incognito_incognito 12/07/2013 18:01 Page 1
Three Top Issues for MSOs
he Cable Industry has been actively launching various initiatives such as cloud computing, WiFi, and connected home. However, in pursuit of additional profits, the fundamental technologies that support these revenue generating services often become afterthoughts. Instead, three crucial issues should be at the forefront in the push to increase average revenue per user: tackling the growth in bandwidth consumption, managing a plethora of different device types, and dealing with the complexity brought on by IPv6.
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Broadband software provisioning and activation solutions specialist Incognito Software gives advice on future-proofing networks and driving up ARPU.
dropped packets or retransmission. Time based SNMP data analysis allows a provider to find out where performance problems may be occurring. Another technology widely used in network analysis is IP Detail Record (IPDR) collection. This protocol allows an application to gather usage patterns, and allows MSOs to collect, process and manage IPDR records from cable modems, embedded multimedia terminal adapters (EMTAs) and set-top boxes through routing elements (i.e. CMTS). The information
Increased Bandwidth Consumption
The growing popularity of over-the-top (OTT) subscriber services such as streaming video, cloud-based applications, and video conferencing results in additional bandwidth demand on MSO networks. This creates bottlenecks during peak hours and a deterioration of the user’s experience. 2012 saw an increase of 41% in peak hour internet traffic compared to a 34% growth in average traffic. Peak traffic will surely continue to outpace average traffic over the next several years, causing more strain on providers’ infrastructure. Today, even temporary service blips are unacceptable to subscribers. 'Bill-shock', caused by unexpected over-consumption charges, is also a leading point of contention between customers and providers. A holistic picture of how and where bandwidth is used within a home network is necessary in educating customers on what and where charges are stemming from. Thankfully, a variety of technologies are available to service providers that will help them keep tabs on service quality, network health, and subscriber consumption patterns. A technology protocol such as Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), provides vital information about underlying network usage. This polling mechanism has been used in the wireline and cable industries for decades, and allows for the extraction of data from most networking equipment. This includes quantitative measures, such as the number of bytes or packets sent or received through any interface on the network, as well as qualitative data, such as the number of
network strain (push vs. poll), obtaining a clear picture of system health, and mapping data to actual subscribers. The last thing you need, when trying to overcome issues with overconsumption and network strain, is to cause more network strain. Unfortunately, some tools rely on active polling in order to gather network intelligence. Look for tools that are efficient and scalable. To stay on top of your network’s health, choose a tool that will not only collect historical data but will also alert you to current network health issues including diagnosing what and where the problems are. The tool should streamline your data collection and reporting process through one interface, as well as provide specific details such as corrected and uncorrectable errors, utilisation, signal-to-noise ratios, etc. Finally, while overall consumption data is useful in identifying traffic trends and aiding in network planning, this data must be easily mapped to specific subscribers so that they too can gain an understanding of how they are using bandwidth. Look for a tool that easily integrates into your OSS, which can categorise traffic into different services flows.
Managing a Plethora of Device Types
While monitoring technologies will help you understand how today’s average household uses devices for social interaction, work, and entertainment, provisioning these devices is also becoming more complex. With multistandard devices becoming the norm, firmware and configuration files are more difficult to manage and administer than ever before. On top of dealing with regional requirements and service specific needs, providers often need to provision multiple devices from a wide range of vendors. Unfortunately, vendors have developed their own methods to configure specialised SIP and TR-069 devices. As a result, providers are stuck with devices that have similar capabilities but are configured in a completely differently manner. The only real option for service providers is to get a device provisioning solution that supports a variety of standards and network types as well as future proofs their investment. When choosing a solution, you should consider the following factors: customisability, flexibility, and expandability for future requirements. The Cable industry is rapidly changing and service providers who want to stay ahead of the game need vendors that provide
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