Order management API specification will ease BSS-OSS integration for service providers

TORONTO, ON – October 5, 2007 – Sigma Systems (www.sigma-systems.com), a leader in the design, development and deployment of OSS service management solutions, announces its participation in the launch of the OSS/J Order Management API specification through its contribution to an expert group at the TeleManagement Forum (TMF).

The OSS/J initiative was founded in 2000 to develop a set of J2EE, open, interface standards for the telecommunications industry, including integration of BSS and OSS. In May 2006, the OSS/J initiative partnered with the TMF to better address the concerns of NGOSS implementation stakeholders by providing open standard APIs based on the NGOSS framework.

This new order management API standardises how an order capture system (billing or CRM) communicates with an OSS service management system, such as Sigma Systems’ Service Management Platform (SMP) 4.0, to handle product, service or work orders provisioned across a CSP’s service delivery network.

Sigma Systems is one of the leading authors of this API and the selected OSS vendor who provided the API’s reference implementation.

“The newest release of OSS/J APIs is a significant step towards accelerating convergence in the communications industry,� said Martin Creaner, president of the TMForum. “It is a key milestone in our goal to make it easier for the industry to put the NGOSS framework into practice.�

Brian Cappellani, chief technology officer, Sigma Systems said; “Until now, there has not been an established standard for service order management API integration to BSS systems. To date, almost everything about BSS-OSS integration has been proprietary and service providers were forced to engage in time-consuming integration to automate BSS-OSS order capture and management. We are proud to have taken leadership in working with the industry on this important initiative to promote open and defined integration between BSS and OSS vendors.�

The OSS/J order management API will enable service providers to effectively integrate OSS service management and BSS systems. This allows the rapid enablement of new revenue generating services and promotes robust order management tracking and reporting as part of end-to-end requirements for automation. OSS/J APIs are developed under the Java Community Process. The Specifications, References Implementations and Technology Compatibility Kits are freely available for download from the TMForum site at http://tmforum.org/ossj