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According to a recent survey, we have reached
the tipping point where the number of telecom
connections is now exceeding the worlds
population. Wireless accounts for the lions share
and Internet is mobile for more than 80% of the
population.
The telecom market is considered one of the most
attactive ones and is driven by two main factors:
- Anyone whishing to take advantage of mobile
devices and their incredible communication
possibilities opens huge growth opportunities
particularly in emerging markets.
- Innovation in mobile broadband technology and
the abundance of rich media content are generating
considerable trafc surge.
Within this market landscape, Astellia is pursuing
its development based on key fundamental values
shared by our teams:
- Innovation: we aim at positioning our products
and services on the leading edge of the market,
- Excellence: as a pure player company, Astellia
permanently adapts and commits to reaching a
performance level above industry standards,
- Ambition: we have the ambition to be the
reference company in our domain,
- Employees and partner satisfaction: we
develop a motivating environment, particularly
through trust, respect, honesty, transparency and
friendly relationships,
- Customer satisfaction: All these values naturally
serve this main objective.
Our mission is to help mobile operators deliver the
highest level of satisfaction to their subscribers and
increase protability.
Your continuous feedback
is the best way to help us
remain focused on these
goals that, I am sure, you
agree on. Please, keep
us under the positive
pressure which will
make our cooperation
protable and successful
for both parties.
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PS: Welcome to Rajesh Sharma, our new Sales &
Customer Operations VP. His choice to join the team
and his strong experience sound as an illustration of our
values.
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Astellia and Videotron, a major operator in
Canada, have strengthened their collabo-
ration to stimulate Wireless Network Qua-
lity of Experience. Videotron is now taking
full advantage of Astellias expert system
for automatic diagnosis and optimization.
The rule-based solution automatically
detects low quality cells, analyses QoS
issues root causes and thereby im-
proves both service quality and optimi-
zation task efciency.
Videotron, a wholly owned subsidiary of Quebecor monitor and optimize their radio access network and
Media Inc, is a Canadian leader in cable television, provide the best services from day one. We quickly
interactive multimedia development, Internet access, demonstrated the added-value in the convergence of
cable telephone and wireless telephone services. OMC counters and probe-based KPIs, and Astellias
Having launched a new Wireless Network based on Xpert application for automatic diagnosis, said Fre-
the latest technology in September 2010, Videotrons deric Gonzales, Sales Director Americas at Astellia.
unique quadruple play offer delivers the largest and
The Astellia Xpert system allows engineers to
most varied selection of multimedia content. With visualize those cells experiencing quality degra-
smart phone sales on the rise and the gradual arrival dation and provides an initial diagnosis of pro-
of tablets on the market, the highest quality of expe-
blems based on both present and customizable
rience is extremely important to maintain a competi- rules.
tive position.
Marie-Jose Mthot, RAN Design & Optimization
Since the launch of their Wireless Network service Manager at Videotron commented: Using Astellias
in 2010 Videotron has been using Astellias monito- Xpert application, our optimization engineers can
ring solution to ensure constant network optimization
automatically focus their attention on critical cells.
and measurement of QoS. The solution, deployed on They are equipped with key information to pinpoint
Videotrons access network converges both OMC
the origin of the problem and prioritize operations in
counters and data coming from Astellia probes. the eld.
The system, providing both system and subscriber-
centric KPIs, is used daily by Videotrons engineers Xpert has already had a great impact on our ef-
for QoS trend analysis, reporting and investigations. ciency. Our engineers are now using and sharing the
same optimization and investigation rules and have
In 2009, when we initiated discussions, Videotron the ability to create new ones.
was looking for an innovative solution to efciently
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 J U N E

2011

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VROXWLRQLQFOXGHV Lets start at the beginning: Astel-
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Astellia has been following the LTE
World Summit for several years now.
We must to admit that the 2011 edi-
tion is really to be seen as the tran-
sition year.
lia participated as exhibitors and
speakers at the event. Some of you
might even have had the opportunity
to discover our new LTE solution in-
tegrating QoE statistics designed to
measure real end-user perception for
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([DPSOHV cepted that the success of LTE relies on what
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data services. Other than the fact that
you were able to meet us, our pre-
sence at the show is to be seen as a
sign that we are now ready to propose our LTE
solution and services to support operators in
this new adventure. That said, our impression
is that LTE is now taking off for real. The tone
of the presentations has really changed com-
pared to previous summits. It is the rst year
that presentations didnt all start by explaining
how data trafc is exploding and how critical it
is to get into this new powerful and cost effec-
tive technology. This year presenters were far
more pragmatic, providing feedback from the
rst network implementations, as well as what
key factors are to be taken into consideration
in order to have a network working efciently.
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A denitive hot topic of the summit was
around the spread of frequencies. It is ac-
lead to the success of its parent technologies
GSM and UMTS: Roaming. Looking at the
number of different bands allocated to LTE, it
is hard to believe that terminals will be able
to support all those bands (in addition to the
current 2G and 3G band set, not mentioning
Wi and Bluetooth capabilities). It seems that
operators are begging their regulators to align
frequency plans across the countries.
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As expected, QoS/QoE has also been the
center of many discussions. To maintain
good quality despite constant trafc growth,
solutions were discussed around what we
could call tiered offering. Several presenters
conrmed the need to adopt solutions to en-
sure trafc prioritization although it created
2
some debate around bandwidth monetization
and net-neutrality. This also raised another in-
teresting point: how do we make sure all this
works properly? Or that subscribers get what
they paid for?
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Not quite ready yet. Some have taken the
availability of voice as necessary criteria to
start their deployment, others are acknowle-
dging the availability of workaround, but eve-
rybody agrees on the fact that it will require
a few more years before we have real voice
(over IP) on LTE networks.
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A last point that is worth mentioning: the mode
of deployments. The majority will be heteroge-
neous, multi-layered with interaction between
the different layers and technologies.
The overall conclusion is that the techno-
logy is there and meets the expectations in
terms of performance so far (latency <25ms,
single user throughputs > 150Mbps). But the
journey is not nished as many steps need
to be passed, with the introduction of voice,
multimode terminals, multivendor networks,
and of course all the further steps planned
to enhance performance, LTE Advance and
beyond.
As we did for 2G, 3G and have started to
do with LTE, Astellia will be present to help
operators turn each of these challenges into
successes by making sure each step runs as
smoothly as possible.

