WHITE PAPER
Mobile standards bodies, including the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP and 3GPP2), the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA), and other groups recommend IP as a common standard for mobile data traffic to support emerging IP-based mobility applications. IP packet switching and associated advances in networking technologies, including IP/Multiprotocol Label Switching (IP/MPLS), offer faster deployment and easier integration of mobile applications, better security, higher availability, and more efficient network management than existing technology. A broad range of network management tools from Cisco Systems® help mobile operators to make the transition to a converged network environment over a Cisco® IP/MPLS backbone.
THIS PAPER DESCRIBES THE SUITE OF STANDARDS-BASED CISCO IP/MPLS MANAGEMENT TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGIES AVAILABLE FROM CISCO AND CISCO IOS SOFTWARE THAT HELP MOBILE OPERATORS INCREASE THE OVERALL RELIABILITY, AVAILABILITY, AND SERVICEABILITY (RAS) OF THEIR CONVERGED NETWORKS WHEN OFFERING VOICE, DATA, AND VIDEO SERVICES.
SUMMARY
Emerging IP applications in mobile networks such as mobile voice, mobile Internet, network-based messaging with Short Message Service (SMS), instant messaging, Multimedia Message Service (MMS), cellular data, and other advances in networking technologies (Figure 1) are allowing mobile operators to generate new revenue from emerging IP services and efficiencies.
Figure 1
Relevance of IP in Mobile Networks and Services
Mobile operators can also lower operating and capital expenditures (OpEx and CapEx) through the consolidation and migration of their existing ATM, TDM, and Frame Relay networks to a converged IP/MPLS backbone and VPN technologies at Layer 2 and Layer 3. Cisco IP/MPLS can operate over MPLS-enabled ATM switches, which helps protect investments as mobile operators transition from ATM to IP and transform their businesses.
Multiservice IP networking products and solutions for mobile networks from Cisco help to transform the design, profitability, and cost-effectiveness of mobile networks around the world. Mobile operators are at different stages of migrating to third-generation/fourth-generation (3G/4G) mobile network services and architectures and new IP services and applications (Figure 2). Standards bodies, such as 3GPP and 3GPP2, recommend IP for mobile network traffic. 4G standards development is moving toward IP-addressable mobile phones and other devices.
Figure 2
Disparate Networks Move to a Single IP/MPLS Mobility Backbone.
Mobile operators have been deploying mobile services for data, voice, and multimedia in disparate parts of their traditional networks. Many now are actively engaged in researching or deploying both existing and new mobile services based on an IP/MPLS network backbone. As the leading global IP expert and with broad networking experience and products, Cisco works with mobile operators to assist them in taking advantage of the many compelling benefits from a migration to a converged wireless network backbone based on IP/MPLS.
The Cisco IP/MPLS-based architecture and products-tested with successful deployments by most wireline service providers worldwide-provide the end-to-end quality of service (QoS), network security, scalability, resiliency, and management enhancements for deploying data, voice, and video services. These industry-leading carrier-class features run on the broad Cisco family of powerful hardware, ranging from the Cisco CRS-1 Carrier Routing System, the world's most powerful router, to the popular Cisco 7600 Series routers for the provider edge and enterprise metropolitan-area network (MAN) and WAN, and to an array of customer edge and access routers.
Mobile operators can generate new revenue streams from emerging IP services. They also can reduce complexity, lower operating and capital expenditures through the consolidation and migration of their existing ATM, TDM, and Frame Relay networks and business processes to a converged IP/MPLS backbone with VPN technologies at Layer 2 and Layer 3.
A crucial part of a converged Cisco IP/MPLS wireless backbone provided by Cisco are the proven, dependable, and integrated carrier-class network management solutions from Cisco that can lower the total cost of ownership (TCO) and enhance the productivity of network support professionals.
