Ericsson LTE Architecture KPIs and Troubleshooting Aircom

LTE architecture, KPIs and Troubleshooting
© 2012 AIRCOM International Ltd

Summary
The document is intended to impart information on EPS architecture / elements and basic
KPIs i.e. Accessibility, Reatiainability, Integrity & Mobility and troubleshooting the poor
performing cells of those KPIs in order to improve the overall network performance.
Reasons and remedies for poor KPI are based on experience and and are not be limited to
the ones suggested in the subsequent slides. Similarly the target / thresholds may vary from
operator to operator.
The specific KPI equations used in the slides are for Ericsson system and are built using
Ericsson L11 PM counters.
2 AIRCOM CONFIDENTIAL © 2012 AIRCOM International Ltd

Index
1. EPS Network architecture
1.1 Network elements
1.2 Network interfaces
2. Accessibility
2.1 Random Access
2.2 RRC
2.3 S1 Signaling Connection
2.4 E-RAB
2.5 KPI formula and equation
3. Retainability
3.1 UE Session Time
3.2 MME Initiated E-RAB & UE Context Release with counters Description
3.3 RBS Initiated E-RAB & UE Context Release with counters Description
3.4 MME & RBS Initiated E-RAB Release Flow Chart
3.5 MME & RBS Initiated UE Context Release Flow Chart

Index
4. Integrity
4.1 Latency
4.2 Throughput
4.3 Packet Loss
5. Mobility
5.1 Intra LTE Intra MME Intra eNodeB
5.2 Intra LTE Intra MME Inter eNodeB (X2 based handover)
5.3 Inter LTE Inter MME (S1 Based Handovers)
5.4 IRAT (Inter Radio Access Technology)
5.5 Inter Frequency Mobility
5.6 Counters
5.7 KPI formula and equations
6 Availability
6.1 Counters
6.2 KPI formula and equation

EPS Network Architecture
EPS = EUTRAN + EPC
EPS : Evolved Packet System

E-UTRAN: Evolved UTRAN
EPC: Evolved Packet Core

Network Elements
Evolved UTRAN (eNodeB) : The eNodeB supports the LTE air interface
Mobility Management Entity (MME): The MME manages mobility, UE identities and security
Parameters
Serving Gateway (SGW): The Serving Gateway is the node that terminates the interface towards
EUTRAN. For each UE associated with the EPS, at a given point of time, there is one single Serving
Gateway.
PDN Gateway (PGW): The PGW is the node that terminates the SGi interface towards the PDN. If a UE is accessing
multiple PDNs, there may be more than one PGW for that UE. The PGW provides connectivity to the UE to external
packet data networks by being the point of exit and entry of traffic for the UE. The PGW performs policy enforcement,
packet filtering for each user, charging support, lawful Interception and packet screening.
PCRF: PCRF is the policy and charging control element

Network Interfaces
S1-C: Reference point for the control plane protocol between E-UTRAN and MME.
S1-U: Reference point between E-UTRAN and Serving GW for the per bearer user plane tunneling and inter eNodeB path switching during handover
S5: It provides user plane tunneling and tunnel management between Serving GW and PDN GW. It is used for Serving GW relocation due to UE mobility

and if the Serving GW needs to connect to a non-collocated PDNGW for the required PDN connectivity
S6a: It enables transfer of subscription and authentication data for authenticating/authorizing user access to the evolved system (AAA interface) between

MME and HSS.
Gx: It provides transfer of (QoS) policy and charging rules from PCRF to Policy and Charging Enforcement Function (PCEF) in the PDN GW. The interface

is based on the Gx interface.
Gxa: It provides transfer of (QoS) policy information from PCRF to the Trusted Non-3GPP accesses.
Gxc: It provides transfer of (QoS) policy information from PCRF to the Serving Gateway
S9: It provides transfer of (QoS) policy and charging control information between the Home PCRF and the Visited PCRF in order to support local breakout
function.
S10: Reference point between MMEs for MME relocation and MME to MME information transfer.
S11: Reference point between MME and Serving GW
SGi: It is the reference point between the PDN GW and the packet data network. Packet data network may be an operator external public or private packet

data network or an intra operator packet data network, e.g. for provision of IMS services. This reference point corresponds to Gi for 3GPP accesses.
X2: The X2 reference point resides between the source and target eNodeB

General Call Flow

1 Accessibility (CSSR or Call Setup Success Rate)
Accessibility includes RRC, S1 and E-RAB establishment success rate. For cells
reporting poor CSSR stats for a continuous span of time, success rate of each sub
metric must be analyzed individually.
Target value of CSSR: 98%
Reasons and Remedy for Low CSSR:
•Poor coverage.
Parameter qRxLevMin can be decreased to resolve.
• UE camping in the wrong cell.

