icbnet

Elsevier

The integration of intelligent networks (IN) and B-ISDN signalling is considered as a prominent and robust solution to the rapid deployment of multimedia application services. The main advantage of this approach is that the network can offer advanced services without significant modifications to existing broadband signalling systems. The IN/IB-ISDN signalling platform will include a set of new elements as the broadband service control point (B-SCP) and the broadband service switching point (B-SSP), which will provide all the functionality required for the processing of user requests for complex multimedia services. The performance of these elements and their protocols is a crucial factor for network design as it determines the total number of calls the network can admit with acceptable call set-up delay. In this paper we study the performance of an IN/B-ISDN integrated architecture by developing a set of protocol models and analysis techniques which are also applicable to other systems. Results show that the proposed architecture constitutes a promising and robust solution that can guarantee a smooth and cost effective evolution to multimedia networks.