MToP stands for Mobile Transport over Packet and is a framework developed by Cisco

Cisco

Cisco may refer to:Companies:*Cisco Systems, a computer networking company* Certis CISCO, corporatised entity of the former Commercial and Industrial Security Corporation in Singapore...

 for expanding the IP/MPLS

Mpls

MPLS or Mpls can refer to:* Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States* Multiprotocol Label Switching, a data-carrying mechanism in computer networking...

 network of mobile operators from their core to their edge (Radio) layer. In this framework, the mobile operator will have an IP/MPLS network which is being used for carrying all kinds of traffic in edge and core.
One of the main issues for mobile operators is handling different technologies for use in different stages of their network evolution. In other words, the mobile operator has to deal with TDM

Time-division multiplexing

Time-division multiplexing is a type of digital multiplexing in which two or more bit streams or signals are transferred apparently simultaneously as sub-channels in one communication channel, but are physically taking turns on the channel. The time domain is divided into several recurrent...

, ATM

Asynchronous Transfer Mode

Asynchronous Transfer Mode is a standard switching technique designed to unify telecommunication and computer networks. It uses asynchronous time-division multiplexing, and it encodes data into small, fixed-sized cells. This differs from approaches such as the Internet Protocol or Ethernet that...

, FR

Frame relay

Frame Relay is a standardized wide area network technology that specifies the physical and logical link layers of digital telecommunications channels using a packet switching methodology...

, and Ethernet

Ethernet

Ethernet is a family of computer networking technologies for local area networks commercially introduced in 1980. Standardized in IEEE 802.3, Ethernet has largely replaced competing wired LAN technologies....

 technologies when using 2G

2G

2G is short for second-generation wireless telephone technology. Second generation 2G cellular telecom networks were commercially launched on the GSM standard in Finland by Radiolinja in 1991...

, 2.5G, 3G

3G

3G or 3rd generation mobile telecommunications is a generation of standards for mobile phones and mobile telecommunication services fulfilling the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 specifications by the International Telecommunication Union...

, and NGN

Next Generation Networking

Next-generation network is a broad term used to describe key architectural evolutions in telecommunication core and access networks. The general idea behind the NGN is that one network transports all information and services by encapsulating these into packets, similar to those used on the...

. Replacing the network infrastructure from TDM to FR to ATM to ... will force a lot of CAPEX

CAPEX

CAPEX, also known as the Kerala State Cashew Workers Apex Industrial Co-operative Society, is an organization managed by the government of Kerala to promote the cashew industry and especially the export market for cashews.-Organization:...

 and OPEX

Operating expense

An operating expense, operating expenditure, operational expense, operational expenditure or OPEX is an ongoing cost for running a product, business, or system . Its counterpart, a capital expenditure , is the cost of developing or providing non-consumable parts for the product or system...

. But with MToP in place, the operator can leverage the AToM

Atom

The atom is a basic unit of matter that consists of a dense central nucleus surrounded by a cloud of negatively charged electrons. The atomic nucleus contains a mix of positively charged protons and electrically neutral neutrons...

 capability of IP/MPLS and build a general purpose transport network which can be used for any kind of transmission technology.
In this framework, there will be pseudowires created inside the IP/MPLS network and each PW will carry a different kind of traffic. For simpler cases, the operator can leverage VPLS instead and build an L2 broadcast domain across its MPLS network or it can implement L3 MPLS VPNs instead. Of course L3 VPNs can be used only when different edge sites are communicating over L3 protocols like IP

Internet Protocol

The Internet Protocol is the principal communications protocol used for relaying datagrams across an internetwork using the Internet Protocol Suite...

and not when these sites use L2 technologies for communication.