Truphone

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Quick facts
Internet telephony on mobile phones
Truphone
Developed by:	Software Cellular Network Ltd
Functionality:	Mobile VoIP, SMS over IP
Initial release:	September 2006
Current release:	v4.0
OS:	Symbian
Platforms:	Nokia Series 60
Licence:	Freeware (with some paid features)
Website:	www.truphone.com

Truphone is a mobile VoIP / internet telephony operator. It provides Symbian software and a network infrastructure that allows people to make telephone calls and send SMS text messages over the internet from WiFi-enabled Nokia Series 60 handsets. Calls and SMS texts to other online Truphone users are free, and calls or texts to other numbers are chargeable.

Truphone uses the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) open standard, which competes with other VoIP standards such as UMA and proprietary protocols such as Skype.

Truphone was founded by James Tagg and Alistair Campbell. It has received three rounds of private investment since 2006, from investors including Alexander Straub, Eden Ventures, Wellington Partners Venture Capital, Independent News and Media, and Burda Digital Ventures.^[1]

In April 2008, Truphone acquired the business of Sim4Travel, including a GSM core network, as part of its stated strategy of offering "global mobile operator services".^[2]

Truphone’s headquarters are in London, UK.

1 Background
2 Technology
3 Major milestones
4 Features
5 Criticisms
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Background

Truphone launched its VoIP service for WiFi-enabled Symbian Nokia Series 60 smartphones in the USA and UK in September 2006. In doing so it has attracted the attention of the incumbent mobile operators in the UK, which have reacted to mobile VoIP in a variety of ways: in April 2007 Vodafone and Orange disabled the internet telephony functionality of Nokia’s new flagship handset, the N95, while in June 2007 T-Mobile blocked calls to Truphone numbers. The fomer of these situations currently persists and affect several SIP-based mobile VoIP companies besides Truphone. As of July 2007 the latter has been resolved, at least temporarily, through a successful application to the High Court by Truphone, resulting in the award of 'interim relief' against T-Mobile. (This forces T-Mobile to interconnect with Truphone pending a full trial.)

The company’s software is noted for its unusual depth of integration into mobile handsets.^[3] This approach improves service performance, voice quality and usability and conserves battery life, but is also what has made Truphone exposed to operator blocking.^[4] The alternative approach, as adopted by the likes of Fring, has been to develop a downloadable VoIP application rather than integrate with existing handset capabilities. This approach is less vulnerable to operator blocking but has significant impact in terms of performance, voice quality, user behaviour and battery life.

[edit] Technology

[edit] Infrastructure

The Truphone service is built largely from Open Source software, notably Asterisk, an open source/free software implementation of a telephone private branch exchange (PBX) originally created by Mark Spencer of Digium, and OpenSER, an open source version of the SIP Express Router. Truphone calls are routed via Wi-Fi - or, since June 2007, 3G - using Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) and Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP). The RTP proxy deals with the Network Address Translation (NAT) used by firewalls, and with transcoding from the Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) codec used in the phone to G.711 if required for transmission to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) via the SIP router.

[edit] SIP vs UMA

UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access) technology encapsulates GSM or GPRS traffic for transmission over unlicensed networks (WiFi and Bluetooth). When on an unlicensed network such as WiFi, voice calls are carried over the Internet until they reach the mobile operator's voice switching network (mobile core), from which point they are switched as normal mobile calls, while data sessions go via the GPRS/3G switching nodes (SGSN and GGSN) as normal. Since UMA typically uses WiFi hotspots, it helps in filling in dead spots in the GSM coverage of the network operators, while also reducing the cost of carrying data traffic for the operator and improving data performance. Using SIP enables essentially the same result, but only applies to VoIP; data sessions normally go directly over WiFi without transiting the mobile operator's network at all. SIP can therefore entirely bypass the mobile operator (although future mobile operator services may use SIP as part of IMS, whereas UMA is controlled by the mobile operator. Truphone uses SIP while, for example, BT Fusion uses UMA.

[edit] Handset software

As of July 2007 the Truphone handset client software works on nine models of Nokia mobile handset. The consistent attributes among these handsets is that all use the Symbian Series 60 operating system, all have Wi-Fi and all support internet telephony – although, interestingly, Nokia’s advertising for these handsets neglects to mention their internet telephony capabilities. This may be due to the Finnish manufacturer’s need to avoid irking its biggest customers, i.e. the mobile operators. Early versions of the handset client were primarily concerned with configuring the internet telephony settings included by Nokia as part of the handset to enable mobile Voice over IP calls over Wi-Fi networks (the earliest, prototype versions used Bluetooth, rather than Wi-Fi to carry the data traffic from the handset to a local PC connected to the Internet). By July 2007 the application had been built out to include additional functionality including Presence, which dynamically configures Nokia address book groups to show whether other Truphone users are online or offline (also referred to as on-net or off-net). The July 2007 version of the software, designated version 3.0, also included the capability to send SMS over IP. All handset software is written in C for the Symbian OS.

[edit] Authenticity of user identity

It has been suggested^[5] that that internet-based communications could be used without fear of interception. Truphone maintains, however, that it is governed by and complies with the same 'legal intercept' laws as every other telecommunications company. This means that Truphone validates the identity of every user before they can use the service, and can comply with security service requests quickly and easily in accordance with the law.

[edit] Major milestones

2000: Software Cellular Network (SCN) founded. Suspends development almost immediately due to the dot-com crash, making funding an impossibility
2005: Company resumes development.
September 2005: SCN demonstrates mobile Voice over IP over Bluetooth at VON Fall in Stockholm.
May 2006: SCN, now trading as Truphone, launches as “the world’s first 4G operator”, now demonstrating its service over Wi-Fi instead of Bluetooth
September 2006: Truphone launches its mass-market mobile VoiP service in ‘beta’
December 2006: Named as a ‘Technology Pioneer 2007’ by the World Economic Forum. Receives largest Series A funding for a European technology company since the dot-com crash.
March 2007: Receives ‘Red Herring 100 Europe’ award from Red Herring magazine
April 2007: Blocked by Vodafone and Orange in the UK on those operators’ branded Nokia N95 handsets.
June 2007: T-Mobile blocks calls from its customers to Truphone’s mobile numbers.
June 2007: Launches version 3 of the handset client.
July 2007: An injunction was issued by a UK court that forces T-Mobile to allow connection to Truphone's mobile numbers.
December 2007: Launches a free "Call-Me" button on Facebook.
April 2008: Raised £16.5m ($32.7m) of Series B venture capital funding^[6]. Acquired Sim4Travel^[7].

[edit] Features

The essential functionality of Truphone is to provide internet telephony on mobile handsets: mobile VoIP. A call may be made entirely over Wi-Fi and the Internet, bypassing the traditional GSM network operators altogether, or the recipient may receive the call over GSM. Since June 2007 calls may be made/received over 3G where the user’s tariff permits this. SMS over IP was also introduced in June 2007.

[edit] Criticisms

As a disruptive technology,^[8] the Truphone service has inevitably been the subject of criticism by some commentators. The service itself has been criticised for being insufficiently robust^[9] - although this is reflected in the service’s “beta” designation and progress has been duly noted with the current release of the software.^[10]