The term deep packet inspection, or DPI, got a bad name when it first moved into the telecommunications lexicon -- or at least when most of us became aware of it. DPI, you may recall, became a key term in the battle over net neutrality and was often described as the method by which incumbent service providers could block or otherwise impede traffic from those entities that were seen by some as just trying to give the Internet a fighting chance.

What a difference a couple of years make.

Today, the term DPI has come back into vogue. But somehow now this technology – which a large collection of suppliers are marketing as a way to help network operators offer better customer service by enabling them to deliver new broadband services and otherwise optimize network performance -- doesn’t sound quite so bad.

Among the companies that have been talking up the benefits of DPI lately are Allot Communications Ltd.; Procera Networks Inc.; Qosmos; and Zeugma Systems, to name just a few.

Allot has announced a major new version of its NetXplorer software, providing an array of new carrier-class reporting, accounting and provisioning capabilities related to DPI. Procera just replaced its entire marketing and sales teams and rolled out a new DPI solution. Earlier this month, Qosmos closed a third round of fundraising worth $10.8 million. And Zeugma earlier this week came out with a solution that includes a DPI component.

DPI has seen a resurgence to help broadband service providers, whose networks have been inundated with a variety of new bandwidth-loving traffic but are still looking for business plans that will allow them to monetize the boom in bandwidth demand to a greater extent. Could this finally be what we’ve all been waiting for?