Cell reselection parameters can be tuned to resolve.
•High UL interference
•Admission reject, due to lack of licenses

License capacity upgrade or offloading the traffic can resolve.
Call Setup

Steps Involved in UE initiated call setup (complementary to call setup diagram)
UE reads the system information broadcast in the cell and performs DL/UL synchronization.
UE then requests RRC Connection setup. Once completed, eNB then forwards NAS Service
Request in Initial UE Message to MME. MME then carries out Authentication process (optional)
and requests eNB to establish the S1 UE context. eNB then activates security functions.
Later Radio Bearers are setup to support EPS bearers in RRC Connection Reconfiguration
messages.
After successfully establishing the bearers, eNB responds to the MME with Initial Context Setup
Response
MME then sends Modify Bearer Request to update SGW with IP address etc. for the DL of the
user plane.

Detailed
The accessibility process can be broadly divided in 4 steps:
1)Random Access
2) RRC Connection setup
3) S1 Signalling setup
4) ERAB Establishment

1.1 Random Access
•In the LTE network, the UE uses the random access process to gain access to cells for
the following reasons:
• Initial access to the network from the idle state
• Regaining access to the network after a radio link failure
• As part of the handover process to gain timing synchronization with a new
cell
• Before uplink data transfers when the UE is not time synchronized with the
network
•Two types of RA procedures are defined in the standard for FDD

CBRA (Contention Based Random Access)
CFRA (Contention Free Random Access)
The main counters for this scenario are the following:

•pmRaAttCbra
•pmRaSuccCbra

1.2 RRC
• RRC connection establishment is used to make the transition from RRC Idle mode to RRC
Connected mode.
• The RRC connection establishment procedure can be of 2 types
1) UE Initiated : example, the UE triggers RRC connection establishment if the end

user starts an application to browse the internet, or to send an email.
2) Network Initiated: example, Network triggers the RRC connection establishment

procedure by sending a Paging message. This could be used to allow the delivery of an
incoming SMS or notification of an incoming voice call.

RRC Connection Establishment Counters

Random Access and RRC setup

1.3 S1 Signaling Connection Establishment
• The UE sends the RRC CONNECTION SETUP COMPLETE message to the eNodeB.
(Message contents: PLMN, NAS message i.e. Attach Request)
RRC connection completed
• eNodeB sends the INITIAL UE MESSAGE to MME.

(Message contents: Attach request message; UE is identified by IMSI or GUTI in this message)
• MME sends AUTHENTICATION INFORMATION REQUEST to HSS

(Message contents: Auth vectors Kasme, RAND, AUTN, XRES, used for security between
UE and network and also the IMSI to identify the UE)
• HSS responds to MME with AUTHENTICATION INFORMATION ANSWER.\

(Message contents: Answers to requested auth vectors for the corresponding IMSI)
• The MME sends AUTHENTICATION REQUEST” to the UE

S1 Signaling Establishment Counters

S1 Signalling Establishment message flow

1.4 E-RAB establishment
• MME sends INITIAL CONTEXT SETUP REQUEST message to eNodeB .
( Message contents: info on first ERAB, security algo. And security keys)
• The eNodeB sends SECURITY MODE COMMAND message to UE.

(eNodeB applies security information to the message)
• The UE responds with SECURITY MODE COMPLETE message.

(Data between eNodeB and UE is now encrypted)
• The eNodeB allocates resources configures the UE by sending message RRC

CONNECTION RECONFIGURATION
• The UE responds with RRC CONNECTION RECONFIGURATION COMPLETE
• eNodeB sends INITIAL CONTEXT SETUP RESPONSE to the MME.