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In July 2010, Wataniya Kuwait deployed
the Astellia VIP Care solution on both
its 2G and 3G networks. The operators
objective was to strengthen customer
loyalty and maximize revenue with high-
value subscribers. One year later we
decided to meet Sabeur bin Muhammed
Ouni, Senior Telecom Engineer at Wata-
niya to understand how the solution is
used and how it contributes to customer
growth.
Kuwait Mobile telecommunication
industry overview:
4,6 million mobile subscribers in Kuwait
Mobile penetration rate: 125%
3 mobile operators:
- Zain: 41,2% market share
- Wataniya: 40,7% market share
- Viva: 18,1% market share
Wataniya Kuwait:
- 2G and high speed HSPA+ broadband
services
- 1,8 million subscribers
- 80,000 VIP and 10,000 corporate
subscribers monitored with VIP Care
:KDWLV\RXUUROHDW
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I am senior telecom engineer managing a
team of 3 people responsible for end-to-end
QoS optimization for Wataniyas VIP and Cor-
porate customers. Our mission is to ensure
that high-value subscribers are supplied with
premium voice and data services. This in-
cludes generating regular VIP QoS reports for
our marketing department, anticipating poten-
tial problems causing quality degradation and
investigating VIP customer complaints. We are
also responsible for providing recommenda-
tions to our operation team to perform correc-
tion plans on VIP cells.
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Yes, an important thing to remember in Kuwait
is the fact that a very large part of our revenue
is generated by corporate eets and VIP cus-
tomers who are heavy mobile data users who
N E W S L E T T E R
require speed and secure connections. They boring 2G and
are subscribers with a high ARPU, typically 3G cells that
business people, corporate eets, or subscri- were not pro-
bers with business plans. There are approxi- perly tuned to
mately 100,000 subscribers monitored on a maintain a pro- 6DEHXUELQ0XKDPPHG2XQL
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vity and smooth
&DQ\RXJLYHXVVRPH handovers. We sent a trouble ticket to the
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The rst important thing to mention is the fact
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that Wataniya has just been recognized as
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Best Telecom Operator of 2011 by The
Arabian Business Magazine for its innova- VIP Care has a tremendous effect on custo-
tion, performance and customer experience. Our mer satisfaction, overall network quality and
top priority is to deliver the best customer expe- user experience. Wataniya has recently an-
rience, by offering the nest quality of service. nounced increased revenue and prot a very
large part of which comes from the VIP and
Using VIP Care, we can not only identify the corporate sector. The Wataniya management
most popular cells used by VIPs but also are extremely happy with this performance
rank them in terms of quality of service. This and wish to extend VIP Care from its current
enables us to prioritize and focus our correc- 100,000 subscribers to 200,000.
tive plan on areas experiencing bad quality. By
using this tool we have been able to reduce +RZLVLWXQLTXHFRPSDUHG
our average call drop rate from 1% to 0.4%. WRWKHRWKHUVROXWLRQV
Furthermore, having measured the SMS DYDLODEOHRQWKHPDUNHW"
success rate on our network we found that it We have had the opportunity to test other
was not up to the standard we were looking solutions from your competitors. Without hesi-
for. By analyzing it, we identied that some tation; I would say that Astellia offers unique
subscribers were unable to receive SMS telecom expertise through its advanced
because their mobile memory card was full. KPIs and its close support to customer.
We contacted each of these subscribers and
recommended them to empty their mobiles
of SMS messages. The success rate rose
from 96% to 99%. Since quality processing
has been implemented: every time a mobile
experiences this particular problem, the SMS
centre automatically sends a ash SMS to the
impacted subscribers.
In terms of data services, we identied that
5% of our most valuable subscribers could not
initiate any sessions because their handsets
were either not well congured or had invalid
APN registered in the HLR. Working with our
customer care and Core network optimization
teams, we managed to recongure these mo-
bile terminals and increase our data access
success rate from 95% to 99%.
Finally, our network is made of equipment
from two different vendors. Statistics from VIP
Care showed that one of them had a 1% call
drop rate for 3G services that we considered
too high. The problem was coming from neigh-
3
 J U N E

2011

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PHQWH[SHULHQFHLQ(0($DQG$VLD3DFLFLQWKH Rajesh Sharma, Astellias new VP Sales and Customer Operations
WHOHFRPDQGVRIWZDUHLQGXVWU\+HKDVRFFXSLHG Astellia has recently appointed Rajesh Sharma to the position of Vice President
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service activities to drive Astellias expansion into new markets and growth of its
customer base. We interviewed him to learn more about his background and motiva-
tions to join Astellia, share his views on our market and understand what his mission
will be at Astellia.
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MRLQ$VWHOOLD"
We are seeing convergence of 5 key trends
3G, Social Networking, VoIP, Video and Smart-
phones / Tablets. This is creating massive
growth in data trafc in mobile networks and
raising concerns about the available capacity.
As a result, mobile operators are changing
business models to fund capacity expansion
and also creating innovative offerings to provide
superior experience to their end customers.
Astellia with its innovative solutions and an
installed base in 180 mobile operators around
the world is in a unique position to help mo-
bile operators make most of their investments.
Astellia has high development ambitions to
further help mobile operators capitalize on
growth in mobile internet. I am driven by chal-
lenges and I wish to be part of this adventure.
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Astellia has established itself as one of the lea-
ding providers of QoS and QoE optimization
solution to mobile operators across the world. It
offers comprehensive solutions enabling ope-
rators to gain deep insight into their network
and services, understand mobile usage pat-
terns and speed up the delivery of innovative
solutions to their customers. With its innovative
solution, proactive global customer support
and value-added services offering, it has gai-
ned the condence of mobile operators on a
global scale.
:KDWZLOOEH\RXUILUVW
REMHFWLYHVDW$VWHOOLD"
As our customers, mobile operators begin to
rethink their business models. Astellia has to
evolve to meet their changing priorities. We
have initiated changes to position Astellia on
the fore-front and we are the only player in our
industry who is singularly focused on mobile
operators compared to our main competitors
who tend to also address other customer
segments. I am looking forward to meeting
customers and understanding their evolving
priorities, so that we can continue to provide
innovative solutions to help them maximize
return on investments.

