Scenario 1:
Enterprise ABC Company is a valuable customer and they use premium real-time services such as business video conferences, but you are unable to provide the best QoS because you cannot control priority allocation of resources

Scenario 2:
Michelle is a savvy Internet surfer. She accesses non-authorized high bandwidth applications such as file sharing that consumes more than 35% of the total Internet bandwidth, yet you have no control over this.

Scenario 3:
Without service reliability or bandwidth on demand, operators are missing out on new revenue opportunities such as value based pricing, pre-determined bandwidth and QoS for third parties at a given price.

The multitude of complex businesses that now require high reliability, security, maximum uptime and fast network transactions include retailers, stock trading services, brick and mortar companies with hundreds of branch offices, emergency planning agencies and hospital networks. Whether subscribers are using complex real-time applications such as video streaming or sending non-time-critical e-mails, operators will need to efficiently control network resource congestion to ensure QoS and prevent network contention and downtime. Currently, applications have access to the entire bandwidth that the mobile network can offer at that time. Without a mechanism to intelligently allocate and control bandwidth, applications or services may acquire more resources than needed, hence reducing performance levels for other users, or resulting in insufficient resources for other critical services or applications (e.g. real-time streamed voice). The subscriber’s expectation of service availability and usability leads to the conclusion that a ‘best effort’ resource allocation is not pragmatic given finite network resources. At the same time, the simultaneous bandwidth and latency requirements associated with a multi-media environment are straining the capabilities of existing networks and are causing operators to undertake unsustainable capital expansion initiatives.

These challenges are inherent with the introduction of real-time multimedia services. Mobile Operators are focused on offering premium services such as video streaming, TV, VoIP, interactive gaming, file sharing, and push to talk that add value to their subscribers’ day to day lives. But as services become more complex, the increasing number of distributed networked users and on-line visitors drive the business critical need to get priority traffic through fast to meet service expectations. Operators must address and deliver better or at least the same level of quality that subscribers expect today from voice services. For example, at Amazon.com, simple enforcement policies might dictate that on-line customer orders warrant the most bandwidth, but at 3 a.m., if most visitors prefer listening to streaming music samples, advanced QoS services should automatically allocate any extra bandwidth to satisfy this secondary group of customers.

Redknee’s Policy Decision Rules Server (PDRS) augments the ‘best-effort’ resource allocation mechanism. Until now, customers were limited to the throughput constraints of the access mechanism (the radio protocol for wireless networks) and any usage related charges. The later point clearly not presenting an issue if an operator provides a flat rate or ‘all you can eat’ data-plan! With the arrival of more bandwidth intensive services, service reliability cannot be guaranteed even with forecasted improvements in next generation access technologies (e.g. 1XRTT Rev. C, HSDPA etc.) With PDRS, not only can operators offer dynamic QoS allocations based on the type of application, but operators can also designate premium services such as the guaranteed assignment of bandwidth to preferred users under high or varying network loads. Based on the Policy Decision Function (PDF) and Charging Rules Function (CRF) defined in IMS standards, PDRS is designed to directly protect valuable core network resources such as spectrum in mobile networks, by giving bandwidth priority to high value transactions. For example, a valuable business video conference should receive priority allocation of scarce resources over a teenage chat room.

Although IP-centric applications and services are using an increased proportion of traffic, pre-existing voice or broadcast services (for mobile and cable networks respectively) will still accommodate for the majority of operator revenues for the near future.   Operators will also want to build on an established customer base that will opt for more sophisticated and segmented multi-media services. PDRS ensures that the QoS levels that operators require to attract and maintain customers are met or exceeded while enabling network operators to manage and grow their converged networks in a profitable manner.  PDRS also ensures that services are controlled and charged correctly in a subscriber centric manner that supports real time credit-limit monitoring and barring for prepaid, post-paid, and hybrid users. This unique feature reduces the fraud window and helps operators minimize revenue leakage. With PDRS, operators have full control of who is accessing their network, with what services, using what bandwidth, and at what price. PDRS ties these functions together and based is based on a unified access-technology agnostic architecture that makes PDRS available to mobile, cable, and IP centric operators.

Using Redknee PDRS, network operators can:

• Guarantee QoS for the most valuable subscribers/ authorized services, while lowering quality for non-authorized services
• Detect, filter, charge, or block  “free-rider” or non-authorized data services
• Monetize every subscriber event and ensure the highest financial return by optimal allocation of network resources
• Generate new revenues from potential partners, such as VoIP providers
• Integrate with existing and new services in both pre-IMS and IMS environments
  

Redknee has completed IOT testing with core network vendors. For further information on PDRS view the product demo and download the bulletin.