(Process complete)

E-RAB Establishment Success Rate Counters

ERAB establishment procedure

CSSR KPI Formula and Equation
Pseudo Formula
CSSR = RRC connection establishment SR * S1 Signalling Conn Estb SR * Initial ERAB estab SR

2 Retainability
The retainability is abnormal releases per second normalized with the time that the UE is active.
Active UE here is a UE that has UL / DL transmitted data during the last 100 ms.
Also the retainability can be expressed as the percentage of abnormal releases of the total
established calls, precisely known as Dropped Call Rate.
Reasons and Remedies for poor Retainability:
•Missing neighbor relations

Neighbor list fine tuning would be the solution.
•Poor radio conditions

Physical optimization or eNodeB health check can help.
•Badly tuned handover parameters

Fine tuning HO parameters to perform handover in an optimized way i.e.
avoiding delayed HO and also too early HO or frequent ping pong.
•Admission reject, due to lack of licenses

License Capacity upgrade or offloading of the eNodeB

UE Session Time
It shows the accumulated active session time in a cell for the measurement period.
Number of session seconds aggregated for UEs in a cell. A UE is said to be ‘in session’ if any data
on a DRB (UL or DL) has been transferred during the last 100 ms.
Ue Session time counters

The call releases can be classified as under.
1) MME initiated ERAB release
2) MME initiated UE Context release
3)eNodeB initiated ERAB release
4)eNodeB initiated UE context release.

MME Initiated E-RAB & UE Context Release counters
Counter Description
The total number of abnormal E-RAB Releases initiated by the MME and that there was data in either the
pmErabRelAbnormalMmeAct UL or DL
The total number of E-RAB Releases initiated by the MME excluding succesfull HO. The counter is
pmErabRelMmeAct stepped regardless of whether data was or was not lost in UL/DL buffers.
The total number of abnormal UE context Releases initiated by the MME and that there was data in
pmUeCtxtRelAbnormalMmeAct either the UL or DL
The total number of UE Context Releases initiated by the MME excluding succesfull HO. The counter is
pmUeCtxtRelMme stepped regardless of whether data was or was not lost in UL/DL buffers.
The total number of UE context Releases initiated by the MME excluding successful HO and that there
pmUeCtxtRelMmeAct was data in either the UL or DL
RBS Initiated E-RAB & UE Context Release counters

Counter Description
The total number of abnormal E-RAB Releases initiated by the RBS. The counter is stepped regardless of whether data
pmErabRelAbnormalEnb was or was not lost in UL/DL buffers.
pmErabRelAbnormalEnbAct The total number of abnormal E-RAB Releases initiated by the RBS and that there was data in either the UL or DL
The total number of normal E-RAB Releases initiated by the RBS. The counter is stepped regardless of whether data was
pmErabRelNormalEnb or was not lost in UL/DL buffers.
pmErabRelNormalEnbAct The total number of abnormal E-RAB Releases initiated by the RBS and that there was data in either the UL or DL
The total number of abnormal UE Context Releases initiated by the RBS. The counter is stepped regardless of whether
pmUeCtxtRelAbnormalEnb data was or was not lost in UL/DL buffers.
pmUeCtxtRelAbnormalEnbAct The total number of abnormal UE context Releases initiated by the RBS and that there was data in either the UL or DL
The total number of normal UE Context Releases initiated by the RBS. The counter is stepped regardless of whether data
pmUeCtxtRelNormalEnb was or was not lost in UL/DL buffers.
pmUeCtxtRelNormalEnbAct The total number of abnormal UE context Releases initiated by the RBS and that there was data in either the UL or DL

KPI Formula and equations
Call Drops Per Second
Pseudo Formula:
Number of abnormally released E-RAB with data in any of the buffers

Active E-RAB Time
Equation

4. Integrity
4.1 Latency
Average IP Latency in DL Direction (ms)

Latency Counters

4.2 Throughput
The speed at which packets can be transferred once the first packet has been scheduled on the air
interface.
Unit : Kbps
The threshold for throughput is defined by the network policies and practices, it also depends on your
design parameters.
Low Throughput causes in the Downlink for LTE networks.