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WRPHHWXV 21st - 24th June 2011 / Booth: # BK3-07 9th - 10th November 2011
Booth: #B15

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19 - 21 July 2011

www.astellia.com

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel. +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61 infos@astellia.com

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Tel. +33 1 40 86 09 72 Tel. +1 646 375 2435 Tel. +65 6372 3538 Tel. +961 382 6008 Tel. +55 21 2586 6028 Tel. +27 11 258 8885 Tel. +91 22 3953 0534

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4
 Make the most
of your network

Astellia Newsletter

February 2011

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 - Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61
 F E B R U A R Y

2011 N E W S L E T T E R

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signature of a major GSM and GPRS
First of all, on behalf of all at Astellia, let me wish
network optimization contract with
you and your families a happy and prosperous 2011.
one of the top 5 mobile operators in India.
Thanks to our new and existing customers, Astellia
This breakthrough deal is a great achie-
has experienced significant growth in 2010 with
new market opportunities, in particular India as vement for Astellia in one of the worlds
you can read in this months issue. fastest growing mobile markets with close
In India and in other markets, our added-value to 700 million subscribers.
services and experience have been recognized
as a key differentiator by our customers. They Under this agreement, the Astellia
enable them to quickly maximize their investment solution will be deployed on several of In a market where operators are facing strong
returns in Astellia Solutions and revenue. Indias telecom circles including top metro circles. competition, we are condent that this long term
As most of you will already be aware, Astellias Astellia will provide its probe-based moni- partnership will allow our customer to accelerate its
strong expertise was rst developed in radio toring solution along with its OSS-Based strategy aiming at delivering premium services to
access optimization for GSM & UMTS Performance Management System. This will
networks with performance indicators that were its VIP and Roaming subscribers and securing high
already both system and user oriented. What you
help the operator optimize both radio access value revenues, comments Bertrand Favier,
will discover in this issue is that for data services and core networks increasing voice, roa- Director of Sales and Marketing for Asia-
Astellia has built a strong solution embedding ming and data income. Pac and India at Astellia.
unique Key Quality Indicators measuring
subscribers experience. In addition, using Astellias Roaming and VIP Astellia decided to focus investment in the In-
While the challenge of mobile operators is to deliver Care applications, the operator will be armed to dian mobile market a year ago creating a local
the expected level of service to their increasingly focus on its most valuable subscribers and and dedicated team covering technical support,
demanding subscribers, Astellias objective is to measure QoS and QoE perceived by these cus- sales and services. Operators have since shown
help our customers drive greater profitability by tomers. This will ensure that they are delivered
offering comprehensive visibility over both a rapid and growing interest in Astellias solution
with the highest quality of service. and expertise. This rst major contract is a sure
network QoS and service usage as well as
in-depth information to detect and resolve Finally, Astellia will also provide the operator with sign that we are heading in the right direction in
technical issues rapidly. ongoing assistance and share its advanced ex- terms of our market driven product offer and com-
Astellia now provides a fully unified perfor- pertise in network optimization, roaming mercial approach, says Christian Queffelec,
mance monitoring solution covering 2G, 3G CEO and co-founder of Astellia.
and data service analysis.
and 4G technologies, from access to core,
with a subscriber-centric approach. It can
also include convergence between signaling and
OMC information.
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This months edition will give you the opportunity to
learn more about the
benets of our new
Core PS solution based
on Neptunes new
generation of IP
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 F E B R U A R Y
2011
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Astellia announces the release of Neptune, its - User Plane traffic counters and session
new generation of intelligent and high summaries for usage analysis and fault
capacity IP probing systems. The rst
version, Neptune for Gn, is designed to help
management.
- Highly exible User Plane targeting and
operators monitor and optimize their mo- sampling.
bile broadband networks and deal with
This technology is essential to handle the
the traffic surge.
increasing amount of data to be analyzed
Dedicated to User on PS networks.
Plane and ser-
Measuring and
Neptune Gn comple- delivering the
ments Astellias Ocean highest level of user
probing product line with experience applying
increased capture and differentiated QoS is
processing performance. one of our customers main
The new platform performs data cap- challenges, comments Frdric
ture over 1GE or 10GE Ethernet links. Vergine, CTO at Astellia.
Neptune embeds a whole set of intelligent With its cost effective and scalable archi-
technologies such as: tecture, Neptune delivers both the power to
- Innovative Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) capture and process a huge amount of data
to classify data trafc and identify the appli- and the capability to perform in-depth service
cations used during every session such as analysis.
YouTube, Facebook and Skype.
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In the last edition, we highlighted the with the amount of
importance for operators to measure data to capture and
and deliver the highest level of QoE process.
for mobile data applications. In this is- In the meantime, the
sue we meet Jacques Guenneugues, need for business in-
Product Manager for the Core PS solu-
telligence to leverage
tion at Astellia to learn more about the revenues and opti-
challenges faced by operators that are mize network and
linked to the data traffic surge and the service quality has -DFTXHV*XHQQHXJXHV
latest developments in the Astellia ser- never been so high. &RUH363URGXFW0DQDJHU
vice assurance product suite.
Mobile operators are now looking at optimizing
monitoring investments and sharing both in-
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Jacques Guenneugues: From a simple status:
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New generation smartphones, rich multimedia
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content and attractive mobile data packages
have driven the trafc surge. Unfortunately, tradi- The solution provides usage analysis statistics
tional monitoring solutions can no longer cope for Marketing, QoS and QoE KPIs for data
2
 N E W S L E T T E R

