Vice President, Andrew Corporation, will chair the session and share his opinion on the new trends and technologies.

Another speaker at the session is Jay Andersen, Director of 3G Market Development for Motorola's Asia Pacific Global Telecom Solutions Sector that is headquartered in Hong Kong. Juha Seppa, Director-Solutions & Applications, Nokia, will also be expressing his views on the subject along with Thomas Bachman, Technology Marketing Manager, Andrew Corporation.

The concluding session of the conference bears the theme, 'Access Technologies for Connectivity in Networks' and will be chaired by Matthew J. Aden of Motorola.

Other distinguished speakers at the session are Baksheesh S.Ghuman, VP & MD, South-east Asia operations, LightPointe, who will speak on free space optics, and Kuldip Johal, Strategic Business Development Manager, Pace Micro Technology. Johal will define a roadmap for Pace's cable home gateways, which is accomplished by working with operators, standardization bodies and industry groups.

Other speakers at the conference include Peretz Meron, Co-founder, Scopus Network Technologies, R.N.Kumar, Additional Member Telecom, Ministry of Railways, S.K.Bansal, Advisor-Telecom, Gas Authority of India Ltd. and Dr.Kailash S.Choudhari, Managing Director, Aksh Optifibre Limited.

Infrastructure and technologies at the exhibition

The development, convergence and deployment of information and communications technologies have the potential to positively impact every aspect of human activity in the 21st century. The 10th Convergence India 2002 event aims to pave the way for the confluence of policy and technology in order to enhance the overall profitability of the telecom sector. The exhibition will draw participation from several sectors including high-speed networking, Internet telephony, mobile and satellite communications, portable communications devices, network infrastructure, and interactive media. Technologies like broadband and wireless access, optical access networking, 3G, m-commerce, multimedia broadband services via satellite and ASP, conditional access technologies, satellite receivers and transmitters, set-top boxes, encoders and the latest in broadcast, cable and satellite equipment will feature at the show. The event will feature the best and the widest range of electronic media technology for the Indian sub-continent.

Country and companies at pavillion

Special attraction at the exhibition will be the country pavilions of China, France and USA bringing together best players to display their latest technology offerings. Several international companies want to make a foray into India's telecommunication sector, which is recognized as a large and lucrative market. These companies will bring in new technologies that have proven their merit in other international markets.

Some of them are as follows:

Andrew Corporation - A global supplier of communications systems equipment and services, focuses on markets like wireless communications, broadcast, and common carriers. The company's state of the art technological products include the latest SelectAmp CDMA 800 which enhances the 800 MHz cellular CDMA network communications and provides selective tuning of an individual channel, while screening other channels out. The product comes in a basic 800-1H model featuring 8 full watts of mask compliant CDMA power over 1 channel.

Their other product, PerforMax dual polarized variable electrical downtilt antennae provide continuous coverage of GSM 1800, US PCS and 3G UMTS frequency bands, all in one package. It enables the cell coverage to be tailored by the hour or by the season and that too with just one antenna. The product provides wideband performance over the full frequency band 1710 to 2170 MHz. It enables the operators to cover the full 3G frequency band, as well as offers operators totally new solutions for dual band systems expected in many new 3G rollouts.

Avenir Telecom - is the first privately-owned mobile phone distributor in France and calls itself a 'global telecommunications distributor'. The company offers a wide range of communication products, mostly in France, including mobile phones, line rental, accessories, landline phones, answering machines, and fax machines. It distributes licensed telephone products and sells Radiocom 2000 and SFR Analogue network line subscriptions.

In 1998, AVENIR formed the @3i subsidiary which specializes in Internet and e-commerce services for business. The subsidiary, whose first remit is to represent the company's interests on the Internet, will soon be a major service provider for French companies

Blue Broadband Technologies - is a young and dynamic organization with a clear focus on strong customer relationships in the telecom Industry. They provide quality and cost-effective solutions and services to the telecom, data and cable operators. They execute total turnkey infrastructure projects for the backbone and access networks of basic, cellular and data operators in India.

In order to have a clear focus on their operations, the organization operates as three SBUs (Strategic Business Units) formed according to their area of operation i.e. telecom infrastructure (wired), wireless Infrastructure and communication products. Their product range includes a complete solution for Internet over cable services (CO & CPE equipment), GSM & CDMA fixed wireless terminals for carriers, and infrared laser solutions for line of sight communications.

Bluemax Co. - designs, manufactures and markets communication systems to deliver analogically-based video, audio and data via HFC (Hybrid Fiber-Coax). Their products, such as transmitters, receivers, two-way amplifiers, and fiber transceivers use the latest technology in the world.

