Enhanced Awareness and Management of Traffic, Services, and Revenue
Growing competitive challenges and changing customer requirements demand a swift and decisive response from service providers. The traditional competitive boundaries of cable, wireline, and wireless networks are disappearing as many of these providers begin offering triple-play service bundles and tiered service options. But traffic from Internet-based sources and peer-to-peer connections is flowing over provider networks and has yet to be adequately managed or monetized. And customers have developed sophisticated expectations for high-speed, high-quality services that include pushing out as well as pulling in content. They want many more service options, faster service activation, the flexibility to modify their services, and competitive pricing.
These and other major changes are impacting the market and accelerating the transformation of service providers from traditional providers of access-based services to "experience providers." The experience providers differentiate themselves competitively by how well they provide and brand a consistent quality experience across network layers, applications, and different end devices. To do this requires a clear understanding of who subscribers are, what services they are using, and what policies govern each account.
The Cisco® Service Exchange Framework - the service layer of the Cisco IP Next-Generation Network (IP NGN) - includes the architecture, technologies, and products necessary for heightened subscriber, application, and network awareness. Cisco calls the subscriber-related intelligence solutions "Personalized Subscriber Management."
Personalized Subscriber Management
As the network becomes the conduit for interactive gaming, IPTV, video on demand (VoD), multimedia collaboration, music and data downloads, and a long list of other applications, experience providers must impose order on converged networks to properly manage and charge for services. With network intelligence, providers can:
• Differentiate between services at the application level
• Prioritize application traffic by subscriber
• Meter and charge for services per subscriber
• Enable zero-touch provisioning, for full self-service account setup
• Enable customers to self-select and modify services and features
These operational and subscription functions have three other major benefits. Aside from enhancing network control and giving customers many new competitive features, the Cisco Personalized Subscriber Management solution can help reduce operational complexity, reduce customer turnover, and boost average revenue per user (ARPU) as customers have an array of new service choices at their fingertips.
The ability to better manage bandwidth-intensive applications, such as peer-to-peer downloads and uploads, helps providers to maintain fairness and ensure that they deliver the quality of service that subscribers expect. Cisco Personalized Subscriber Management enables service providers to implement Fair Use Policies (FUP) to manage congestion. These policies can significantly increase the performance of interactive applications (VoIP and gaming, for example) benefiting the majority of users, while keeping network upgrades in sync with revenue growth. Through application awareness, the Personalized Subscriber Management solution can dynamically manage network resources to ensure that the service qualities required by the application or business agreements are met. With this solution, subscribers are empowered to improve the quality of service applied to specific applications that they select, such as VoIP and/or video applications.
The Cisco Service Exchange Framework
As service providers transform into experience providers, they must control network access sufficiently to identify subscribers and the services they use in real time. One solution is the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) standards (3GPP IMS, 3GPP2 MMD, ETSI TISPAN, and Cablelabs PCMM 2.0 Standards), supported by Cisco, which identify subscribers and manage traffic that is based on Session Initiation Protocol (SIP). IMS, however, does not support many other types of traffic that are not SIP-based, including many implementations of VoD, voice over IP (VoIP), and IPTV. The Service Exchange Framework of the Cisco IP NGN, shown in Figure 1, does. It encompasses service control for both SIP and other IP-based applications and services.
Figure 1. Cisco IP NGN Layers
The Cisco IP NGN and the Service Exchange Framework were created to allow service providers to take advantage of the cost and efficiency benefits of migrating disparate services and legacy transport networks to converged, IP network backbones. The network, application, and service layers are integrated to allow wireline, cable, and wireless service providers with diverse equipment and topologies to become multimedia and mobile experience providers. With the intelligent Service Exchange Framework and its integrated policy-management capabilities (Figure 2), providers have the unique ability to individually coordinate personalized customer experiences versus simply providing generic or commoditized access services.
Figure 2. Elements that Support Personalized Services with the Service Exchange Framework
The Cisco Solution for Personal Subscriber Management
Cisco has the products and technologies that service providers need to quickly deploy Personalized Subscriber Management services. To enable greater customer intimacy, personalization, and optimized operational services, Cisco offers:
• Cisco Service Control Engine (SCE) - This carrier-grade network element inspects packets within each traffic flow, making the network application-aware and subscriber-aware. The Service Control Engine communicates with a policy manager to differentiate between different types of traffic, prioritizes traffic flows, and thereby optimizes the network to meet specific service-level agreements (SLAs). Reports can provide data on top users, top applications, peak flows, and many other metrics.