service optimization, fault management
for supervision teams and highly detailed
data session information for customer care to
enable complaint investigation.
6RZKDWVQHZLQWKLV
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We have developed Neptune Gn, a new
generation high capacity IP probing system
embedding intelligent technology such
as Deep Packet Inspection. It is designed
to handle and process huge amounts of
data to feed various applications and opera-
tors teams with rich business intelligence.
We have also been focused on developing a
powerful, easy to use and exible multidimen-
sional Usage Analytics application ena-
bling marketing and management teams to get
unique insight on subscribers usage: ob-
taining a better understanding of the most popular
applications used for every handset for example.
Finally, we have released our trend analysis
application, Trending & Aggregation
for Core PS. We have integrated the Pac-
ket Services Monitoring (PSM) module that
generates QoE KPIs such as email transfer
throughput per le size, Web page down-
load time and Live video streaming defects
responsible for image pixilation.
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With this new solution, our approach is to
provide a fully integrated end-to-end mobile
service assurance to operators, providing them
with comprehensive visibility over the
whole communication chain including hand-
sets, access and core networks and data content.
Monitoring the Gn interface, situated
between the GPRS and UMTS networks, is par-
ticularly attractive from a nancial perspective.
Capturing user plane information from this link
offers a very cost effective way to generate
QoE statistics.
When investigating quality regressions cau-
sing customer frustration with internet service
for example, probes located on the Iu and
Iub interfaces are a great help for operators.
Monitoring the signaling on the Iu links
is extremely efcient in identifying most
problems and allocating them either to
core or access networks.
In most cases, quality regressions come from
poor radio conditions i.e. coverage, mobility
or overshooting cells. The monitoring of the
Iub interface on strategic areas will provide
crucial information to pinpoint the root
cause of the problem and anticipate reve-
nue leaks.
In a nutshell, the Astellia solution fully integrates
both Core and RAN monitoring. This enables
operators to identify potential QoE regressions,
analyzing the User Plane on the Gn interface
and to translate them into technical causes
thanks to the monitoring of the Iu and Iub links.
+RZGR\RXGLIIHUHQWLDWH
IURPWKHFRPSHWLWLRQ"
First, Astellia is one of the only providers of a
fully integrated end-to-end service mo-
nitoring solution. This means that opera-
tors are not only able to measure subscribers
quality of experience through statistics but they
can also perform very detailed multi-interface
investigations.
Secondly, Astellia is recognized for its unique
QoE KPIs measuring service quality
from the eyes of subscribers. We also provide
a comprehensive view of service availability,
delivery and integrity through the correlation of
both OMC counters and customer-centric KPIs.
Finally, operators can benet from our strong
expertise in end-to-end data service and QoE
analysis through audits.

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Based on substantial information generated by Nep- The application will also help
tune, the Astellia multidimensional Usage Ana- optimization teams compare
lytics application will enable marketing teams to traffic over several cells and
make better and faster business decisions. analyze their profiles based
on the services and applica-
Examples:
tions used. For example, this in-
- Understand mobile user behaviour and service usage, telligence will be used to adapt
- Perform subscriber segmentation based on data radio capacity per cell and ne-
usages, tune OMC (RNC, NodeB) con-
- Identify and quantify the most popular mobile appli- gurations.
cations used by their customers aged from 20 to 25
years old owning an iPhone 4. In parallel, optimization teams
will be able to measure and
benchmark equipment per-
formance based on unique
QoE KPIs. In this case, the
performance of 3 RNCs from 3
different vendors is measured
and benchmarked based on
QoE KPIs - the percentage of
MMS sent / received exceeding
45 seconds which is considered
as too long.

3
 F E B R U A R Y

2011

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LTE has nally arrived. It is gradually being introduced by operators, for the most part on a trial basis and for
some in full deployment. In anticipation of this development, Astellia announces a major milestone of its LTE
Monitoring Solution, Cigale LTE.

Astellia has already successfully proved the 3HUIRUPDQFHLVVXHV data service using customer focused KPIs, for
efciency of its Cigale LTE solution while par- - Limited service accessibility, example webpage download time.
ticipating in various pilots and trials with - Set-up failure for SIP sessions,

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To ensure maximum visibility of network

Middle Eastern and European operators
using several equipment vendors. During these
trials, Cigale LTE has helped operators to as-
sess network performance and carry out in-
depth investigation of network behaviour.
A crucial aspect of the trials was the detection
and analysis of problems and system
failures that arose. Among the most common
problems that Astellias solution uncovered,
investigated and helped to solve were:
,QWHUHQRGH%+DQGRYHUSURFHGXUH

- Waiting time to connect to an FTP server too performance, tracking of eld tests was also
long. carried out during the trials, providing the ope-
rators with detailed reports of tests performed
6\VWHPIDLOXUHV
- Interworking problems between enodeBs and on a daily basis including colour coded CDRs
indicating success or failure of the tests.
MME after reset and during handovers,
- Too many retransmissions over SCTP trans- Astellias solution will not only accompany ope-
port layer. rators in trial phases but also in deployment of
LTE. The solution equips operators to measure
As with any new network, an important
the network performance as regards the
aspect of the LTE trials is to validate the
subscribers perception, and measures QoS
technology. Astellias solution
and QoE on the user plane. This then em-
tested the technical capabi-
powers operators to improve the overall quality of
lity of LTE through measuring
service across their networks. Benchmarking
the network performance
of equipment (handsets) is also essential to
(throughputs, jitter, round trip
ensure compatibility with data services.
delay).
Providing maximum visibility and constant
The quality of experience
monitoring of networks, Astellias LTE solu-
offered to subscribers is parti-
tion is ready to accompany operators in the
cularly important, seeming as
unfolding challenge of LTE.
LTE is a pure data network.
Cigale LTE addressed this For more details on Cigale LTE please visit our
during the trials by measuring website, www.astellia.com
the QoE envisaged for each

:KHUH 0XQLFK
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14 - 17 March 2011 Booth: # 408 21st - 24th June 2011 / Booth: # BK3-07

www.astellia.com

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel. +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61 infos@astellia.com

3DULV 1HZ<RUN 6LQJDSRUH %HLUXW 5LRGH-DQHLUR -RKDQQHVEXUJ 0XPEDL

Tel. +33 1 40 86 09 72 Tel. +1 646 375 2435 Tel. +65 6372 3538 Tel. +961 382 6008 Tel. +55 21 2586 6028 Tel. +27 11 258 8885 Tel. +91 22 3953 0534

