France Télécom

http://www.francetelecom.com/rd/

First leading R&D centre in Europe in the telecom sector, France Telecom R&D is one of France Telecom's assets for its worldwide strategy of expansion and consolidation in all major markets of the telecom sector.
With more than 3,000 engineers and researchers spread across 13 sites in Europe, North America and Asia, France Telecom R&D operates at an international level which enables cooperation with influential industrial groups, the international scientific community and regulatory bodies.
Responsible for the Group's strategic targets and critical technical areas, France Telecom R&D aims to deliver the best innovations to the intra-Group clients: 70% of the products and services marketed by the Group come from France Telecom R&D labs.
To face current technological challenges, France Telecom R&D develops its expertise and technology in the following fields:

  • New generation networking: definition of concepts and architectures enabling networks to evolve progressively towards high bit rate, multi-service, easily operated solutions
  • Multimedia services and technology
  • Mobile networks and services including GRPS, UMTS and Beyond 3G
  • Innovative end-user interfaces: multimodal interfaces, natural languages processing, advanced interfaces
  • Software engineering systems: real-time kernels, distributed systems, embedded systems

France Telecom R&D has actively been contributing to numerous collaborative R&D actions, both at national and international level: RNRT (National Research Network in Telecommunications), IST projects (with more than 75 projects in FP5), EUREKA, etc. In addition, France Telecom R&D maintains a close relationship with public-sector laboratories, such as the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), the INRIA and the CEA. On average, 60 research contracts on telecommunications and technology are signed per year.

By recognising the importance of standardisation in the field of telecommunications, France Telecom R&D is also strongly involved in standards organisations (e.g. IETF, ITU, ETSI) and contributes to the promotion of technical innovations and policies.