Facing a network capacity issue, an operator turns to Tektronix Communications to avoid unnecessary spending on extra capacity
Carrier planning and performance teams have a primary goal of ensuring subscribers get excellent service from the network. To measure their success, they operate within a set of management driven key performance indicators (KPIs). Managers’ bonuses depend on achieving stringent performance levels, which include managing capacity while staying within budget.
An area manager at a wireless operator faced a network capacity issue that could have impacted on his KPIs for capacity management. Tektronix Communications’ core network solution detected a higher than normal attach failure rate for a node that was operating at almost zero capacity.
Subscriber equipment stopped attaching to the node, and instead attached to a node in another area. While this behavior was undetected by the equipment manufacturer, it was overloading the distant node and pushing it to 80% capacity. If the overloading had continued, service degradation could have forced the area manager to spend on capex to increase capacity.
An independent solution not tied to NEMs’ KPI definitions can provide unique insight. Network performance manager
The customer’s LTE network is a self-organizing (SON), so when a node appears to be busy, the network simply attaches subscribers to another available node. This type of self-organizing “feature” is not normally logged as a failure in the switch or network equipment.
The Tektronix Communications solution was able to detect the attach failures, and alert the operator. Upon further investigation, the operator found that some switch cards were stuck in a busy state. This caused the node to appear busy, preventing subscribers from attaching.
After rebooting the switch cards, the operator was able to resolve the issue and subscribers were returned to their home node. This correction helped balance the traffic between nodes and eliminated the issue.
The Tektronix Communications solution allowed the operator to avoid overreacting to a nodal capacity issue, which could have cost up to one million dollars in unnecessary capex spending.
Tektronix Communications core network solution has flexible KPIs, such as attach rate failure, that allow operators to quickly identify hidden problems that network equipment manufacturers don’t recognize.