3XEOLVKLQJGLUHFWRU&KULVWLDQ4XHIIHOHF&RQWDFW'DYLG%RXFKRQ

4
 the most
network

Astellia Newsletter

December 2010

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 - Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61
 D e C e M B e r
2010
Editorial
3G - The best
days are
ahead
With the interesting enhancements in our
3G solution and some major 3G contracts
awarded to Astellia over the last year, we
have decided that this newsletter was a good
opportunity to reflect these stories.
The 3G revolution is finally taking off to become
the main revenue driver for operators.
Compelling mobile applications and interactive
smartphones have changed the way we live and
communicate, adopting a new mobile lifestyle.
In regions such as the Middle East and Africa,
mobile broadband is becoming the main way to
connect to the Internet.
Once their 3G networks are rolled out, our
customers are all faced with the same challenge.
Bandwidth-greedy applications such as mobile
gaming and video streaming are increasingly
popular and put a huge strain on operators. The
solution? Delivering greater speed and capacity
through 4G technologies is tempting of course
but operators still want to see the return on their
3G investments and 4G will take a while to come.
3G still has its best days ahead. Operators need to
manage traffic load and fine-tune both their
access and core network infrastructure
accordingly. This is no longer possible by me-
asuring Quality of Service on network centric KPIs.
Operators now need a better understanding of the
true subscriber experience and must analyze
end-to-end data services performance.
In this months issue, you will have the opportunity
to read 3G consultant interviews presenting the
unique expertise and methodology developed
by Astellia in data
service and QoE
analysis. You will al-
so learn more about
the 3G and Packet
Switched courses
offered by our Telecom
Training Centre. Final-
ly, this newsletter will
inform you of the
latest developments in Grard Erabit
Marketing Director
Astellias 3G solution.
N e w s l e t t e r
Astellia strengthens
its 3G network
optimization solution
Astellia has just released a new
portable probe-based monito-
ring solution for UTRAN optimi-
zation and troubleshooting.
Easily transported from site to
site, the new Astellia 3G UTRAN
optimization solution is designed
for three main applications. First
in the case of new site inte-
gration, it reduces the costs
associated with drive tests and
enables fast commercial launch.
It is also ideal for experts carrying
out detailed investigations
of complex data service pro-
blems. Finally, for operators who
have deployed 3G monitoring on their main cities, it CDRs, multi-interface call trace and protocol
represents a cost effective investment to pe- decoding,
riodically cover other regions with less traffic. - Fine-tune site parameters thanks to radio
business-oriented features for neighboring
Using the Astellia solution, optimization engi-
cells optimization, detection of overshooting
neers can:
cells and top worst cells.
- Detect quality degradations through KPIs
focused on subscribers experience such as Supplied with its own compact suitcase, the in-
time to fully download all contents of a web tegrated solution combines a new mobile probe
page provided per cell, and an embedded software suite dedicated to the
- Perform top-down analysis to uncover monitoring of UTRAN interfaces (Iu, Iub and Iur).
problem root causes, from high level KPIs to It is quickly set up in-the-field, thanks to its auto-
detection and auto-configuration capabilities.
Contents
p.2 p.3
Optimizing mobile broadband Quality of Experience Share 3G knowledge & best practices
International
dimension
p.4
 D e C e M B e r
2010
In brief
Activity Analysis 4.0
New Statistics viewer
The application now integrates a new viewer
to visualize statistics previously available in
Cigale View.
Main enhancements:
- More intuitive navigation:
- From tabular views to graphs
- Data filtering capability
- Increased interactivity
- KPIs can be focused on any individual
cells.
Global Tracing
This feature enables faster complaint
investigation. Customer support can now
rapidly access, trace and analyze any
subscribers activity wherever and whe-
never they were when experiencing poor
quality of service, over multiple interfaces
and all technologies.
New Ocean XLR 3 model
Greater reliability, performance and re-
duced storage cost through:
- A 70% increase of the data capture rate,
- Storage capacity x 3,
- The latest SAS HDD generation,
- Windows 2008 OS.
VIP Care 6.0
VIP Care is designed to closely monitor the
QoS delivered to high-value subscribers.
New features:
- Up to 1 million VIP subscribers,
- xDRs generated in near real-time,
- KPIs every hour,
- Correlation of handovers : 3G/2G, 2G/2G,
- Visibility over any subscribers activity
across multiple technologies.
Expert Opinion
Optimizing mobile broadband
Quality of Experience:
Challenges & solutions
Data services are driving mobile operator growth. Operators are now
faced with the complex challenge of providing the best possible quality
of experience to their subscribers in order to reduce churn while mana-
ging the traffic surge.
In this months issue, we talk to Thierry Jacq, 3G Product Manager at
Astellia to gain better insight into the concept widely referred to as
Quality of Experience optimization (QoE) that most operators want to
master.
Why is QoE equipment and the exact radio condi-
so complex tions his communication has to go through.
to assess?
In Mr Lepages case, identified at one of our
Thierry Jacq: Slow customers, the analysis highlighted that fol-
web page download lowing an RNC software upgrade, his mobile
time, frozen or buffe- was no longer compatible with the new feature
ring video streaming enabling reconfiguration of HSUPA channels.
are some examples After disabling this feature, Mr Lepage and
of poor quality that Thierry Jacq all other owners of this popular type of smart-
most 3G subscribers 3G Product Manager phone featuring the same chipset recovered
have experienced. But full access to their favourite services.
they cant be detected with OMC-based per-
formance management systems and remain
What has Astellia
very complex to measure with most probe-
developed to cover such
based monitoring solutions. These solutions
a large scope?
are too system-focused and do not fully reflect
true subscriber experience. We have focused our efforts on the monitoring of
high-value packet services and on the user
What are the key factors plane analysis, elaborating advanced
for optimizing data service and customer-
service QoE? centric Key Quality
Indicators. These KQIs
Measuring true data are correlated with
service quality of ex- network behaviour data
perience implies super- including information such as
vising the whole com- location, handover, radio condi-
munication chain. This is tions and drops. To identify poorly
only possible by analy- performing mobile terminals, we have de-
zing and correlating both data service veloped the Handset Profiling application.
content and network behavior. This means
for example being able to measure what the Monitoring subscribers activity from an end-
exact QoE is for an individual user such as Mr to-end perspective is of crucial importance.
Lepage who drives close to Paris - Charles de Thats why we have developed a 3G network
monitoring solution covering both the access
Gaulle airport and has trouble checking his flight
and the core networks including the Iub,
status using his smartphone.
IuPs, Gn and Gi interfaces.
In order to analyze the problem experienced
and identify the weak link, you need to Finally our experts who work along side
take into account various factors such as the with operators have developed a unique
subscribers profile, location, handset, methodology that is shared through audits,
mobile application, the cell, the network consultancy and services.
2
 N e w s l e t t e r

