Former telecom executives said switching Local Number Portability...
Former telecom executives said switching Local Number Portability Administrators 10 months before the change is supposed to take place poses risks, in a webinar sponsored by Neustar Thursday. “It’s a really tight time frame for anything,” said Standish Group CEO…
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Jim Johnson. The North American Numbering Council has recommended that Ericsson subsidiary Telcordia, doing business as iconectiv, replace Neustar as the next LPNA. Neustar has filed challenges to the selection in docket 09-109, and in its webinar, former Sprint Chief Information Officer Dick LeFave said the work of the LNPA is far more complex than in the past when there were “a limited number of customers. Customers have multiple devices now.” It’s a “short amount of time” to ensure there won’t be any problems, said former Comptel CEO Jerry James. Customers are “all going to blame you regardless of where in the process things may have failed,” he said. Any problems that would arise would carry the risk of losing customers, James said. Which company is the LNPA “is going to be very important” to the IP transition, he noted. “For local number portability, the biggest risk is actually staying with the incumbent who has no incentive to innovate and who has continually charged high rates,” responded Richard Jacowleff, CEO of iconectiv/Telcordia, in a statement. “No one is going to proceed with a transition faster than makes sense. The current contract allows for extensions in transition if needed. … But delay will also cost industry and consumers tens of millions of dollars per month.” The company’s transition plan “was thoroughly reviewed by a subcommittee of industry experts and by the North American Numbering Council. … For service providers, their interfaces to the NPAC won’t change and everyone will see lower costs, including consumers.” A new LNPA will also allow better integration into new technology “because it will have been built for the current environment and not based on what telecommunications looked like in 1997,” the statement said.