C-DOT (Centre for Development of Telematics) - is a premier telecom R&D centre of the Government of India. It offers state-of-the-art switching and transmission technologies for rural and urban applications. The 256 port Rural Automatic Exchanges (256 RAX) from C-DOT are widely accepted as world-class cost-effective switching systems for rural areas. These exchanges have been integrated with radio equipment to form a system, known as TDMA-PMP, for providing telecom facilities in sparsely populated and geographically dispersed clusters of villages all over the country.

CPI SATCOM - the company's amplifiers have provided the backbone of C, Ku, and DBS-band global satellite uplink systems for over thirty years. Satcom's TWT and Klystron high power amplifiers established new benchmarks for reliability and for quality performance.

Dielectric Communications - is a world leader in the engineering, design and manufacture of broadcast systems for TV (DTV/DVB/UHF/VHF), FM, HF and MF. Their strength is the development of custom solutions that fit their customer's unique requirements. They offer a full complement of products, including a variety of proprietary offering, from the transmitter output to the tower top including antennas, towers, filter/combiner systems, switches and patch panels. Their service offerings include tower mapping, modifications and complete installation services. Through the subsidiary TCI, they are the world's largest suppliers of high power antenna systems for MF and HF broadcasting.

Electronics and Controls (E&C) - came into existence in 1976 to manufacture quality industrial products in the field of digital and power electronics. E&C manufactures India's biggest indigenous thyristorised power supply handling a current of 10 kilo amps, a record unbeaten in the Indian industry till date. The company added a number of items to its list of products like speed controllers, counters, switches, and proximity switches.

ERNI - was founded in 1947 for manufacturing relays, controls and lighting products. In 1968, the company introduced the world's first Din 41612 connector at the Electronica exhibition and this solidified ERNIs position in the networking arena. The ERNI trademark represents an international group of companies specializing in selected electrical and electronic engineering components. Most of their products are developed, produced and marketed by companies of the ERNI Group itself.

Eutelsat - one of the world's most established and experienced providers of satellite communications resources and expertise on a global basis. Headquartered in Paris, its team of 380 people from 23 countries manages a satellite infrastructure that assures delivery of consumer television and radio channels to a measured audience of 98 million cable and satellite homes. Its capacity also serves news agencies, Internet service providers, corporations and telecommunications service providers.

Globecast - is a leading provider of satellite-based broadcast and Internet transmission and services. It is the satellite services arm of France Telecom. Globecast was created in 1997 by combining the group's vast array of broadcast activities, and soon became the world's largest provider of end-to-end transmission and production services for video, audio, multimedia and business TV.

L-3 Communications - is a leading merchant supplier of secure communications systems and products, avionics and ocean products, training products, microwave components and telemetry, instrumentation, space and wireless products. The company has entered into a joint business agreement with ND SatCom, a leading manufacturer and provider of satellite-based communication systems and networks to provide turnkey multi-node, fully meshed satellite terminal networks for civilian and military customers.

Under the agreement, L-3 will provide mobile SatCom systems and ND SatCom will provide anchor stations and network management systems. New Skies Satellites - is a global satellite communications company providing video, Internet, voice and data communications services to a range of broadcasters, ISPs, and telecommunications carriers around the world. New Skies is headquartered in The Hague, The Netherlands and has offices in London, Washington, D.C., Singapore, New Delhi, Sydney, São Paulo and Johannesburg.

Philips Broadband Networks - is headquartered in Atlanta and manufactures broadband RF (Radio Frequency), fiber optic, and subscriber related equipment for use in traditional and digitally compressed video networks. The company offers all the electronics needed to transmit analog or digital format broadband signals over today's two-way networks. The equipment supports a full range of services that technologically advanced consumers desire. In addition the company offers system design services, technical training programmes, and field engineering support.

Promax Electronica S.A - manufactures a wide range of signal level meters and spectrum analysers for television and data via satellite, cable, broadcast, and wireless. Other product ranges include pattern generators and general purpose test equipment. Signal level meters, CATV analysers, pattern generators, field strength meters, spectrum analysers, return path monitoring equipment, QPSK, QAM and COFDM are also available.

PY Systems - has been a player in the industry since 1990 supplying telecom products and office equipment including PABX telephones, photocopiers, fax machines, and printers. The company also supplies calculators, pagers, and mobile phones for individual use.

Raven Manufacturing Limited - are producers of high specification, top quality satellite antennas, and as such have been supplying some of the world's leading companies in the broadband communications industry for many years. From 'concept to completion' Raven can supply the total package including design, prototypes, product testing, packaging and logistics management.

Raven has a complete range of antennas available to suit analogue, digital, multisat, motorized and some VSAT requirements.

Ripley - is a leading manufacturer of cable preparation tools, has a full line of high quality wire and cable preparation tools and accessories. The target market areas of the company are the CATV, fiber optic, electrical and telecom industries. For CATV and broadband applications, the company's Cablematic line offers a wide selection of hard line cable coring and stripping tools, drop cable tools and specialty accessories. Ripley's professional grade tools include their line of crimp tools, coring and stripping tools, and drop cable trimmers. The company also offers the popular Miller fibre optic strippers, the high quality Kevlar cutters and jacket removal tools.