The management requirements at each layer of mobile networks have been carefully addressed by Cisco to provide operators with all the tools they need to efficiently deploy new and converged services over a Cisco IP/MPLS backbone. Cisco technologies that provide management functions in mobile IP/MPLS environments cover the fault, configuration, accounting, performance, and security (FCAPS) standard network management model. They go beyond to provide fully automated techniques for deployment, provisioning, monitoring network performance, measuring traffic down to the end user, and engineering different types of traffic to conform to defined service classes. These standards-based management technologies from Cisco raise the bar on migration to and management of IP/MPLS-based backbones. They are designed to increase IT operational efficiencies and reduce human error. Together, Cisco technologies for IP/MPLS backbone management add up to a management infrastructure that mobile operators can trust. It also uses global expertise in Cisco IOS Software and can provide bottom-line savings in time, resources, CapEx, and OpEx.
CHALLENGE
Today, an explosion of IP-based data, voice, and multimedia services for mobile users (including VPN access to public and private wireless networks, packetized data and voice, Internet access, and e-mail) is driving multimedia capabilities to mobile devices. Whether in the office, at the café, in the airport, or in the car, the mobile user is increasingly demanding greater access to data services. The worldwide market for cellular data services is expected to grow from US$33 billion in 2003 to US$82 billion in 2007 and data-capable mobile devices will grow from 22 percent of mobile devices to 75 percent in that timeframe, according to the market research firm Ovum.
Mobile operators worldwide face a highly competitive market environment where success in attracting and maintaining subscribers and staying profitable are based on offering new mobile services while reducing costs. As they migrate their networks to 3G architectural standards, mobile operators must support data networks already in place, typically based on ATM, TDM, and Frame Relay. Noted corporate enterprises, a growing number of service providers, and industry groups including the ATM Forum, MPLS, and Frame Relay Alliance have determined that traditional cellular, voice-centric technologies and their associated frameworks have proven bandwidth inefficient, overly expensive, and impractical to manage for integrated, mobile, multimedia IP-based applications. IP/MPLS is being embraced as a much more attractive alternative.
Mobility Network Management Requirements
Implementation of IP by itself in mobile networks is not sufficient to meet all of the necessary requirements for RAS-especially in the last-mile narrowband link of the Radio Access Network (RAN). A converged IP/MPLS backbone must be able to apply the appropriate QoS to each traffic stream and must be interoperable with existing and future radio access network technologies. The network readily must scale to support new services, greater throughput, and a greater footprint. The network must be resilient, providing at least 99.999 percent availability, and easy to service when faults occur. Network management technologies have been developed and tested over time to handle each of these requirements for dependable end-to-end performance in converged mobile networks running differentiated services.
Cisco provides comprehensive management tools and leading practices for the efficient planning, design, implementation, and operations of carrier-class IP/MPLS networks. Cisco IP/MPLS networks adhere to carrier-class FCAPS model service requirements. Provisioning and monitoring of network failures and network performance to verify service-level agreements (SLAs) and policy management are provided, giving mobile operators a comprehensive framework for managing, troubleshooting, measuring, and enhancing converged multimedia services over their mobile networks.
For example, voice trunking or virtual leased-line applications require the equivalent of an emulated circuit point-to-point connection in the network, with bandwidth guarantees. Network devices must be capable of scheduling traffic so that voice always receives enough of the link capacity under any congestion conditions. Bandwidth guarantees, however, do not always ensure a proper delay or jitter guarantee. By carefully selecting the path across the network using traffic engineering, different classes can receive different minimum guarantees according to the service class. Applications such as voice trunking require the support of consistent and predictable network behavior. Network devices introduce jitter during traffic queuing and scheduling. Jitter bounds must be established in the end nodes for smooth playback of voice at the receiving end. Having network-level visibility into the behavior of the network and appropriate management features are critical to ensure efficient and stable voice services.
These are some of the many challenges and requirements for managing mobile networks transitioning to IP data services. All have been recognized by Cisco, based on extensive experience with thousands of wireline service provider and customer networks of all types and sizes. The broad range of feature-rich solutions to manage and monitor new mobile network deployments, individual network elements, and diverse traffic and network types are the result of the work of thousands of Cisco engineers, exhaustive testing, and years of real use by Cisco customers worldwide.
