A Call for Automation in the Last Mile

Copyright 2010 by Virgo Publishing.

http://www.billingworld.com/
By: Dan Baker
Posted on: 02/24/2010



Ask yourself: Where would telecom carriers be if they didn't control the last mile of fixed and
mobile access to the customer?
Take away that last mile "toll gate" and telecoms would be quickly commoditized by the
Microsofts, Googles, RIMs, and Nokias.
But telecoms are spared that worry because no matter how virtual or "over-the-top" our world becomes, it
still needs to obey the laws of physics. Sooner or later, communications needs access to physical things.
Cable pairs, fiber, junction boxes, and line equipment all need to be assigned and connected to switches.
A strawberry-colored iPhone without radio network access is just a glittering chunk of metal and glass.
The Two Basic Types of Activation Platforms
If we've established that automating access networks is profitable, who should you hire to get the job done?
If your network has more than one family of switches, you need to select a vendor of service activation
software.
But first, a word of warning: Your choices here are not easy because activation solutions come from many
different domains. And being good in one domain doesn't make a solution good in another.
Still, the activation market can be broken down into two basic types: local/wireless and transport/IP.
Local and wireless activation is the last mile connectivity variety (and the one we'll talk about in this article).
It is specific to actual customers. Its job is to modify the settings of network elements in access, transport,
DSL and wireless networks. By contrast, transport/IP activation is all about big pipe circuits in the cloud.
The Challenge of Network Interfaces
The biggest obstacle to building a local/wireless activation capability is creating and testing the network
interfaces to the great variety of network elements on the market. Vendors usually offer a limited capability
for activation. If it doesn't contain an active catalog of network interfaces, you may end up with a high cost
of ownership or the need to run activation software on the vendor's inventory system.
Telcordia, with its 25-year Bellcore heritage, shows how activation software has evolved over time.
Traditionally, adapter development was very time-consuming and costly and required custom interfaces.
However, last year Telcordia introduced a new service activation architecture that greatly simplifies the
process. Rather than develop custom or monolithic adapters, Telcordia supplies optional "techpacks", a
combination of data models and scripts that help Java developers write their own interfaces. This latest
version of its Activator product is now proving itself at operators such as Telecom Croatia and Brazil's Oi.
Oracle, too, has proved its ASAP product at dozens of customers, including AT&T, BT, China Telecom and
Vodafone.
Oracle solves the adapter building issue by certifying several systems integrators to support the product. In
fact, almost all of Oracle's integrator partners have developed and deployed ASAP cartridges on their own.
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The process takes three weeks to three months, depending on the complexity of the interface.
Comptel takes yet another approach. It has a series of "strategic" adapters as well as more "tactical"
adapters originally built for particular projects and kept in a library for possible future use. Comptel's
activation solution is used by several global operators, including India's 20 million-subscriber Bharti Aircell.
Leveraging the Power of Activation Software
While activation software has improved greatly in the last decade, integrating new services with old is still
not a seamless process.
Anuradha Sreekumar of Amom Technologies and a former Oracle ASAP expert at Tech Mahindra, believes
telecoms need to devote more time to customizing their activation software.
"If you don't tailor service activation software to your needs, you can't unleash its power," she said. "But
there's a flip side. If you customize too much, you're reliant on a few experts who understand your
customizations, which is problematic if those people churn."
The power Sreekumar talks about is actually a function of many variables: excellent adapters,
customizability, scalability, application high-availability, low cost of ownership and other factors.
Although revenue assurance is not customarily thought of as an activation software virtue, SaskTel
International is one activation vendor who makes that happen. SI, who counts Centurylink as a client, uses
its OSG activation software to reconcile switch data with billing. OSG queries the devices, and then generates
an RA report.
OSG verifies the accuracy of service orders. If, for instance, the OSS erroneously believes a customer exists
on a particular switch, an activation script detects that error and automatically creates the command to fix it.
Conclusion
As popularity surges for next-gen services like IPTV, VoIP, and metro Ethernet, the access network remains
pivotal to delivering those services profitably. And when femtocells emerge as a faster, cheaper alternative to
precious radio access bandwidth, they will rely on cost-effective cables and fiber facilities as their preferred
backhaul path. Any way you stack it: plenty of opportunities for activation software to do its thing.
Dan Baker is Technology Research Institutes (TRI) principal market synthesizer and co-founder. He is a
former market analyst at Venture Development Corporation (VDC), where he tracked the telecom and real-
time computer markets. In 1992 while at VDC he authored one of the first multi-client research reports on
the Advanced Intelligent Network software and systems market. From 2004 through 2008, TRI sold its
research reports exclusively through Dittberner Associates. Baker was the research director and principal
analyst for reports in the Dittberner OSS/BSS KnowledgeBase.
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