Charles Simmons is president of Spirent Communications’ Wireless Division, which provides test and analysis systems and equipment to mobile operators and handset manufacturers. His division helps wireless equipment manufacturers and operators develop and deploy networks and services more efficiently. Although Spirent is perhaps best known in its home market in North America, Simmons says the experience his company has will add significant value to European operators as they roll out more complex handsets and services on WCDMA and HSDPA networks. Keith Dyer heard how Simmons plans to help operators add new capabilities to their test programs and speed up time to market for handsets and services.
Mobile Europe:
Charles, as some readers may not be aware of Spirent as a whole, perhaps you could give us some idea of the structure and background of Spirent.
Charles Simmons:
Spirent plc has its corporate headquarters in the UK and is divided into three groups: Communications, Network Products, and Systems. Spirent Communications is one of the world’s leading suppliers of telecommunications test equipment and is made up of three business units. Performance Analysis – Broadband is based in California and is a leader in the testing of broadband network infrastructure, such as GigaBit Ethernet systems and wireless core networks. Next is the Service Assurance business unit, which specializes in service assurance solutions for network testing and trouble diagnosis.
The division I run is Performance Analysis–Wireless & Positioning, which offers equipment and systems for testing wireless and positioning devices. Our primary focus is mobile handset performance testing. A key area of focus for us is the air interface, the physical wireless link between the handset and the base station. Our RF channel emulator, for example, emulates the air interface environment to help test handset or base station receiver performance. We have solutions for handset testing at the physical, protocol and application layers, as well as those that target specific services. At a services level, our UMTS Location Test System automates testing of the performance of a handset designed for use with the high-accuracy location technology Assisted GPS.
Mobile Europe: As president of the wireless division, how has the mobile market compared to other markets within which Spirent operates?
CS:
While the entire industry has had its ups and downs, our wireless business has really been positive from 2000 on. The wireless market in general may have had a downturn or two but nothing like what we saw in other communications sectors. Our division has stayed well-positioned through this realignment, and in fact 2002 and 2004 were exceptionally good to us. From the point of view of Spirent as a whole, the wireline business is still bigger, but it’s safe to say that our recent wireless growth has been higher in terms of percentage.
Mobile Europe: So what, from your point of view as a provider of test solutions and services, has been driving that growth in the wireless business?
CS:
In the wireless business the most growth in 2004 was due to high-speed data service deployment, in particular the roll out of EV-DO within the CDMA2000 market in Asia and North America. That rollout has had the add-on effect of accelerating UMTS development. For example, our experience in North America is that non-CDMA operators feel an urgent need to introduce competitive high-speed data services. So, the deployment schedule for WCDMA and HSDPA has become more aggressive, accelerating deployment schedules worldwide.
Mobile Europe:
So how does network and handset testing play in that background of operators being faced with faster time to market for high speed data services?
CS:
For example, operators carry out much of their handset testing on real infrastructure or they wait until they can do field-testing on a live network. But we have solutions that emulate a complete WCDMA network in the lab, which gives you a level of flexibility and control you could never have on the live network. Layered on top of that is our ability to carry out specific testing at the applications level – things like Location Based Services, Push-To-Talk or high speed data. This testing can be carried out on an automated basis in the lab, testing more functionality of the handset or terminal in a shorter time and helping to minimize problems when services are deployed.
Mobile Europe:
You’ve talked of your experiences in the US market, how will that help operators in Europe?
CS:
In Europe we have market presence in four different areas. First, our physical layer test products emulate the air interface, or the physical wireless channel, are used by both base station developers and terminal equipment manufacturers.
The second area is the conformance test market, where the 3GPP’s 34.121 RF test standard dictates test cases and pass/fail criteria. We’ve built on our deep CDMA subject matter expertise to develop our U-ATS system, which automates this kind of testing. The third is performance testing. Here we go beyond the minimum requirements of conformance testing to determine by what performance margin that result was achieved. You can determine “break points” due to various conditions; you can characterize a product so you know whether its performance is good or marginal, or benchmark a wide range of handsets for comparison purposes.
The fourth area we are strong in is location-based testing for GSM and WCDMA as well as for CDMA. This is a key differentiator for us as we’ve leveraged Spirent’s leadership in GPS satellite system emulation and wireless network emulation.
Mobile Europe:
Could you expand on why greater depth in test methodology beyond conformance testing would be of interest to operators already hard pressed to ensure basic conformance of existing products?
CS:
Operators are very concerned about new products and services and making sure their associated user experience is positive. The general consensus is that every handset should be certified against conformance tests, but carriers are very interested in testing beyond that. Some carriers have their own acceptance test layered on top of the conformance test.
The complexity of WCDMA handsets and the services they must support goes way beyond what was needed for 2G – you didn’t have very many GSM operators testing beyond conformance. Operators are nervous about putting handsets on the market handsets just because they passed conformance testing.
An example is battery life — if the user expects three to four days’ use, and the battery dies after six hours, that subscriber is not going to be too happy about it. Performance testing can also find handset issues that aren’t even addressed in the current conformance specs and that could impact things of great interest to the operators, such as network capacity.
