Oscar Correia, Aston University

The rapid growth of telecommunications world-wide has put increasing pressures on vendors to reduce costs through economies of scale. However, as much of the new subscribers come from emerging economies with low margins there is need for more affordable and scalable platforms. Hence more and more vendors are looking at real-time Linux platforms.

The key questions this will paper will ask (and try to answer) are:

1. Is Linux ready for the telecommunications space? How far has the Carrier Grade Linux project gone?
2. Does Real-time Linux really offer Africa a solution? Can such platforms withstand the often harsh conditions on the African continent and still provide the services they were designed for?
3. What is the business model behind such a structure? Is it a viable long-term strategy?