Russian Satellite Comunicatiosn Company (RSCC) - constituted in 1967, is the national operator in the field of satellite communication. Today RSCC is the authorized body of the Ministry for Telecommunications and Information of the Russian Federation to develop and operate the technical means of satellite communication. The enterprise is registered in the ITU (International Telecommunication Union) and is the shareholder of international companies, Intelsat, Eutelsat and the main partner of the international organization of space communications, Intersputnik.

Sancheti Ancheti Electronics Ltd. - is an importer and supplier of high quality satellite/cable television equipment, consultancy, and engineering services. Sancheti Electronics is headquartered in Kolkata and has a Branch office in Delhi and a dealer network of over 100 throughout India.

Sancheti Electronics has exclusive distribution rights in India for industry recognized satellite/cable equipment. Product profile includes antennas, LNB's, headend systems, receivers, coaxial cables, connectors, amplifiers, power supplies, power dividers, taps and splitters, DB meters and others.

They are sole distributors for Trilogy Communications Inc., USA for Trilogy coaxial cables, Corning Gibert Inc., USA for Gilbert connectors, Leader Communications for cables, DB meters, taps and splitters. Also, they are distributors for Motorola, Scientific Atlanta, Arcom, DX Antenna Holland, Aegis Broadband, and MX.

Scopus Network Technologies - is a leading supplier of digital compression technology to the broadcasting industry. Scopus Network Technologies' intelligent MPEG-2 and DVB video contribution and distribution architectures enable professional broadcasters to make a quick and smooth transition to the digital age.

Tianjin Fuheng Electronical Technology Co. - is a high-tech and new technology enterprise centralizing and unifying the technological development, manufacture and the sales. It owns the advanced manufacturing and checkout equipment and severe quality control system. The products have passed through the identification and approval of the State Technical Supervision Bureau and are awarded a special license for metrical appliance manufacturing.

Times Fiber Communications - has always been a pioneering force in the coaxial cable industry, anticipating and providing advancements that later became standards in quality, performance and reliability. This legacy of 'firsts' and commitment to the success of their customers continue to drive TFC toward greater advances in products, backed with pride in the past innovations.

Trilogy Communications Inc. - was founded in 1985 and is one of the worlds leading CATV coaxial cable manufacturers. Its MC2 (the first low-loss air dielectric coaxial cable) and MVP drop cables and over 3 billion feet of cable carrying CATV signals are sold in more than 40 countries worldwide.

TVS Interconnect Systems Ltd (TVSICSL) - was incorporated in 1999. The company has it's manufacturing plant located in Madurai and the regional marketing offices located at Bangalore, Mumbai & New Delhi. In response to the emerging network convergence they have profiled themselves as a preferred supplier of interconnect solutions to the cellular & access markets (WLL, FTTH and CATV). The current product range includes patch antennas, RF/FO passive and active network components as well as powerful network simulation software.

TVS-R&M offers complete solutions in terms of cable management products, and have emerged as a very strong player in the telecom segment both in the DoT & private basic service providers. Products are MDF's, cross-connects, distribution point boxes, FDMS, joint closures, DDF's, and customized Hybrid solutions.

Will Same - is the manufacturer of CATV trunk/distribution amplifiers, line extenders, indoor / outdoor taps and splitters, and many other CATV accessories. They are also the distributors of a famous brand of coaxial cable. Their products include CATV accessories, taps, satellite equipment and accessories, amateur radio accessories, and coaxial cable.

Xi'an Haitian Antenna Technologies Co. - is a professional antenna producer. XAHT produces antennas for GSM, CDMA, PHS (PCS), and 3G (trial) base stations, WLL, and other wireless systems, covering frequencies of GSM900/1800 MHz, CDMA800/1900 MHz, PHS 1900MHz, WLL450/2400/3500MHz, and IMT - 2000. XAHT has one of the largest single-roof production

Co-organizers

The 10th Convergence India 2002 event is organised by Exhibitions India Pvt. Ltd., and is co-organised by the Ministry of Communications & IT, Government of India; Cellular Operators Association of India; Association of Basic Telecom Operators; Indo-American Chamber of Commerce; Internet Service Providers Association of India; Telecom Equipment Manufacturers Association of India, and VSAT Service Providers Association.

The event is certified by the US Department of Commerce and is supported by several renowned associations including the IBC (International Broadcasting Convention), Global VSAT Forum, NAB (National Association of Broadcasters), Swiss Multimedia Association (Switzerland), Electronic Component Industries Association (India), Institution of Electronics and Telecommunication Engineers (India), and Telecom Users Group of India.

