Presentation given at the 4G Wireless Evolution Conference in Miami, January 21, 2010

1. Network Intelligence
Mauricio Arango
Sun Microsystems
January 21, 2010

2. Introduction
• Telco industry needs to steer away
from "dumb pipe provider" concerns
and focus on smart networks
• Business reality presents large
challenges and opportunities
• Smart telco networks are about
extracting higher business value from
network infrastructure – via Network
Intelligence layer

3. 4G Business Challenges and
Opportunities
• Faster pace of business with more
dynamic & complex network
– Smartphones
– Device-based applications
– Femtocells
• Enhaced service quality and customer
experience

4. 4G Business Challenges and
Opportunities
• Increased regulation
– Higher operations visibility
– Restrictions while driving
• Interaction with other complex systems
– Transportation
– Power grid
– Social networks

5. Need for Network Intelligence
layer
• Extract higher business value from
network events in realtime via:
– Continous monitoring
– Simplified integration of network and
business application layers – event-driven
– Connecting dots in realtime – correlation

6. Network Intelligence builds on:
• Business Intelligence
• Performance monitoring
• Traffic monitoring
• Fault management
• Policy-based management
• Deep Packet Inspection (DPI)

7. Network Inteligence adds:
• Sharing of events across management
silos
• Connecting dots in realtime – event
correlation
• Integration of business processes with
network operations processes
• Event-driven architecture

8. SLA management use case -
consumer mobile broadband
•
access throughput,
Service level guarantees:
packet loss, latency, jitter
• Monitoring via: DPI, device agent
• SLA tracker – detects SLA violation events
• Integrates: CRM, billing, device
management, service portal, data
warehouse

9. SLA management use case -
consumer mobile broadband
Event stream
processing app
(CEP)
Data SLA Service
CRM Billing
warehouse Tracker Portal
SLA violation
event
Event routing – Messaging system
Packet loss & delay Throughput
measurement measurement
Device
DPI
Mgmt

10. Service restriction while driving
use case
• Block usage while user is in a moving
motor vehicle
• Monitor: device location, vehicle device
presence

11. Service restriction while driving
use case
Event stream processing app
(CEP)
In-vehicle
Data Service
usage tracking & CRM
warehouse Portal
restriction
Disable Enable
device event device event
Event routing – Messaging system
Location change In-vehicle presence
event event
In-vehicle
Location Device
presence
collector Mgmt
collector

12. Service problem monitoring via
social networks
• Identify potential service problems by
from patterns of communication in
social networks such as Twitter
• Search for keywords related to service
problems, track over time and location
• Generate trouble investigation events

13. Service problem monitoring via
social networks
Event stream processing app
(CEP)
Problem
Data Text streams investigation
warehouse tracking workflows
Investigation
event
Event routing – Messaging system
Twitter event
collector

14. Technologies and Products for
Network Intelligence
• Event stream processing – Complex
event processing (CEP)
• Application servers
• Messaging middleware
• Data caching – fast access to state info
• Databases

15. Event-driven Architecture
Event Event
consumer consumer • Simplified integration via
decoupling between
producers & consumers
Event routing
• Producers don't know
about consumers and
Event Event viceversa
consumer/ consumer/
producer producer • Events are common info
• Horizontal scaling
Event routing
Event Event
producer producer

16. Conclusions
• Smart not dumb networks – higher
complexity of network infrastructure
• Extraction of higher business value from
network requires new functional layer –
Network Intelligence (NI)
• NI offers simplified integration via Event-
driven Architecture
• NI enables realtime analysis via
Complex Event Processing