Downlink interference: Cells with downlink interference are those whose CQI values are low. If low CQI values are found after a CQI
report is obtained, then downlink interference might be the cause of low throughput .
Common sources of interference : inter-modulation interference, cell jammers and wireless microphones
BLER Values: Larger BLER values are an indication of bad RF environment .Threshold value 10%
Typical causes of bad BLER are downlink interference, bad coverage (holes in the network, etc.)
MIMO Parameters: Identify the transmission mode of N/W. There are seven transmission modes as shown in the table below:
Adjust the SINR thresholds for transition of transmission modes as recommended by the OEM. Request the Link Level simulations they
used to set these thresholds and see if the conditions under which the values were calculated apply to your network. Otherwise, update them
if the parameters are settable and not restricted.
Low Demand: If the maximum number of RRC connections active per cell is close or equal to the maximum number of RRC
connections supported, then. The cause for low throughput is load.
A high number of scheduled users per TTI does not necessarily mean that demand is the cause for low throughput.

Scheduler Type: Find the scheduler types your OEM supports. Select the one that is more convenient for the type of cell you are
investigating. Examples of schedulers are: round robin, proportional fairness, maximum C/I, equal opportunity, etc. OEMs allow you to
switch the scheduler in your network but recommend one in particular. The wrong scheduler may be the reason for bad throughput.
CQI reporting parameters:

a) Identify CQI reporting of the network periodic or aperiodic (or both).
b) Verify the frequency of CQI reporting & max number of users supported per second.
c) If the value is too small compared with the maximum number of RRC active connections, then, increase the values of the parameters
CQIConfigIndex as well as RIConfigIndex.
d) Enable aperiodic CQI reporting, if not used.
e) Slow CQI reporting frequencies may give bad channel estimations that restrict the eNodeB from scheduling the appropriate amount of
data and correct Modulation and Coding Schemes to UE.
Other : VSWR, Backhaul capacity

DL DRB Traffic Volume Counters

UL DRB Traffic Volume Counters

KPI formulae and equation

4.2 Packet Loss
Two types of Packet Loss:

•The rate of congestion related packet losses (for example, the packets that get dropped
due to active queue management functionality).
•The rate of non-congestion related packet losses (those are packets that get lost in
transmission, for example, discarded by some link layer receiver due to CRC failure).
Downlink Packet Error Loss Rate [%]:
Uplink Packet Loss Rate [%]:

Counters

5 Mobility
HOSR (Handover Susses Rate) is the measure of Mobility . Target 98%.
Reasons and remedy for poor Mobility:
•Missing neighbor relations

• NL Fine tune is the solution
•Poor radio conditions
• Physical Optimization or site health check
•Badly tuned handover parameters
• Fine tune the HO parameters to a tradeoff b/w too early or delayed
handovers
• Handover hysteresis and TTT (time-to-trigger) parameters to be tuned to avoid
excessive ping-pong handovers.
(Parameter tuning may vary case to case and should be planned as per requirement. Values may differ for
different terrain, under different traffic conditions etc.)
Besides this the coverage overlap needs to be carefully planned. Too much cell overlap may result in
interference or low cell edge throughput. No or very less overlap may result in higher dropped calls .
Overlap can be optimized with parameters and physical changes.

Network Architecture Configuration

Triggering Events for sending Measurement reports to eNodeB

Measuring quantity
User equipment use two alternative types of measurements in the cell

evaluation process:
• Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP) representing the mean
measured power per reference signal
• Reference Signal Received Quality (RSRQ) providing an indication of
the reference signal quality

The LTE mobility can be broadly divided into “Intra-LTE mobility” and “Inter-LTE
mobility” (inter-working with 2G/3G and CDMA 2000).
Classification of HOs
•Intra-LTE Handover - within one MME pool
Intra-eNodeB
Inter-eNodeB
•Inter LTE Handover - Inter MME pool
•Inter-RAT Handover
•Inter Frequency Handovers

5.1 Intra LTE Intra MME Intra eNodeB
Handovers between the cells of the same eNodeB
5.2 Intra LTE Intra MME Inter eNodeB

(X2 based handover)
As long as the UE moves between eNB’s that belong to the same pooling area where the UE is
currently registered, the handovers are executed via the X2 interface. However HO can
proceed on S1 in case the X2 is not defined between source and tareget eNodeBs
Intra MME Handover Network Architecture Configuration

5.3 Inter LTE Inter MME
(S1 Based Handovers)
In cases when the UE moves between eNB’s that belong to different pooling areas the handover
procedure necessarily has to be executed via the S1 interface.
5.4 IRAT (Inter Radio Access Technology): Inter-working between LTE (E-UTRAN) and
• UTRAN
• GERAN
• CDMA2000
5.5 Inter Frequency Mobility
The Inter Frequency Mobility consists of Coverage Triggered Inter Frequency

Handover and Coverage Triggered Inter Frequency Session Continuity.