The Sponsors

The French corporate giant CANAL+ Technologies is the Silver Sponsor at the 10th Convergence India 2002 event. CANAL+ Technologies is an international provider of interactive TV software solutions, application software for cable operators, pay TV systems, broadcast turnkey systems, and fiber cable management. It offers a range of flexible products to broadcasters and digital operators around the world. Its product line includes conditional access software MEDIAGUARD, hardware independent interactive systems and middleware MEDIAHIGHWAY, as well as over 30 different interactive and multimedia applications and several integrated development environments. Its technologies today power more than 8.6 million digital set-top boxes.

The company has granted licenses to approximately 15 set-top box manufacturers internationally. It is actively present in major international markets and has concluded agreements with industrial partners to set up showcases of its systems in different parts of the world.

the Co-sponsors

Americom Asia-Paific - is a joint venture company of Lockheed Martin, a world-class manufacturer of communication satellites, and SES Americom, one of the world's pioneers in specialized, satellite-based distribution services. Formed in 1998, the company provides high powered capacity and state-of-the-art services to programmers, telcos, carriers, ICPs and ISPs and its customers throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

Audiocodes Ltd. - is the world leader in VoIP technologies and products. It designs, develops and markets enabling technologies and communication subsystems for the transmission of voice, fax and data over packet networks. Newly developed VoIP gateways as well as DSL and ATM access devices, enable packet networks to carry voice and data more efficiently and at lower cost than traditional telephone networks.

The organisation is a leading provider of technologies and building blocks that are driving the development of equipment for these emerging markets. AudioCodes' products are integral components of the most advanced and reliable Voice over IP and Voice over ATM platforms on the market. AudioCodes is an acclaimed leader in voice compression. The company co-authored the ITU G.723.1 voice-coding standard that was adopted by the Voice over IP Forum and Frame Relay Forum for use in packet networks. AudioCodes' voice compression technology permits the high quality transmission of voice over packet networks using substantially less network capacity than used in traditional telephone networks.

Intelsat - The company has 30 years of experience in the satellite communications industry and offers a wide range of wholesale global satellite services. The company claims to have, for nearly four decades, led the industry in the launch and operations of state-of-the-art geo-stationary spacecraft. Armed with a fleet of 20 satellites with access to a global network of earth stations and local partners in over 200 countries, the company can transmit information to anywhere from anywhere ensuring high quality uninterrupted transmission. Intelsat offers a wide variety of options to tailor services as per customer requirements.

Lightpointe - is an innovator, designer and manufacturer of carrier-class optical transmission equipment using FSO (Free Space Optical) technology that delivers high-speed communications solutions to enterprise and service provider customers who want to address the connectivity bottleneck in the metro optical networks be it core, access or edge networks.

Motorola - is a global leader in providing integrated communications solutions and embedded electronic solutions. These include software-enhanced wireless telephone, end-to-end systems for the delivery of interactive digital video, voice and high-speed data solutions for broadband operators; embedded semiconductor solutions for customers in networking and computing; embedded electronic systems for automotive, industrial, transportation, navigation, communication and energy systems markets.

Pacific Century Matrix (HK) Ltd. - is Asia Pacific's leading provider of satellite-based broadband network solutions providing unsurpassed reach to the world's fastest growing and largest markets. PCM was founded with the aim of offering reliable, high quality broadband telecommunications services for video, data and voice to businesses throughout Asia Pacific and West Asia. These services include TV broadcast, Internet access, corporate network, content and application services for the ISP, SOHO /SME/ Corporate and DTH markets.

Seagate - was founded in 1979 and its hard disc drives helped create the PC revolution. Today the company is helping to revolutionize the way we live, work and play by enabling the growth of the Internet putting the world's information at your fingertips. And storage technology, Seagate's core business, has become the center of the new computing architecture.

Texas Instruments (TI) (India) Private Limited - was opened in August, 1985 as a strategic move to enhance Texas Instruments Incorporated's (TI) presence in the Asia/Pacific area. This region is projected to have one of the highest growth rates in electronics over the next 20-25 years. The initial activity of TI India was the development and support of proprietary Electronic Design Automation (EDA) software systems used for integrated circuit (IC) design by TI's semiconductor design centers worldwide. This activity includes development of applications for creating, simulating, testing and verifying both logical and physical IC manufacturing process. In early 2001, TI India announced the opening of a center for design of 3G Wireless chipsets and a center for developing Wireless LAN chipsets.

Tyco Telecommunications - provides global broadband capacity through the Tyco Global Network (TGN) while also providing co-location facilities and data center space and services through its worldwide network of TelExchange centers. Tyco Telecommunications also designs, manufactures, installs, operates and supports turn-key subsea optical networks for many of the world's leading carriers.

The Networking Partners for the 10th Convergence India 2002 event are Convergent Communications and Space Link Systems who will provide support services during the course of the event.