SOLUTION
Cisco IP/MPLS Backbone Overview
Cisco IP/MPLS provides a common network backbone to encapsulate and transport voice and data traffic. This results in lower CapEx and OpEx. Transmission costs can be reduced. Design and planning can be centralized, processes can be streamlined, and development cycles can be greatly shortened. The common Cisco IP/MPLS backbone allows mobile operators to offer a range of new IP-based services quickly, efficiently, and securely. To make the move to IP/MPLS, mobile operators must be fully convinced that the result will enhance the bandwidth availability, QoS, uptime, security, and resilience already in their networks. Cisco, a pioneer of IP/MPLS, provides important traffic engineering and QoS technologies so that mobile operators can deploy IP/MPLS backbones-as thousands of service providers around the world have done-with confidence and operational integrity.
Tunneling, encapsulation, and other methods have been used for many years in different applications to solve migration challenges. Cisco offers a number of Layer 2 and Layer 3 IP/MPLS-based solutions to assist in migration and consolidation and enable the right service within the mobile operator's infrastructure. Cisco Any Transport over MPLS (AToM), a standards-based Pseudowire Emulation Edge-to-Edge (PWE3), has become the de-facto solution that allows service providers with existing Cisco IP/MPLS backbones to offer Layer 2 connectivity by expanding service offerings to connect Ethernet, ATM, Frame Relay, and Serial/Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) networks. AToM is a scalable architecture based on label switching that allows multiplexing of connections. It is a standards-based open architecture and can be extended to other transport types.
Many mobile operators have implemented connection-oriented ATM networks in the backbone. Although ATM is designed to provide QoS, bandwidth, and the ability to perform traffic engineering, an ATM network without MPLS does not scale well for VPNs because it relies on virtual circuit state information in the core. For every virtual circuit created as part of a Layer 2 VPN, the core switches must keep the complete state for the virtual circuit. Cisco IP/MPLS AToM, however, links any pair of provider edge (PE) routers with a single Label-Switched Path (LSP) instead of a multitude of virtual circuits. That single LSP then serves as a carrier of many emulated virtual circuits through label stacking, for better scalability.
With Cisco AToM, mobile operators can build virtual leased-line services and provide connectivity regardless of physical connections at each site (Figure 3).
Figure 3
Layer 2 Virtual Leased Line with Cisco AToM.
Cisco AToM was designed to work within mobile networks in an open, standards-based environment. Along with the industry's leading QoS, traffic engineering, and the ability to map virtual circuits to traffic engineering tunnels, Cisco AToM reliably can emulate circuits across the Cisco IP/MPLS backbone. Extensive operations, administration, and management (OAM) features, such as status notification and emulation, make possible successful tunneling of ATM circuits.
Cisco IP Solution Center
Cisco IP Solution Center (Figure 4), a carrier-class management solution, is a centralized family of network management applications. Its many technologies let mobile operators plan, provision, and manage ATM, Frame Relay, TDM, Ethernet, PPP, High-Level Data Link Control (HDLC) traffic, and Layer 2 and Layer 3 VPNs across multiple sites through a unified IP/MPLS backbone. Simplified provisioning and automated troubleshooting lower the TCO of mobile networks.
The four primary management modules of the Cisco IP Solution Center are Layer 3 IP/MPLS VPNs, Layer 2 VPNs, AToM IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering, and IP/MPLS Troubleshooting.