To understand how this approach
is integrated into audits, we have
also interviewed Herv Miot, 3G
consultant at Astellia.
Can you
tell us more
about your
audit metho-
dology?
Herv Miot: A typical
audit performed by
Astellia is based on
the analysis of a simul-
taneous data capture Herv Miot
3G Consultant
on the Iub, IuPS and
Gn interfaces. The audit is usually carried out
on a 3 step basis:
The first analysis is performed on traces
collected on the Iu Interface. It consists
of a QoS and QoE assessment based on
a set of Key Quality Indicators. These me-
trics are then benchmarked against market
reference KPIs. The Iu link is one of the most
important interfaces as it bridges core and ac-
cess networks. This first phase usually iden-
tifies 90% of problems affecting the QoE
and enables us to allocate them either to
the access or to the core network.
The second objective is to investigate bad
KPIs and analyze performance problems
responsible for quality degradations focusing on
the Iub interface to analyze poor radio condi-
tions or UTRAN equipment failures and on
the Gn link to spot core network problems.
In parallel, after analyzing service usage, we
focus on the QoE delivered for the most
popular data services. This can cover
Internet browsing, video streaming, email
and MMS. Typically audits measure service
access, retainability, mobility, throughput, po-
tential latency and packet loss.
What are the main causes
for quality regressions?
Quality degradations can have four main ori-
gins: external content service providers, core
network equipment, weak radio conditions on
the RAN and low performing handsets.
Can you give us some
typical QoS problems
impacting QoE?
One of the most recent audits I did in South
America is a good example of the typical pro-
blems that can impact QoE. It also illustrates
the need for both end-to-end data service visi-
bility and user plane analysis.
From a QoS perspective, this audit pinpointed
that 39% of subscribers could not access
data services because their handsets APNs
(Access Point Name) were wrongly set up.
After activating the APN overwrite / redi-
rection feature at SGSN and HLR level, the
percentage of subscribers unable to use data
services was reduced down to 23%. Those
users who were still rejected were mostly
prepaid subscribers with no credit left.
This analysis led to a significant revenue
increase for the operator.
And what about service-
focused analysis?
The audit also highlighted that web surfing
represented 80% of the operators data
traffic, therefore the optimal performance of the
DNS (Domain Name Server) service was es-
sential. The analysis revealed that the DNS res-
ponse time was very slow: In 82% of cases
it was more than 500 milliseconds whereas this
figure should normally be below 20 ms. The
time delay was due to 2 main problems loca-
lized at core and access levels: The DNS ser-
ver was hosted by an external provider and a
latency was spotted between the NodeB and
the RNC, probably due to latency of the IP
backbone.

Astellia Telecom Training Center

Share 3G knowledge & best practices
Astellias Telecom Training Center regularly organizes training sessions on 3G and Packet Switched mobile
networks. All courses are delivered by experts with strong practical experience.

Moving from 2G to 3G Optimize QoE for Data Getting ready for

Networks Services Long Term Evolution
22-23 FEB 22-23 MARCH
Nairobi - Kenya Paris - France The 4th generation network promises unequal-
2011 2011
Duration: 2 days Duration: 2 days led speed and reliability for new multimedia
services. This evolution implies major modifica-
Course objective: Assist operators in the Course objective: Help operators carry out tions in both radio access and core networks.
process of rolling out UMTS networks or those end-to-end data service analysis, and covers:
who require a better understanding of the evol- - Mobile network packet switched protocols, Course objective: Provide a solid base of
ving role of 3G. It provides a comprehensive - The basics of radio and transport layers, LTE fundamentals examining:
overview of UMTS technology, examining: - The most used services (web browsing, - The principles of LTE network and its asso-
- The evolution from 2G to 3G, email, MMS and video streaming) ciated services,
- Core network and Iu interface procedures, - The methodology to analyze subscribers usage, - LTE interworking with 2G/3G wireless net-
- UTRAN, Iub and radio interface procedures, - Best practices on how to measure and op- works,
- Releases 5 and 6, evolution of the UMTS timize data service performance, QoS and - Radio, eUTRAN and Core network interface
network (HSDPA/HSUPA). QoE. procedures.
>>> To register please contact Floriane Perchard f.perchard@astellia.com

3
 D e C e M B e r

2010

Astellia shortlisted International

for Best Network
Improvement at the dimension
Africacom awards
Jean-Philippe Larvol, Sales Director for Africa, Astellia
Astellia has been
nominated for the We interviewed Jean-Philippe Larvol, recently appointed Sales Director for Astellia in Africa to
Best Network Im- learn more about what he believes Astellia can bring to the African telco market.
provement award
AWA RDS

at the Africacom Can you tell us about customer retention. The gradual arrival of 3G

All other trademarks, service marks (registered or not) mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners. Copyright Astellia Photographic credit: Astellia, iStockphoto. Impression :
2010 Congress your experience and your opens new opportunities for operators to in-
in Cape Town for decision to join Astellia? crease ARPU through data services.
the data service I worked for 12 years with Alcatel Lucent
audit performed throughout Africa as Sales and Country Mana- How can Astellia help
at Airtel Zambia ger. I became extremely familiar with the African African operators?
in 2009. telco market and the importance of understan- First, we have reinforced our Africa Sales team
Astellia has been ding and adapting to the local cultures. based in Johannesburg to be closer to our
AfricaCom customers.
recognized for While there, I used to hear about Astellia
enabling Airtel to regularly. With many years of experience on To build competitive advantage and accelerate
accelerate data this market they have built up a solid reputation new service adoption, operators need to deliver
services adoption, improve both QoS and a unique knowledge of African operators. high QoE. This is possible by using probe-based
and QoE on its mobile data networks monitoring solutions in addition to OMC counters.
I naturally viewed joining Astellia as the per-
and maximise revenues by more than Astellias solution helps operators optimize 3G
fect opportunity to share my experience, in a
$1,200,000 a year. networks and get end-to-end data service visibility.
fast-growing company with strong expertise in
The analysis helped the operators to mobile network optimization. With the strong trend for alliances of operator
identify and reconfigure wrong performing groups, operators often need to measure per-
handsets, remove viruses causing network What are the main formance across multiple networks from head-
inefficiency, grant all subscribers access to characteristics of quarters. They also require crucial information
data services and optimize Airtels web the African telco market? to optimize QoS and network performance at a
portal architecture amongst others. local level. Astellia provides solutions on these
This market, dominated by prepaid subscri-
This Airtel success story is available for bers, is growing constantly with 2G and 2.5G two distinct levels.
download at www.astellia.com established everywhere. Subscribers tend to Finally, our consultancy & services department
use multiple SIM cards and operators are de- provides expertise in data service optimization
veloping new services such as mobile banking to most of our African customers. We can also
and text-based social networking to increase offer customized training courses.

