Network capacity and cost is being severely impacted by a combination of factors related to subscriber mobility and these impacts are only getting worse.

The factors that are driving increased signaling at present include:

(i) Increased signaling associated with 2G -> 3G technology migration and the increased number of handoff types (hard, soft, softer handoff)
(ii) Inter technology hand-offs between 2G and 3G (IRAT)
(iii) The increased number of handoff types associated with handoff between different network domains (E.g. 2G/2G, 2G/3G, 3G/3G)

The signaling occurring within a mobile network only supports the delivery of services and does not directly generate revenue for an Operator. Also the more signaling there is – the more messages must be processed by the CPU’s of the different network elements – inhibiting their ability to process revenue earning transactions. Hence it can be viewed as a ‘tax’ on the network that should be avoided at all costs.

With growing demand for bandwidth, rapid advances in broadband technology and the convergence of fixed and mobile networks/services the ‘tax’ impacts of mobility related signaling will only get worse, for example:

(i) As Operators begin to use second carriers the management of 2G/3G handoff becomes more intense and complex to manage, because it is happening at two different frequencies, with different in-building penetration.
(ii) Roaming between different technologies such as UMTS/Wi-Max and Fixed/ Mobile (IMS) creates new hand-off domains, leading to new hand-off types
(iii) An increase in hand-offs between different domains creates increased signaling intensity.

The inherent design of UMTS networks means that mobility related signaling has a major impact on network capacity across many network elements, including RNC’s, SGSN’s MSC’s and HLR’s – In many instances I have seen real-world capacity erosion on these system elements upwards of 50% – and with the advent of LTE, mobility management moves to the e-Node B’s giving rise to a similar problem at the base stations.

To help overcome this problem and ensure optimal performance, it is important for Operators to adopt a more sophisticated approach to Network Capacity Management that incorporates an assessment of subscriber mobility impacts on all the critical network elements.

The Cerion team has been working in this area for many years and is proud of the innovation we have delivered – in Artificial Intelligence (AI) based methods for characterizing and minimizing mobility impacts across key network elements –These solutions are being used by some of the worlds largest Operators to help improve network capacity, reduce costs and maximize End User Quality of Service.

With the escalating challenges in this space, we look forward to continuing on this path and leveraging our innovations to help Operators maximize their performance and shareholder returns.