Mobile Europe:
You mentioned location testing as a differentiator, but the European LBS market is different from the US model.
CS:
Yes it is…back in 2001 in North America, the FCC’s E911 requirement forced operators and handset manufacturers to accelerate location technology development, and the flavor selected by CDMA operators was Assisted GPS, or A-GPS. GSM carriers selected a different approach that relies on measurements taken from the wireless network, not the handset. But the very nature of this technology means it is not as accurate as A-GPS.
In CDMA, Qualcomm has a market leading position and it made the decision to integrate A-GPS with its chipsets. In GSM and WCDMA there is a broader group of leading suppliers and we are seeing a wider variety of location technologies. Although I think we will see more integration of A-GPS into WCDMA/GSM devices, there is more work to be done here. We have sold significant numbers of GSM and WCDMA A-GPS test systems into Europe and believe that over the next two to three years you’ll see that much of the next-generation commercial LBS in Europe will be based on A-GPS.
Mobile Europe:
What do you think the impact of the introduction of high speed data will be on operators’ test methodologies?
CS:
There is clearly a push for high-speed data and the “killer applications” to take advantage of it. One “killer app” is LBS, as I’ve already mentioned.
A second potential “killer” service is Push to Talk (PTT), which hasn’t really taken off in Europe yet, though much European effort has been put into defining the PoC (PTT Over Cellular) standard. VoIP will drive a lot of new applications, and once you get HSDPA up and running you have huge opportunities for delivery of ‘triple play’ over wireless networks.
This puts Spirent in a good position…our Performance Analysis-Broadband division has a tremendous amount of expertise in triple-play and the underlying data technology and a lot of that core expertise can be brought to the testing of delivery of similar services over wireless. The same Spirent division has also developed expertise in performance testing of core network components such as GGSNs, which can become stressed as data volumes build.
Mobile Europe:
Once operators are faced with IP networks and services, their testing requirements are going to be far outwith their “known” GSM world.
CS:
It’s all about getting handsets and services to market with a high degree of confidence that they will meet or exceed subscribers’ expectations. Because operators have come to this market via GSM, some of them do not have a good feel for test issues for a CDMA-based handset. Many of the technology pressure points are new, and when you add high-speed data services over IP, and technologies like A-GPS, there’s a huge learning curve. To help transfer our CDMA technology test expertise to our customers, we provide professional services to help define and develop those test methodologies. We work together to develop test programs that go beyond mere conformance testing to ensure a great user experience of new services.
We have similar activities with CDMA carriers, and have been working for four to five years with the world’s largest network operators to provide that level of test product. What we’re seeing in CDMA is that operators are being inundated with handset models, applications and new software releases to a point where it is difficult to keep up to date with testing requirements. So we’ve worked with them to automate this testing, and they’ve pushed more of it back onto their suppliers and saved a lot of their own time. As WCDMA evolves, we will see a similar phenomenon. Today the focus is on testing basic services, with not a lot on value-added services yet. That will ramp up quickly once we’re all past initial deployment.
The value we add to operators is in helping them accelerate their testing and deployment. The phase we’re in now with A-GPS is typical. We are able to work at the early stages of that technology and develop test methodologies and systems that align with handset manufacturers test needs. When handsets are ready, there is already a test methodology available to the operators. This type of highly automated testing in the lab condenses test cycles and leads to a more successful deployment.
The number of devices supporting HSUPA (High Speed Uplink Packet Access) has increased 110% since October 2009 to 724 models, and more than half (364) support, or are easily upgradeable for 5.76 Mbps peak or higher data speed.
Smartphones are another strong growth segment, says GSA. Approximately 1 in 3 models of HSPA phones launched in the market today incorporate WiFi and GPS technologies.
Over 55% of HSPA devices support a peak data speed of at least 7.2 Mbps on the downlink (excluding notebooks and e-book readers). 50 HSPA Evolution (HSPA+) devices have been launched.
The HSPA mobile broadband devices eco-system extends to all the main cellular bands. A key trend confirmed by GSA in this survey is the boom in availability of HSPA devices which operate in the 900 MHz band (UMTS900), in support of mobile broadband network deployments in re-farmed (former GSM-only) spectrum. Excluding notebooks and e-book readers, 401 HSPA devices i.e. 19% can operate in the 900 MHz band, and user penetration is continuously building. This is an important point, particularly for markets in the Asia Pacific region, Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
While the main HSPA band globally is 2100 MHz, the 850 MHz band is very well supported by 940 devices (excluding notebooks and e-book readers), says the GSA. The 850/2100 MHz frequency combination is supported by 806 devices, and 690 tri-band 850/1900/2100 MHz devices enable global roaming.
GSA recently confirmed that mobile broadband service is now commercially available on 357 HSPA networks in 148 countries. Almost 99% of WCDMA networks have implemented HSPA for fast mobile broadband connectivity, and approaching 1 in 5 of these networks have launched HSPA Evolution (HSPA+) for higher capacity and an improved user experience of mobile broadband services.