Pressure Points: The New Intelligent Network

Few telecom professionals would disagree with this proposition: “Legacy intelligent network architectures are inadequate to meet the requirements of the new services and new consumption models revolutionizing telecommunications."

Actually developing a timely framework for planning and building a new intelligent architecture is much more nuanced than the fundamental proposition, however.

Here is a quick look at four pressure points confronting network architects:

A: “The inflection point for when ... visibility and intelligence becomes a make-or-break proposition is not too far off. The 4G Americas group expects more 3G and 4G connectivity to be embedded in consumer electronics and enterprise devices going forward, reaching a penetration level of 50 billion connected things relying on mobile broadband by 2010." Source: V2M Report, “Architecting the New Intelligent Network," p. 4 (emphasis added).

Q: The new intelligent network will need a flexible core, and the development work for that core is still underway, correct?

A: “Because service providers will be maintaining hybrid networks for quite some time, managing subscribers across multiple access types and potentially networks while providing a common experience becomes an important priority. And it is here that the Evolved Packet Core, or EPC, offers the elasticity to do just that. ‘There’s a lot of talk about the EPC, and how it has been designed for all access technologies, not just 4G,’ said Cisco’s [Andy] Capener. ‘Utilizing that function to manage the subscriber as they do different things and move around the network means implementing an intelligent packet core that can move in concert with policy and control functions.’" Ibid, p. 8

Q: In this environment, isn’t the key to the backhaul challenge going to be to simply build a bigger pipe?

A: “… new approaches to backhaul center around the mobile data tsunami and how to address that efficiently. Carriers are essentially looking to deliver mobile backhaul efficiently to maintain their margins, while at the same time delivering extremely robust, redundant, highly recoverable services. … the theme of today’s backhaul is how to address the tsunami without building an ark – how to address it on a surfboard,’ said Jennifer Pigg, a Yankee Group analyst." Ibid, p. 15.

Q: What is V2M’s takeaway?

A: “… operators will need to build out their next-generation mobile broadband networks to not only provide efficiency and optimization, but also offer flexibility for innovating in their business models. Because these business models have yet to be decided, new networks will need to be scalable, armed with real-time intelligence and able to move holistically to adjust for subscriber behavior and changing traffic profiles as new services come on board and are adopted." Ibid, p. 7.

The complete V2M Report, “Architecting the New Intelligent Network," is available for free here .