[Dundi] DUNDI for inter carrier exchange

[Simon Woodhead]

Hi folks,

I'm new to the list today so please forgive me if this is the wrong 
place to post this.

I've been looking at DUNDI for a while and have implemented it 
internally. It is very impressive so thanks and praise to all those 
involved.

The next stage for us is to implement it externally but whilst thinking 
about that something comes to mind. Is there scope within the 
specification to advertise rates, or has it already been discussed?

Before you set about me, let me explain:

- Yes, there is the obvious 'live LCR' type scenario where multiple 
termination providers could advertise their rates and any that are 
interconnected could be sent the call. That has a place but isn't the 
bigger application.

- Of much more interest is the inter-exchange of traffic between 
carriers. I'm in the UK so the following may not be appropriate 
elsewhere but every call in or out of a carriers network results in a 
payment to/from the peer. The sum of those makes up the outgoing call 
cost but, more relevantly, represents an income on the incoming call. 
Currently, a carrier is better off receiving the call through PSTN than 
advertising a VoIP route through DUNDI but if they could publish a rate 
then their peers could choose the least cost route. Implicitly this 
would lead to lower costs for both parties even if the direct 
cost/revenues remained unchanged - carrier a could route to carrier c 
over VoIP, avoiding carrier b. Carrier b receives the call directly and 
gets the same income as he would have done from carrier c without the 
costs of the traditional interconnect.

The second option is possible now between any two peers but I do think 
if it was built into a protocol like DUNDI it could give it significant 
traction and make the benefits of peering two-way. Taking my company as 
an example, it only makes sense to advertise routes to numbers on which 
we receive no ingress income. The vast majority, even where they 
terminate to VoIP, would not make sense as we'd lose the income. 
Granted, that income subsidises an expensive interconnect and the call 
would be coming over a much lower cost one, but there remains a real 
cost. Further, we offer numbers where the income directly funds another 
service such as overseas diverts which it would be impossible to 
advertise. If we could advertise them with a rate for interconnected 
peers, other participants could send traffic through on inter-carrier 
terms and we'd have the same income on a lower cost base.

It strikes me that this would really give the system traction and cause 
the kind of disruption to the traditional marketplace that is long 
overdue and ultimately benefiting the consumer.

Looking forward to your comments.

Kind regards,
Simon

PS - We'd be happy to make UK toll-free available as well as publish our 
own voip terminating numbers if a local peer could contact me off-list.