A new silver lining for MBB when networks go cloudy

Key takeaways:

• NB-IoT terminals are close to good for close to ubiquitous protection as a consequence of their value and power-use benefits.
• By establishing an MVNO subsidiary, operators can develop new companies below new manufacturers.

Mobile Internet has enabled OTT companies to flourish, breaking the unique worth chain and creating large challenges for telcos. Because present networks are now not as much as the duty of assembly the various wants of various verticals, cloud networks may help operators increase enterprise boundaries, create new enterprise fashions, and construct open ecosystems.

IoT Packet Core

IoT is ready to turn into a key blue-ocean market sooner or later, with Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) as the principle enabling tech. NB-IoT terminals are close to good for close to ubiquitous protection: They’re cheap, devour little or no energy, and supply Plug and Play performance. 

One NB-IoT software is sensible parking, which given at this time’s city congestion is required greater than ever. In reality, some 30 p.c of site visitors jams are attributable to drivers trying for a parking spot. Intelligent parking programs find areas right away, which drivers can then reserve to keep away from driving round heaps to look for empty ones.

Huawei gives an clever parking resolution primarily based on NB-IoT networks. Its important function is IoT Packet Core, which gives scalable and versatile community assist for IoT functions as a part of Huawei’s CloudEdge resolution. 

IoT Packet Core gives sign administration performance for low-power and low-cost UE, enhanced protection, and congestion management. For instance, NB-IoT enhances 20 dB extra protection than GPRS, permitting close to ubiquitous community protection and fixing the issue of weak indicators in underground parking heaps. Vehicle detectors primarily based on NB-IoT are plug-and-play, present a decade’s battery life, and are very straightforward to take care of. The resolution additionally gives carrier-grade reliability and safety.

In 2016, Huawei carried out demonstrations of the clever parking system with a lot of operators in several components of the world, together with Bell in Canada, T-Mobile in Germany, ET within the UAE, Shanghai Unicom in China, and LG U+ in South Korea. At the top of 2016, Huawei began deploying the system commercially for Shanghai Disney in partnership with Shanghai Unicom.

CloudMSE

The information explosion and recognition of good units and cell broadband (MBB) are driving the fast growth of the MBB market. But, companies have gotten extra complicated. With fastened and cell networks converging, operators are going through extra difficulties with revenue fashions, billing, and consumer expertise.

Huawei’s CloudMSE resolution relies on the cloudification know-how GiLAN. The resolution gives a number of forms of entry strategies, together with GPRS, UMTS, LTE, CDMA, WiFi, and Fix. It gives service-based billing and bandwidth management, service consciousness, and a third-party app integration platform for good service chain. CloudMSE allows built-in operations and administration on third-party apps, and flexibly orchestrates the service chain primarily based on consumer, entry sort, and OTT companies. New companies will be rapidly launched, serving to operators shorten TTM and decrease CAPEX and OPEX by fixing the administration issues on conventional MBB networks.

Intelligent service aggregation platform

Standardized operation fashions and an excellent service expertise are operators’ core aggressive strengths. For MBB networks, service utilization frequency and loyalty are decided by consumer expertise, which immediately impacts operators’ earnings. QoE is in flip decided by a spread of things reminiscent of the novelty, richness, tariff, and entry pace of companies.

To retain high-value customers, ship numerous and personalised companies, and refine pipe operations, extra cell operators are rising community features on the Gi interface. These embrace new companies reminiscent of header enhancement, transmission optimization, content material optimization, content material filtering, and advert insertion. Huawei’s CloudMSE resolution gives a wise companies aggregation platform that integrates industry-leading third-party functions and gives extra agile and environment friendly GiLAN options for operators.

Extensive third-party capabilities assist construct the app ecosystem

Operators can vastly improve consumer expertise, enhance loyalty, and entice new subscribers with VAS, exact pipe operations utilizing the Gi interface information, and features reminiscent of content material optimization and acceleration. Huawei’s CloudMSE resolution integrates industry-leading third-party VAS functions, permitting operators to quickly deploy VAS options, optimize pipeline operations, and enhance end-user expertise.

The Saudi Arabian provider Zain needed to decrease its worldwide bandwidth and reduce prices by optimizing video site visitors so it might supply extra aggressive service plans. Zain adopted Huawei’s CloudMSE video optimization resolution, deploying the companies aggregation platform and utilizing third-party video optimization modules. This helped the operator scale back bandwidth by 11.57 p.c.