Dubai, UAE
Where 30th November -
Nairobi,
Kenya
to meet us 1st December 2010
25th - 27th - January 2011
Booth: #30
New Delhi, Barcelona,
India Spain
9th - 11th December 2010 11th - 14th February 2011
Booth: #1460 Booth: #1B08

www.astellia.com

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel. +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61 infos@astellia.com

Paris New York Singapore Beirut Rio de Janeiro Johannesburg Mumbai

Tel. +33 1 40 86 09 72 Tel. +1 646 375 2435 Tel. +65 6372 3538 Tel. +961 382 6008 Tel. +55 21 2586 6028 Tel. +27 11 258 8885 Tel. +91 22 3953 0534

Publishing director: Christian Queffelec Contact: David Bouchon

4
 Make the most
of your network

Astellia Newsletter

June 2010

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 - Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61
 J U N E

2010 N E W S L E T T E R

(GLWRULDO
6KDULQJ
H[SHULHQFH
A major strength of Astellia has always been
to maintain close proximity with our clients.
One tool to build a strong relationship with
our customers consists of holding Astellia
<HDU
customer conventions on a regular basis. These
events provide our clients with an open forum for
&HOHEUDWLRQV
discussion.
Last year a convention was organised with
SFR, gathering people from teams such as
radio and data optimisation, supervision and
customer care. Towards the end of the year,
On the occasion of the Mobile World Congress the acquisition of new technologies such as
a similar event took place in Bahrain bringing in Barcelona, Astellia celebrated its tenth Trending & Aggregation and Xpert for Automatic
together 10 operations from the Zain Group. anniversary with its customers and partners. Diagnosis.
The most recent convention, held in Egypt Other events including the CommunicAsia
with the Orascom Group, was attended by tradeshow on the 15th - 18th June in One of Astellias greatest strengths lies in our
representatives from 4 different entities. Singapore will present further opportunities to staff members who each bring their skills and
These highly interactive meetings are a unique organize similar celebrations. expertise to the organization. This ensures that
opportunity for both Astellia and our customers Astellia is well equipped to deal with operators
to share experience and best practice through On the 4th of June, a special event was held at challenges and expectations in the fast-paced
product information, practical workshops, Astellias headquarters attended by all 220 telco environment.
demonstrations and case studies. collaborators. It was the perfect occasion to
Operators can nd out about the latest product mark 10 years of evolution. Client proximity has always been at the heart of
developments and learn valuable tips and Astellias policy. With this in mind, Astellia opened
techniques to get the most out of Astellias We have made unprecedented progress thanks eight ofces around the world to support existing
solution. It may also be a unique opportunity for to the loyalty of our clients and our commitment customers and reinforce our sales presence.
people from different teams working for the same
operator to meet and share their practice and
to innovation, commented Christian Queffelec,
best use of the solution. For Astellia, these events CEO and co-founder of Astellia, Over Given the success of the last ten years, Astellia
are an ideal occasion to get end-user feedback the years, Astellia has achieved many key mi- is ready to meet the challenges the future will
and discuss future development. lestones including the development of solutions bring to help operators make the most of their
All operators who have attended these designed for mobile network optimisation and network.
conventions are eager to renew these
meetings on a regular basis. Should you wish
to participate in such an event, please get in
touch with your sales contact.
In this months issue, we have selected a
particularly interesting business case that was &RQWHQWV
presented during one of last years events. It
illustrates how this operator benets from the
Astellia handset proling solution in order to
select the best performing terminals.

