Actix, a specialist in mobile network analytics, has released a new HSPA+ optimisation solution to aid operators in optimising the performance and capacity of new HSPA+ network upgrades. The new solution is available on the most recent release of Actix’s optimization platform, ActixOne.
With more than 70 HSPA+ networks already launched, operators are increasingly looking to HSPA+ as a cost effective way to improve both the performance and capacity of data services. Working with operators that have deployed HSPA+, Actix has determined that the RF environment is the most common cause of major performance and capacity issues post-launch. In particular, RF problems related to coverage, interference and neighbours are the most common underlying causes of data service issues such as degraded capacity, low throughput and dropped connections.
However, says Actix, operators have struggled to clean up RF problems that impact data services due to challenges in accessing the data required to understand and fix the problems. Unlike voice networks, where the detection of quality issues such as dropped calls and failed initiations is relatively straightforward, data networks deliver a variety of services, each requiring measurement of multiple quality metrics such as connection failures, throughput and latency. Furthermore, quality metrics and RF data are typically stored across multiple data silos, including network performance statistics, subscriber trace databases and drive survey logs, says Actix. These data silos can accumulate at a rate of terabytes/day in large networks, further complicating the issue, it says.
ActixOne is said to provide a highly-scalable optimization platform which can access all required data sets, enabling operators to visualize, analyze and optimize the mobile data network. ActixOne allows the operator to use network performance statistics such as channel quality statistics, which are based on measurements reported by the subscriber’s device, to quickly determine which areas in the network may have degraded data services. Once a problem area has been identified, the operator can then seamlessly drill into the area using near real-time Subscriber Traces or Drive Tests to diagnose RF causes of problems and determine solutions to the problems.
The optimization solution is backwards compatible with HSPA networks and is therefore completely relevant to deployment of new HSPA sites and carriers.
“We’re excited to be delivering analytics to our customers that address critical challenges related to surging Mobile Internet traffic”, said Jeff Atkins, Vice President of Product Management at Actix. “There’s no silver bullet when it comes to optimizing HSPA+ networks, and a key value proposition of our platform is the ability to use an ever increasing number of data sources to streamline and automate optimization processes. We’ve already deployed our optimization platform to multiple operators launching HSPA+ and it’s now being used by hundreds of engineers to optimize the performance and capacity of HSPA+ deployments.”