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Networks & Infrastructure
Network monitoring in next generation broadband wireless
Handling a new level of complexity
by Gerry Christensen, Associate Editor
Long Term Evolution (LTE) for Broadband Wireless
While some debate remains, few would argue that Long Term Evolution (LTE) is the winner for the fourth generation (4G) broadband standard, as operators begin implementations to evolve from 3G Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS). From a technical perspective, LTE brings an evolved radio access network (RAN) and packet core system to UMTS. From a business perspective, LTE means lower cost per unit of bandwidth, higher peak throughput, lower latency and other improvements.
LTE cannot come soon enough for some operators to bear with surges in demand for data services. Increasingly, voice services are viewed as a commodity, and are marginalized from a revenue perspective. Voice remains a central feature of an operator’s network, but the inclusion of data-driven services in its design is a natural evolution for software and electronics as scale and scope increase. As end users rely more on their wireless devices, they expect the cost of usage to decrease. Increased usage, coupled with competition for coverage and customers, has put enormous pressure on network operators to dramatically increase capacity.
While LTE solves the problem of capacity and costs, it is not a panacea. It also introduces a new level of complexity to the network as it brings new network elements and interfaces, evolved network elements, and a host of new implementation and operational challenges. Arguably some of the biggest challenges will be the operational in nature, as LTE enables new applications and services that have completely different requirements than those of 3G networks. Many of those requirements revolve around the unique needs of each application. For example, some applications will require bandwidth on demand while others will be very latency sensitive, or both. Because of the potential for many applications, with many different requirements, and the need to apportion bandwidth appropriately, network operators will need to focus on Quality of Experience (QoE).
LTE -- QoE and a Whole New World of Service Management
In theory, communications with LTE will be a whole lot different than anything that came before. LTE will not only bring much greater bandwidth. It will change the way that network operators provision, maintain and monitor their networks and manage their applications. It will also lead to a change in the breadth and variety of applications. From the end user’s perspective, it will also lead to a fundamental change in expectations about application capabilities, performance and availability.
Many new applications and services enabled by LTE will be not only bandwidth intensive, they will bring more focus to service management and network monitoring. Mobile network operators will need to focus on Quality of Experience (QoE) of the end user rather than just Quality of Service (QoS) of the network. Without LTE, network operators have been able to measure macro QoS issues such as network availability, capacity and coverage. This will no longer be sufficient in the world of LTE as applications will have completely different usage characteristics and patterns, and user expectations. Network operators will need to monitor the individual QoE of customers to ensure satisfaction.
Greater Bandwidth Leads to More and Different Applications and Greater Need to Monitor
LTE will enable many and varied applications including everything from content-on-demand (optimized to the device) to video calling on-demand. Not only will different devices have varying form factors (such as smartphone versus tablet), but also different use case scenarios and user expectations. For example, video calling on an iPad may enable each video stream simultaneously but the smartphone may only display the person currently speaking. This translates into great complexity for the network operator in terms monitoring requirements in a diverse application environment.
Other network changes are coming that add further complexity. A network approach called IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) is in the early stages of evolution with the operators. IMS provides a framework for dealing with IP services in a centralized, controlled fashion that provides greater opportunities for multimedia services across virtually any device, network, and operator. LTE and IMS work hand-in-hand as the former provides greater bandwidth and the latter greater control over multimedia services. However, IMS does not come without a price as it introduces more application variations and greater demands on the network due to many different protocols and procedures involved as well as greater demands on backbone IP bandwidth.
The Need for Comprehensive Monitoring
With the introduction of LTE, there is a need for operators to consider a comprehensive range of monitoring solutions. By addressing the issues as an integral part of broadband wireless network evolution, operators will ensure that their networks are able to encompass and sustain a wide variety of applications, new network elements, protocols, and procedures. Monitoring solutions will need to be highly configurable, flexible, and ideally are invisible or seamless to network and customer operations. Due to the many and varied potential applications and requirements, there is a need for solutions that consider many factors. Accordingly, solutions will come from vendors that have experience dealing with the challenge of juggling many factors within core network signaling, switching, intelligent networks, transport and a variety of different protocols and media types.
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