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VP Sales & Marketing
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Innovation is at the forefront of mobile technology. We interviewed
Bertrand MIZZI, Innovation Manager at Astellia to find out more about
LTE and other hot topics.
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Bertrand MIZZI: We are on time with our LTE WKHPRPHQW,VWKHUHD
schedule. Our customer base is mainly using UHDOGHPDQGIURP\RXU
UMTS-HSPA; most of them plan to push this FXVWRPHUV"
technology forward and therefore they dont fall Bertrand MIZZI: Yes, indeed. 3D radio
into the category of LTE early adopters. Even visualisation appears to be very useful to
so, they are still considering deploying LTE. address optimisation issues as it helps radio
Several trials are ongoing and Astellia has engineers to map quality problems taking into
already started supporting its customers in this account the geographical topology without
task, as we do for IMS. We have developed performing drive tests. We have been working
an LTE monitoring toolset designed to assess on the subject with some operators and have
the technology and measure performances. A come up with an innovative way to show the
key objective is to help operators benchmark localisation of problems such as drop calls and
terminals and network vendors during trial and their density on a 3D satellite view (Google
pilot phases. Earth!). This has turned out to be a great
added value and we are launching it as a rst
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Bertrand MIZZI: Above all, the hot topic in
the Mobile industry is managing the explo-
sion of data trafc which is incidentally also
an important issue for LTE. Astellia has been
focused for quite some time now on elaborating
the right way to address this challenge. It is
perfectly clear that capturing the entire Mobile
Data trafc is not an option anymore. There-
fore we have implemented an intelligent way of
focusing in-depth analysis on the valuable part
of the trafc thanks to a smart combination of
ltering, targeting and sampling features. This
selective capture of the User Plane is perfor-
med according to criteria like user (or group
of users), type of service, geographical area,
&LJDOH$ELV'UDGLRYLVXDOLVDWLRQ
type of terminals or even sampling. Meanwhile
statistics and measurements are generated
on the overall User Plane trafc. The signalling
strategy has not changed, the entire CP trafc
can still be captured.
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With the tremendous expansion of multi-
media smartphones and the surge of data
services, operators are faced with the
challenge of optimizing both their 2.5G and
3G networks. On the other hand, subscribers
QoE expectations are growing and users
who experience poor mobile quality often
blame the network. This is not necessarily the
case: faulty handsets can be responsible for
some of these problems.
The quality of handsets is becoming
increasingly important in order to deliver
a unique user experience. Unfortunately
operators are nding it more and more dif-
cult to test mobile device performance before
market launch.
It is for this reason that a major European Tier
1 operator decided to use Astellias Handset
Profiling Solution (HPG). Their aim was
to ensure consistency throughout the value
chain consisting of multimedia content,
wireless networks and mobile handsets.
The operator quickly understood that being
able to measure any handset performance
on their network would be a precious asset
for accelerating mobile data service adoption
and revenue.
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Today, HPG is considered as a strategic solu-
tion for the operator. Firstly, it is used to gene-
rate reports for the Board of Directors and
the Marketing team. These reports enable
handset benchmarking and selection of
the best performing terminals to trigger en-
hanced data service usage. Secondly, it
serves to identify, analyse and resolve
problems such as call drops, MMS failures,
drop rates and HO 3G-2G efciency which
arise due to low performing handsets.
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The handset proling solution is fed by Ocean probes which are deployed in strategic geo-
graphic areas such as business districts and airports where usage of data services is
particularly high.
These probes collect data from every active customer allowing true visibility of indivi-
dual handset performance on the network. As well as enhancing the use of professio-
nal mobile applications, emails and social networking, the operator ensures that handset
models used by roamers are compatible with its network and that applications
are fine-tuned for the handsets that use them the most.
To enable the operator to evaluate different handsets, the Astellia solution provides Key
Quality Indicators for the most valuable services such as video streaming, web brow-
sing, email, MMS services, FTP
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Since the introduction of the iPhone, the operators marketing team has been using the
Astellia solution to measure the penetration of all new iPhone Operating Systems
as they are released. This benchmarking means that the operator can recommend the best
performing OS on its e-portal.
The operator has also gained a more in-depth understanding of iPhone user behaviour and
usage. For example, by identifying the most widely used applications (emails, video-streaming,
web browsing, etc.), as well as the most popular websites (Facebook, Google, Flickr, ) per
type of handset.
The rapid success of smartphones such as the iPhone has had a considerable impact on the sta-
bility of the network, says Herv Miot, 3G Specialist at Astellia. The fact that the 3G network
is near saturation means that data trafc has to be redistributed accordingly between available
network layers (HSDPA / Edge / GPRS). Consequently both 2G and 3G network resources now
need to be managed and optimized conjointly. The key radio metrics provided by HPG are critical in
the optimization of both 2G and 3G network capacity, coverage and intersystem mobility.
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Benchmark and select best
performing terminals
Detect quality regression due to
poorly performing handsets
Accelerate data service adoption
through top QoE
Increase negotiation power
towards handset makers
Optimise both 2G and 3G
networks resources to manage
([DPSOHRIKDQGVHWSHUIRUPDQFHEHQFKPDUN data service growth.
Understand handset usage
3
 J U N E

2010

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&((6DOHV In this months edition, we interview Freddie Seah, newly appointed South East Asia Sales Director
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Asia at Astellia to nd out more about his motivations and the opportunities he sees on the Asian
DW$VWHOOLD mobile market.

Enrico enriches Astellias sales team with
more than ten years of experience in the
telecommunications industry in Central &
Eastern Europe.
His credentials include several years at
TTC Marconi in various key positions in
sales, business development and consul-
ting activities. Enrico was responsible for
sales to alternative operators of the whole
Ericsson portfolio, including transport
networks, wireline and wireless access
networks, data systems and related ser-
vices.
He joined Astellia in March 2010 as CEE
Sales Director. Based in Prague in the
Czech Republic, his role is to manage
existing customers and develop sales in
the region.
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Freddie SEAH: Yes certainly. I have over 17
years of experience in Account Management,
Business Development and Partner Mana-
gement roles within the telecommunications
and software industries in Asia. I have helped
4 international start-ups including Bytemobile,
WDSGlobal and OpenMarket establish their
presence in the region, ensuring new business
leads and a client base in key Asian markets as
well as boosting their revenue growth by over
300%. These companies provide solutions such
as data optimisation, mobile content adapta-
tion, service provisioning and infrastructure
integration services.
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Freddie SEAH: From my experience and
discussions with mobile operators in the same
arena, I had heard about several Astellia
success stories worldwide as well as in the
Asian region. I have always been interested in
working for a mid-size company, valuing close
partnerships with customers and I strongly
believe I have a signicant role to play in the
development of Astellia on this market.
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Freddie SEAH: Asia is a huge and maturing
market for mobile operators. With the arrival
of 3G data services, subscribers are not only
looking for good prices, but more importantly for
increased quality of service. To address these
challenges, the Astellia solution can greatly
help operators. Their customer focused solution
is designed to measure and improve the user
experience, resulting in increased subscriber
loyalty and enhanced competitive advantage.

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16 -17 June 2010 6RXWK$IULFD
WRPHHWXV Booth: #6 10th-11th November 2010
Booth: #P50b

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15th-18th June 2010 st st
31 June - 1 July 2010 1st December 2010
Booth: #3F2-14
Booth: #C10 Booth: #63

www.astellia.com

ZA du Plessis - CS 27241 - 35772 Vern sur Seiche cedex - France - Tel. +33 (0)2 99 04 80 60 Fax: +33 (0)2 99 04 80 61 infos@astellia.com

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Tel. +33 1 40 86 09 72 Tel. +1 646 375 2435 Tel. +65 6372 3538 Tel. +961 382 6008 Tel. +55 21 2586 6028 Tel. +27 11 258 8885 Tel. +91 22 3953 0534

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