Service assurance, in
telecommunications
Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that ...
, is the application of policies and processes by a
Communications Service Provider
A telephone company, also known as a telco, telephone service provider, or telecommunications operator, is a kind of communications service provider (CSP), more precisely a telecommunications service provider (TSP), that provides telecommunic ...
(CSP) to ensure that services offered over networks meet a pre-defined
service quality Service quality (SQ), in its contemporary conceptualisation, is a comparison of perceived expectations (E) of a service with perceived performance (P), giving rise to the equation SQ=P-E. This conceptualistion of service quality has its origins in t ...
level for an optimal subscriber experience.
The practice of service assurance enables CSPs to identify faults in the network and resolve these issues in a timely manner so as to minimize service downtime. The practice also includes policies and processes to proactively pinpoint, diagnose and resolve service quality degradations or device malfunctions before subscribers are impacted.
Areas covered
Service assurance encompasses the following:
*
Fault and event management
*
Performance management
Performance management (PM) is the process of ensuring that a set of activities and outputs meets an organization's goals in an effective and efficient manner. Performance management can focus on the performance of a whole organization, a ...
* Probe monitoring
*
Quality of service
Quality of service (QoS) is the description or measurement of the overall performance of a service, such as a telephony or computer network, or a cloud computing service, particularly the performance seen by the users of the network. To quantitat ...
(QoS) management
* Network and service testing
* Network traffic management
*
Customer experience
Customer experience (CX) is a totality of cognitive, affective, sensory, and behavioral consumer responses during all stages of the consumption process including pre-purchase, consumption, and post-purchase stages. Pine and Gilmore described th ...
management
*
Service level agreement
A service-level agreement (SLA) is a commitment between a service provider and a customer. Particular aspects of the service – quality, availability, responsibilities – are agreed between the service provider and the service user.
...
(SLA) monitoring
*
Trouble ticket management
Adoption
There are many drivers for service assurance adoption, with some considering the most important to be the ability to measure the performance of a service. A subscriber’s service experience quality can be directly linked to
customer churn
Customer attrition, also known as customer churn, customer turnover, or customer defection, is the loss of clients or customers.
Banks, telephone service companies, Internet service providers, pay TV companies, insurance firms, and alarm monitorin ...
. Therefore, maintaining satisfactory service quality levels is key to creating “customer stickiness.”
Other factors driving growing interest in service assurance include increasing competition, new challenges due to the convergence of networks, services, applications and devices, enabling services over
IP and the merging of IT and telecommunications services. But ultimately, it is the CSP’s ability to ensure a satisfactory level of QoS that will have the greatest impact on revenue.
The importance of service performance is also reinforced by research stating that two thirds of subscribers will stop trying a new service after two failed attempts with that service. Therefore, it is increasingly apparent that service assurance tools must be put in place prior to the introduction of a new service if it is to be successful in the market. This is particularly true of deployments of such services as
VoIP
Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...
,
IPTV
Internet Protocol television (IPTV) is the delivery of television content over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. This is in contrast to delivery through traditional terrestrial, satellite, and cable television formats. Unlike downloaded med ...
and mobile video.
Service assurance spending by CSPs is forecast to grow to $USD 3.0 billion by 2011. Leading global service assurance providers include
InfoVistaVIAVI TEOCO
TEOCO is a privately held telecom software vendor based in Fairfax, Virginia, in the United States.
History
TEOCO was founded in 1995 and is based in Fairfax, Virginia. The company's name is an acronym derived from 'The Employee Owned Company.' ...
,
Ericsson
(lit. "Telephone Stock Company of LM Ericsson"), commonly known as Ericsson, is a Swedish multinational networking and telecommunications company headquartered in Stockholm. The company sells infrastructure, software, and services in inform ...
,
nsn, EXFO,
MYCOM OSICentina Anritsu
is a Japanese multinational corporation in the telecommunications electronics equipment market. A global pioneer for producing the world's first wireless telephone network, Anritsu's revenue numbers near US$782 million.
History
In Japan, Anri ...
Epitiro Riverbed Technology,
Spirent
Spirent Communications plc is a British multinational telecommunications testing company headquartered in Crawley, West Sussex, in the United Kingdom. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.
His ...
,
Empirix
Empirix Inc. is a privately held company which designs and manufactures service assurance testing and monitoring equipment for IP-based communications networks such as Voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP), IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS)-based, nex ...
,
JumpSoft
JumpSoft Inc is an American software company that provides application performance management (APM) software. JumpSoft is a committee member for several industry web services standards including web services interoperability and cloud application m ...
,
Computer Associates
CA Technologies, formerly known as CA, Inc. and Computer Associates International, Inc., is an American multinational corporation headquartered in New York City. It is primarily known for its business-to-business (B2B) software with a product po ...
, EMC,
Telcordia
iconectiv is a supplier of network planning and network management services to telecommunications providers. Known as Bellcore after its establishment in the United States in 1983 as part of the break-up of the Bell System, the company's name ...
,
Tektronix
Tektronix, Inc., historically widely known as Tek, is an American company best known for manufacturing test and measurement devices such as oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and video and mobile test protocol equipment.
Originally an independent ...
,
RADCOM
''RadCom'' is the monthly magazine published by the Radio Society of Great Britain and is provided to all corporate members of the society. Typically 100 pages, it includes a mixture of news, theory, construction and technical articles of inter ...
CENX Agilent
Agilent Technologies, Inc. is an American life sciences company that provides instruments, software, services, and consumables for the entire laboratory workflow. Its global headquarters is located in Santa Clara, California. Agilent was establ ...
,
Cisco
Cisco Systems, Inc., commonly known as Cisco, is an American-based multinational digital communications technology conglomerate corporation headquartered in San Jose, California. Cisco develops, manufactures, and sells networking hardware, ...
,
HP,
IBM,
IBM Tivoli/Netcool and Softenger (I) Pvt Ltd.
Service Assurance Market Review February 2007, OSS Observer
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See also
*Service fulfillment
Fulfillment of telecommunications services involves a series of supply chain activities responsible for assembling and making services available to subscribers. These activities delineate an operational infrastructure whose efficiency relies upon i ...
References
{{Reflist
Network performance