CloudUIC

In at this time’s period of fast MBB site visitors development, operators should extract extra worth from information companies in addition to present pipe bandwidth for connectivity. Better O&M planning and advertising and marketing, automated companies, and improved assist for third-party enterprise functions can all assist create new companies and earnings streams.

Based on Huawei’s CloudEdge resolution, CloudUIC can open community capabilities. It combines and orchestrates varied atomic capabilities on operator networks, offering numerous interfaces that may be invoked by third-party functions. Among these, location and QoS capabilities ship the best worth.

Opening capabilities: Digital Footprint

Huawei’s Digital Footprint resolution integrates MBB community location capabilities for third-party demand, permitting third events to invoke the companies they want by way of APIs. It collects, positions, and analyzes location information for cell operators, together with location historical past evaluation and real-time location evaluation, and opens these as much as third events by way of APIs. Operators and third events can then develop new enterprise fashions for business functions.

Opening capabilities: On-demand acceleration

Huawei’s on-demand acceleration resolution packages operators’ QoS sources into APIs and makes them accessible for Internet functions to invoke. The resolution can speed up OTT companies for tens of tens of millions of customers on demand with out complicated PCC configuration or verification on the PCRF. The important worth of Huawei’s on-demand acceleration resolution lies in offering versatile QoS ensures and simply invoking APIs.

Solutions for verticals

Cloud-based networks trigger numerous necessities and new software eventualities to rapidly emerge, bringing each alternatives and challenges.

Automated MVNO for operators

Opportunity:  MVNO (cell digital community operator) is a new possibility for conventional operators to deploy in particular market segments to answer competitors. By establishing an MVNO subsidiary, operators can develop new companies below new manufacturers and undertake extra radical market methods to draw prospects with out being tied to their unique manufacturers or buyer bases.

Challenge: MVNOs are individually deployed, and miniaturized gear is required to decrease prices; completely different MVNO prospects require completely different variations, options, and O&M strategies; and extremely steady {hardware} is required to supply QoS ensures.

Enterprise wi-fi broadband

Opportunity: As LTE know-how matures and develops, 4G chips and terminals are getting cheaper, and 4G functions are rising in popularity. Operators can deploy LTE small cells and enterprise-level developed packet core (EPC) inside massive firms. Local information companies will be accessed by way of native breakout (LBO), offering the shortest path. This helps scale back using useful EPC spine bandwidth and community site visitors, nevertheless it additionally improves consumer expertise. In addition, SMEs can think about outsourcing workplace wi-fi community infrastructure to operators to scale back the quantity they should put money into IT, improve reliability, and allow higher indoor protection to enhance community expertise for workers.

Challenge: Equipment have to be deployable with out requiring set up, configuration, or upkeep, and it have to be straightforward to make use of. It must be low-cost to assist scale back firms’ IT funding burden.

Public security

Opportunity: Public security our bodies should have the ability to take care of occasions like emergencies, civil unrest, site visitors accidents, pure disasters, and enormous public occasions. To accomplish that, these our bodies want to make use of know-how, together with info platforms, huge information programs, and video surveillance.

Natural and man-made disasters have the potential to break communications gear or block it by means of congestion as a consequence of a surge in use. Emergency vehicle-mounted communications programs, together with base stations, miniature EPCs, and cluster servers will be quickly deployed to emergency websites. They permit rescue personnel to speak and supply clustered voice companies inside the sign vary of the vehicle-mounted base station. The resolution ensures the reliability of unified command and dispatch by means of non permanent command facilities.

Challenge: Equipment must be very dependable so it will not be broken or rendered inoperable if catastrophe strikes, and scaled down in dimension so it may be simply deployed on completely different sorts of emergency communications autos.

Huawei’s miniature EPC, aka the Core in a Box, gives 4S performance.

Small: The resolution helps 3U and 1U units that devour little energy, leaving a small footprint. 

Simple: Plug-and-play doesn’t require set up, commissioning, or upkeep, and helps varied administration choices. 

Saving: It’s cheap and doesn’t incur upkeep or excessive vitality prices. 

Stable: The resolution is extraordinarily steady, providing 99.999 p.c carrier-grade reliability and excessive catastrophe resistance.

Huawei’s miniature EPC has enterprise-level ease of use and simple O&M, so it doesn’t require set up, configuration, or upkeep. It additionally meets strict carrier-level downtime necessities and will be quickly deployed at comparatively low value. As a outcome, it’s good for area of interest and new markets.