Figure 4
Cisco IP Solution Center
With Cisco IP Solution Center, mobile operators can:
• Manage resources such as Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) autonomous system, regions, customers, customer sites, access domains, provider administrative domains, VPN routing and forwarding (VRF) names, IP addresses, VLAN IDs, pseudowire virtual circuit IDs, route distinguishers, and route targets
• Define Layer 2 VPN and Layer 3 VPN provisioning parameters in a service policy and upload the network element configuration to calculate the change in configuration needed to help ensure successful service activation
• Provide post-provisioning validation of the service design to determine if the Layer 2/Layer 3 VPN is active and functioning
• Reduce time to market for introduction of new services and reduce the cost of upgrading versions of Cisco IOS Software and line cards by providing extensive support for the latest Cisco hardware and Cisco IOS Software versions
• Protect against link, node, or Shared Risk Link Group (SRLG) failures by installing backup tunnels
• Generate IP/MPLS traffic engineering (TE) tunnel paths that meet user-specified constraints including bandwidth, affinity, and delay
• Propose fixes to meet user-specified constraints for new tunnel demands
• Perform global reoptimization of primary tunnel placements to improve network utilization
Cisco IP/MPLS Embedded Management
Cisco IP/MPLS Embedded Management technologies provide mobile operators with a robust set of OAM tools. These tools and features have been available in ATM and Frame Relay-based WAN backbones. Layer 3 technologies, such as Cisco IOS IP SLAs, have been available more recently. All of these tools and features provide FCAPS management functions (Figure 5) for the array of different traffic types.
Figure 5
FCAPS Functions in Cisco IP/MPLS Embedded Management
Cisco IP/MPLS Embedded Management capabilities are based on emerging IETF draft standards that enable mobile operators to guarantee service levels across an IP/MPLS-based network, regardless of the subscriber interface connecting customers to the WAN service. For example, IP/MPLS MIBs, accessible by third-party management systems through the industry-standard Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), bring together the various service views needed to quickly troubleshoot a converged IP/MPLS network. In addition, the ability to automate the IP/MPLS OAM tools through the deployment of Cisco IOS IP SLAs performance measurement technology will help mobile operators automate critical fault detection mechanisms in IP/MPLS networks. Cisco IOS Software is the only software that supports IP/MPLS-aware Cisco NetFlow Version 9.0 for per-VPN traffic monitoring, a primary requirement for traffic monitoring from the backbone to the user (Figure 6).
As mobile operators and wireline service providers worldwide converge disparate networks and migrate services onto Cisco IP/MPLS backbones, the Cisco IP/MPLS OAM capabilities become pivotal in providing SLA guarantees, service assurance, QoS assurance, and overall internetworking service management. Network operators need the ability to conduct SLA testing reliably, detect IP/MPLS control- and forwarding-plane defects, and check IP/MPLS forwarding path integrity in real time. A mobile operator that plans to offer managed services on an IP/MPLS-based infrastructure must make sure to deploy IP/MPLS OAM capabilities to support premium SLAs.
Figure 6
Cisco IP/MPLS Embedded Management Components
Cisco IP/MPLS LSP Ping and Traceroute
Cisco IP/MPLS LSP Ping/Traceroute facilitates the diagnostics and troubleshooting of IP/MPLS LSPs. When an LSP fails to deliver user traffic, the failure cannot always be detected by the IP/MPLS control plane. To enhance the verification of IP/MPLS data plane, the commonly used IP data plane verification tools-ping and traceroute-are extended to work on the MPLS networks. IP/MPLS Ping allows verification of LSP connectivity and the integrity of the IP/MPLS network. Ping mode can test the integrity of connectivity using verification on the Forward Equivalence Class (FEC) entity between the ping origin and the egress node for that particular FEC. This test is carried out by sending an IP/MPLS echo request along the same data path as other packets belonging to this FEC (Figure 7). When the ping packet reaches the end of the path, it is sent to the control plane of the egress label switch router (LSR), which verifies that it is indeed an egress for the FEC. The IP/MPLS echo request contains information about the FEC whose IP/MPLS path is being verified.
Figure 7
Cisco IP/MPLS Ping
Cisco IP/MPLS Traceroute is used for hop-by-hop fault localization and LSP path tracing. In the traceroute LSP verification, the packet is sent to the control plane of each transit LSR, which performs various checks, including one that determines if it is a transit LSR for this path. Each transit LSR returns extra information related to the FEC being tested (label bound to the FEC, for example). This information helps when checking the control plane against the data plane (for example, in checking if local forwarding information matches what the routing protocols have determined as the path). IP/MPLS Traceroute operation is performed using a manipulation on the time-to-live (TTL) settings. Cisco IP Solution Center and Cisco Information Center use IP/MPLS Ping and IP/MPLS Traceroute to verify the connectivity between provider edge and customer edge routers.
Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel-Primary and Backup
Cisco MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel lets mobile operators automatically set up traffic engineering tunnels (Figure 8). The two variants of AutoTunnels for protection capabilities are primary and backup. Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel Primary is a one-hop primary tunnel that, when used in conjunction with Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering Fast Reroute protection, protects any traffic steered through the primary "one-hop tunnel." This means that any traffic, including IP traffic going through the physical link, is protected by Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering Fast Reroute. Similarly, Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel Backup provides the capability to build MPLS traffic engineering backup tunnels automatically for the primary traffic engineering tunnel. These backup tunnels are set up mainly using "next-hop" or "next-next-hop" protection, whenever available. A manually configured backup tunnel is preferred and provides "tweaking capabilities" for AutoTunnel features. Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel automates the configuration tasks in the deployment of Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering Fast Reroute.
Figure 8
Cisco IOS MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel
Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel-Mesh Groups
Cisco IP/MPLS Traffic Engineering AutoTunnel Mesh Group focuses on the ability to increase the amount of bandwidth available over the same IP/MPLS infrastructure. It automates the configuration tasks in deployment of full-mesh IP/MPLS traffic engineering tunnels. A full mesh of similar IP/MPLS traffic engineering tunnels sharing the same attributes automatically is built between the router's member of a "specific mesh group."
By deploying a full mesh of traffic engineering tunnels, some wireline service providers have reported a gain of 40 to 50 percent of additional bandwidth availability over the same infrastructure. This represents a significant reduction in capital expenses.
This kind of tool typically is needed when transitioning an IP/MPLS network to a fully meshed IP/MPLS traffic engineering tunnel, which requires heavy configuration. It is highly desirable when adding a new router in a fully meshed IP/MPLS traffic engineering core, where traffic engineering tunnels to every existing router from the new one are needed.
Cisco IOS IP SLAs
Cisco IOS IP SLAs are widely used when network performance measurement and SLA monitoring data (such as jitter statistics, packet loss, and round-trip time) are required within an IP-based network (Figure 9). Cisco IOS IP SLAs in Cisco IOS Software collect network performance data in real time, including response time, one-way latency, one-way jitter, one-way packet loss, voice quality measurement, and other network statistics.
Cisco IOS IP SLAs provide unidirectional and bidirectional measurements and support measurements per class of service. Proactive notification and threshold violation monitoring for jitter, packet loss, latency, and connectivity are available and performance statistics are available in the SNMP MIBs. Cisco IOS IP SLAs provide unique tools that allow monitoring of IP/MPLS Layer 3-based VPNs and reporting through the Cisco IP Solution Center.
Figure 9
Cisco IOS IP SLAs for End-to-End Performance Monitoring and Reporting
The Cisco IP Solution Center IP/MPLS VPN Management feature is an IP/MPLS VPN provisioning and auditing tool. It focuses on the provider edge routers, customer edge routers, and the link between them. Cisco IP Solution Center can use either a Telnet gateway or Cisco Configuration Center software to transport configuration file information to and from target routers. Cisco IOS IP SLAs are deployed on provider-edge and customer-edge routers using SNMP.
Cisco IP/MPLS-Aware NetFlow
Cisco NetFlow capitalizes on the flow nature of traffic in the network to provide detailed IP accounting information with minimal impact on router and switch performance. Cisco NetFlow monitors IP flows in routers and switches and exports the flows in User Datagram Protocol (UDP) format to a NetFlow collector (Figure 10). The NetFlow collector correlates, aggregates, and reports on the data received from the network. This data can be used for purposes that include network management and planning, enterprise accounting, departmental chargeback, use-based billing, and data warehousing and mining for marketing purposes. Cisco NetFlow Version 9 and beyond extends NetFlow to support MPLS label information, IPv6 information, BGP next-hop, and multicast information. Several excellent third-party tools are available to collect, aggregate, and report on NetFlow data.
