Study Group 13 leads ITU's work on standards for next generation networks (NGN).

Broadly speaking the phrase NGN refers to the move from circuit switched to packet based networks that many operators worldwide will undertake in the next few years. It will mean reduced costs for service providers who will in turn be able to offer a richer variety of services.

Convergence is a key word in the NGN field. Built upon the Internet protocol (IP), the convergence between networks and/or technologies such as public switched telephone network (PSTN), digital subscriber line (DSL), cable television (CATV), wireless local area network (WLAN) and mobile technologies is a task that many believe is impossible without the development of global standards.

Recent work by SG13 includes a standard (ITU-T Recommendation) to provide interworking between two dominant technologies in next generation networks (NGN), Ethernet and MPLS (multiprotocol label switching). SG 13 has also done much work in the field of VPN in particular on standards that will allow VPNs to work over all kinds of networks - optical, MPLS, IP etc. Also SG13's earlier work on global information infrastructure (GII) was an important precursor to today's NGN work.​