5.6 Counters
Intra Frequency Handover Preparation Counters

Intra Frequency Handover Execution Counters

Inter Frequency Handover Preparation Counters

Inter Frequency Handover Execution Counters

5.7 KPI Formula and equations
Pseudo formula : 100 *(Succ HO Prep / HO Pre Att) * (Succ HO Exec / HO Exec Att) %
EUTRAN Mobility Success Rate [%]:

6 Availability
Partial cell availability (node restarts excluded)
This KPI measures system performance. Since the KPI is measured by the eNodeB, it does not
include time when the eNodeB is down, i.e. node restart time is excluded.
The length of time in seconds that a cell is available for service is defined as cell availability.
6.1 Counters
The main counters for this cell down time are:
pmCellDowntimeAuto - Length of time the cell has been disabled due to a fault
pmCellDowntimeMan - Length of time the cell has been disabled due to
Administrative State of the cell
(The counter is only incremented when the eNodeB is operational)

6.2 KPI Equation
M - number of cells
N - reporting periods

References:
Google
Aircom SoW Document
Ericsson Counter Reference
LTE L11 KPIs tutorial by CHAVANKUMAR T C

THANK YOU

Ericsson LTE Architecture KPIs and Troubleshooting Aircom

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LTE architecture, KPIs and Troubleshooting

© 2012 AIRCOM International Ltd

2 AIRCOM CONFIDENTIAL © 2012 AIRCOM International Ltd

3 AIRCOM CONFIDENTIAL © 2012 AIRCOM International Ltd

4 AIRCOM CONFIDENTIAL © 2012 AIRCOM International Ltd

EPS = EUTRAN + EPC

EPS : Evolved Packet System

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Evolved UTRAN (eNodeB) : The eNodeB supports the LTE air interface

PCRF: PCRF is the policy and charging control element

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S5: It provides user plane tunneling and tunnel management between Serving GW and PDN GW. It is used for Serving GW relocation due to UE mobility

S6a: It enables transfer of subscription and authentication data for authenticating/authorizing user access to the evolved system (AAA interface) between

Gx: It provides transfer of (QoS) policy and charging rules from PCRF to Policy and Charging Enforcement Function (PCEF) in the PDN GW. The interface

SGi: It is the reference point between the PDN GW and the packet data network. Packet data network may be an operator external public or private packet

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Target value of CSSR: 98%

Reasons and Remedy for Low CSSR:

• UE camping in the wrong cell.

•Admission reject, due to lack of licenses

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The accessibility process can be broadly divided in 4 steps:

2) RRC Connection setup

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•Two types of RA procedures are defined in the standard for FDD

The main counters for this scenario are the following:

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• The RRC connection establishment procedure can be of 2 types

1) UE Initiated : example, the UE triggers RRC connection establishment if the end

2) Network Initiated: example, Network triggers the RRC connection establishment

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• eNodeB sends the INITIAL UE MESSAGE to MME.

• MME sends AUTHENTICATION INFORMATION REQUEST to HSS

• HSS responds to MME with AUTHENTICATION INFORMATION ANSWER.\

• The MME sends AUTHENTICATION REQUEST” to the UE

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• The eNodeB sends SECURITY MODE COMMAND message to UE.

• The UE responds with SECURITY MODE COMPLETE message.

• The eNodeB allocates resources configures the UE by sending message RRC

• The UE responds with RRC CONNECTION RECONFIGURATION COMPLETE

• eNodeB sends INITIAL CONTEXT SETUP RESPONSE to the MME.

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Reasons and Remedies for poor Retainability:

•Missing neighbor relations

•Poor radio conditions

•Badly tuned handover parameters

•Admission reject, due to lack of licenses

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Ue Session time counters

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2) MME initiated UE Context release

3)eNodeB initiated ERAB release

4)eNodeB initiated UE context release.

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