Figure 10
Cisco NetFlow-Creating Export Packets
Cisco IP/MPLS-Aware NetFlow can determine and account for traffic to a particular destination in the IP/MPLS cloud. It accounts for IP/MPLS traffic that contains IP or non-IP packets and can include the MPLS header as part of the accounting information.
Cisco IP/MPLS VCCV
As mobile operators deploy AToM services, the ability to provide end-to-end fault detection and diagnostics for an emulated pseudowire service is critical for the network operator. Cisco IP/MPLS VCCV enhances the monitoring and troubleshooting of Layer 2 services across an IP/MPLS network. VCCV creates a control channel between the two termination points of the pseudowire provider edge devices to uniquely identify the connectivity verification packets from the regular Layer 2 payloads. Ideally, such a control channel would be completely in band. When a control word is present on virtual circuit, it is possible to indicate the control channel by setting a bit in the control header. To ensure smooth interoperability between the different devices participating in the pseudowire service, however, the use of an IP/MPLS router alert label to indicate the control channel is supported. The combination of VCCV and IP/MPLS Ping/Traceroute simplifies the operation, management, and troubleshooting of the emulated Layer 2 service end-to-end. IP/MPLS Ping allows an administrator to start a Cisco Extended Ping operation, which opens a session to a remote Cisco IOS Software-based device to execute an extended ping. The IP/MPLS Traceroute tool allows an administrator to open a session to a remote Cisco IOS Software-based device to execute an extended traceroute operation.
Cisco Info Center
Cisco Info Center (Figure 11) provides a high-performance, distributed, and integrated client-server system for alarm and event management from diverse sources, including many different vendor products and standard management platforms. Simplified partitioned views are achieved easily through the Cisco Info Center Desktop and increase productivity with no dependency or limitation to an underlying network management platform.
The Cisco Info Center facilitates the integration of other vendor equipment through readily available Info Mediators (or probes). It simplifies configuration of Info Mediators distributed throughout the network. It provides a central configuration tool that allows for centralized Info Mediator rules file administration, and can centrally restart distributed Info Mediators, causing them to reread modified configuration files. Cisco Info Center is an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) product based on Micromuse's Netcool technology, Version 3.5. It includes automations and customization specific to Cisco device and operations support system (OSS) solutions.
Figure 11
Cisco Info Center
The key purpose of Cisco Info Center is to consolidate, de-duplicate, filter, and correlate fault and alarm information from a wide range of management platforms and products. The Cisco Info Center solution provides a powerful, customizable fault management environment that filters out the noise in the network using event-triggered automations, and allows operators to focus on what is important-critical network and service-affecting alarms. This function, coupled with the Cisco Info Center VPN Policy Manager, enables a deeper understanding of which IP/MPLS VPNs are affected by a network fault.
Cisco Info Center collects, consolidates, and correlates events from more than 1000 unique networking environments in real time, and presents this information in a meaningful, intuitive, visual format so that administrators can act upon and prevent business processes from being negatively affected by network events. The severity of events can be monitored through color-coded Cisco Info Center EventLists. In addition, Cisco Info Center Dashboards give customized service views that can be managed using UNIX, Windows NT, and Web-based graphical tools. Whether the infrastructure includes mainframes, UNIX and Windows NT platforms, circuit and voice switches, IP routers, SNMP devices, or management frameworks, Cisco Info Center helps monitor it, reducing alarms and helping to decrease the mean time to resolution of problems.
Cisco Info Center is a multivendor, end-to-end fault management solution that offers flexibility in consolidating events and alarms from many different vendors and technologies. Cisco Info Center facilitates the integration of other vendor equipment using readily available Info Mediators (or probes) developed by OEM provider Micromuse. These Mediators are all operational in both Cisco Info Center and Netcool Omnibus. They can plug into Cisco Info Center for consolidation. Mediators perform the role of event normalization, thus allowing other vendor events and alarms to be displayed through the same screens as those used to collect Cisco alarms and events. Cisco resells the entire library of Info Mediators on a single CD. These Mediators are supported by Cisco with a back-end support by Micromuse.
