New solution aims at facilitating LTE deployments

Details: James Barton; Category: Service Management; 09 December 2010; 8276 views

A new solution designed for monitoring, optimising and troubleshooting 4G networks is now available from Astellia...

A new solution designed for monitoring, optimising and troubleshooting 4G networks is now available from Astellia.

Primarily aimed at facilitating LTE deployments and operations, the LTE Monitoring Solution can assist in assessing network performances, benchmarking equipment and terminals, and carrying out in-depth investigation of network behaviour – a crucial task in this early stage of the technology’s life cycle.

The solution consists of features such as eRAN monitoring capabilities on S1 and X2 interfaces as well as User Plane analysis with PSM (Packet Service Monitoring).

It has undergone several successful trials with operators from across the Middle East and Europe, using equipment from various vendors. During these trials Astellia was able to validate LTE performances with operators, measuring data throughputs over 100Mbps.

"As only a few LTE networks are commercially live, most operators today are running trials, pilots or limited deployments. For this reason we have put the focus on analysis capabilities, benchmarking and investigation for these first releases,” says Bertrand Mizzi, Innovation Manager at Astellia.

“Since LTE is a pure Mobile Broadband technology, we have brought all our data traffic expertise to our LTE Solution with in-depth packet data analysis capabilities to measure service efficiency carried by this new technology. Operators however must keep in mind that LTE remains a wireless technology and they will be facing radio issues similar to what is being experienced in 2G and 3G if not more. In particular, the necessity to deploy LTE in overlay with 2G/3G networks, along with serious spectrum constraints means that operators will have to focus on optimisation from day one.”

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