Cable Television Laboratories has announced that its PacketCable test programme will be ready to qualify vendors' products by next year.

This will allow the cable industry to deploy PacketCable-based multimedia services such as Voice-over-Internet Protocol without delay. More than 40 PacketCable vendors have reportedly brought their products to CableLabs for experimentation and assessment. The project is updating test plans and procedures at present.

CableLabs, which comprises cable television operators from North and South America, engages in extensive R & D, helping companies tackle challenges and explore further avenues for growth. The company claims to have made great progress in demonstrating product inter-operability. The PacketCable programme is a company initiative aimed at developing inter-operable interface specifications for delivering advanced, real-time multimedia services over two-way cable plant. Built on top of the DOCSIS 1.1 cable modem infrastructure, PacketCable networks will use Internet Protocol technology to deliver multimedia services to the consumer such as IP telephony, multimedia conferencing, interactive gaming and general multimedia applications.

Next year, there will be four PacketCable certification waves, officials said. CableLabs is currently establishing a working prototype of the PacketCable architecture in the Louisville labs. Vendors who want their products to participate in the PacketCable Network have to submit a checklist of their implemented functionality for assessment by PacketCable.