Cisco CNS Family
The Cisco CNS Programmable Network augments standard device-level operations systems by incorporating intelligent agents in devices within Cisco IOS Software, capable of producing event-based instrumentation data for granular management across the FCAPS functions. Intelligent FCAPS policy engines correlate events and aggregate FCAPS data from each device and network domain, for a consolidated view of the network.
Operating alongside the architectural layers of the Internet OSS model is a common set of services based on International Telecommunication Union (ITU), IETF, and TeleManagement Forum (TMF) standards. These common services (which include security, workflow, equipment inventory, topology, and event management) enable mobile operators to eliminate the traditional approach where each application has to maintain its own database, workflow management, and other services. Finally, a middleware publish-and-subscribe bus enables communication within the Internet OSS. It allows device agents and OSS applications to "produce and consume" device and network information in a peer-to-peer model using role-based authorizations.
CONCLUSION
Cisco Systems is the world leader in IP/MPLS technologies, offering a broad range of products and management tools. Today Cisco provides mobile operators with a suite of solutions that address all of the essential service quality requirements for reliable, available, serviceable, scalable, secure, and manageable multiservice mobile networks.
The future of the next generation of mobile networks lies with IP, and as more mobile data applications are built and delivered using IP, Cisco is working to make the transition to IP/MPLS converged networks smooth and cost-effective. Cisco is radio technology agnostic, working with many partners to make sure that mobile operators have the best-in-class solutions. With unparalleled technical expertise, global coverage, channel relationships, and product maturity in all facets of Internetworking, Cisco is delivering the solutions mobile operators need today to prepare for tomorrow.
The Cisco next-generation mobility framework for mobile operators, based on a Cisco IP/MPLS network backbone, includes six technology pillars (Figure 12):
Figure 12
The Six Pillars of the Cisco Next-Generation Mobility Framework for Mobile Operators
The six pillars of the Cisco next-generation mobility framework for mobile operators include:
• Cisco IP/MPLS Backbone, a common transport and integrated management platform for the convergence of packetized data, voice, and video services over existing ATM, TDM, and Frame Relay networks
• Cisco Mobile Exchange, the intelligent mobile Internet edge solution set that links the RAN to IP networks and their value-added services; simplifies and enhances service delivery independent of underlying access technologies with functions supporting service selection and control, flexible billing models, security, Mobile IP, and load balancing
• Cisco IP RAN optimization technology, which takes IP all the way to the cellular site and interoperates with leading wireless vendors, can lower backhaul costs dramatically, improve cell site maintenance, and enable operators to easily add 3G radios to a cell site
• The Cisco IP Transfer Point platform, which increases Signaling System 7 (SS7) signaling efficiency and lowers circuit costs by moving signaling traffic to IP, can help mobile operators dramatically decrease the costs of services such as SMS, mobile number portability, custom ring tone downloads, and other resource-intensive new applications
• Cisco Mobile Voice solutions include high capacity, carrier-class voice gateways that offer standards-based support for voice over IP (VoIP) and voice over ATM (VoATM) services; wireless trunking that replaces traditional TDM trunking with aggregated VoIP transport between mobile switching centers
• Cisco Public/Private Wireless LAN solutions offer access points, access zone routers, and Cisco Mobile Exchange for service selection, content billing, and other features for consumer, enterprise, and service provider markets
Business Transformation for Mobile Operators
IP is the foundation and base technology for the next-generation communications architecture. IP/MPLS is one step in the move to 3G/4G network services where IP is of increasing importance. To help mobile operators manage the complexity of their existing array of networks and applications while introducing next-generation services cost-effectively, the Cisco IP Factory was created. The Cisco IP Factory, which is available through the Cisco Customer Advocacy Organization, helps mobile operators capture and simplify existing processes and technologies, creating modular service components. Successful application of this model can yield up to 25 percent in operational cost savings per year for mobile network operators.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Cisco IP/MPLS Management: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/index.html.
Cisco IP Solution Center: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/sw/netmgtsw/ps4748/index.html.
Cisco IP/MPLS Embedded Management: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/tech/tk436/tk892/tech_brief09186a00801f4a8d.html.