• Cisco Intelligent Services Gateway (ISG) - This function, available in intelligent edge routers, automatically detects when users are accessing the network and determines both the type of service each user wishes to access and the type of device that is being used. The Cisco ISG has the intelligence to manage access to various types of services, both IMS and other non-SIP-based services, by many different types of devices.
– Multidimensional identity capabilities simplify authentication using a single sign-on from any access point, and build an extensible subscriber profile to enable high-quality, tailored service delivery.
– Integrated policy management allows service providers to dynamically apply QoS on a per-subscriber basis. By distributing network intelligence, Cisco provides for more scalable and efficient policy administration.
– Dynamic personalization allows transparent application of subscriber-specific personal preferences to enhance overall application performance.
– Operational integration simplifies the network management of multiple services. With broad cross-platform interoperability, the Cisco ISG acts as an open integration point that bridges service-to-network administration functions and eliminates the redundancy of multi-network operations, allowing providers to speed new service offerings to market.
• Cisco Broadband Policy Manager (BPM) and Third-Party Policy Management Solutions - By extending policy decision-making and enforcement to the edge of the network, service providers can provide QoS on a per-subscriber basis and offer more scalable and efficient policy administration. Cisco policy management uses intelligence in the edge routers for automatic detection when users access the network and the option of using existing AAA servers for operational duties. Cisco supports broad flexibility in distributed policy management, allowing the network or a centralized policy management system to detect policy triggers or make policy decisions. Cisco supports both the Cisco Broadband Policy Manager and several third party policy management server solutions for centralized implementations of this technology. Cisco also imbeds policy management functionality within the Cisco Intelligent Services Gateway which can be implemented standalone, or may be integrated with a centralized policy server to delegate or distribute policy decisions to the edge of the network.
• Cisco Session Border Controller (SBC) - The Session Border Controller (SBC) is a toolkit of functions to control and manage IP multimedia traffic between network borders. In the past, service providers established direct peering points between each others' networks for voice-over-IP (VoIP) traffic through back-to-back time-division multiplexing (TDM) media gateways. Voice traffic was separated from data traffic and the quality of voice was often problematic due to latency from repeated voice encoding and decoding as traffic was converted from IP to TDM and back to IP.
Now there is a much better way to interconnect IP multimedia traffic between service provider networks and enterprises. The SBC not only handles VoIP but video streaming, instant messaging, multimedia conferencing, interactive gaming, and other types of real-time IP multimedia traffic as well. And Cisco SBCs can be quickly embedded within the routing fabric in a wide array of Cisco routing platforms already in the network so service providers and enterprises don't have to buy, interface, and manage a new collection of standalone appliances. Cisco SBC solutions are available today on the high performing Cisco XR 12000 SBC, or on a variety of Cisco's Router via Cisco IOS.
Parental controls and content filtering - Adults can access a Web portal and set Internet controls for children, including blocking access to certain types of Websites and imposing time limits on online access.
The Cisco Service Control Engine intercepts the packets coming from a home computer and sends a request to a policy server to verify whether the traffic is permitted. If a particular URL is off limits, the policy server will respond with this policy to the Cisco ISG and the user will receive a message indicating that the Website is off limits. Time limits are enforced with a similar communication between the computer, the Cisco Service Control Engine, the policy server, and the Cisco ISG.
Allowance-based subscription - This feature allows subscribers to choose volume quota-based or time-based bandwidth for a set period of time, for example on a monthly basis.
The subscriber logs in to a Web portal and selects the volume quota-based or time-based service desired. With a time-based limit, the policy server stores the requested settings. At the indicated time each evening, the policy server pushes the QoS policy to the Cisco ISG and Service Control Engine for 2-Mpbs speeds and this is applied to the user's connection. The policy server tracks the time and when the time limit is reached the policy server pushes the user's normal QoS policy back to the Cisco ISG and Service Control Engine, which governs the user's access from then on.
Bandwidth on demand - Subscribers who may have a standard lower-speed Internet service may visit a Web page on the provider's site and click on a Turbo Button to boost their bandwidth for a set period of time or to leave the button engaged until they return and deselect it. The subscriber only pays for the extra bandwidth when it is needed. This service could prove popular with gamers, telecommuters transferring large files, and parties making a video call.
The subscriber logs in to a Web portal and requests upgraded service. The policy server confirms the request and then pushes the QoS policy to the Cisco ISG and Service Control Engine, applying the new policy to the subscriber's connection. The policy server tracks the time allotment. When the time expires, the policy server pushes the previous QoS policy back to the Cisco ISG and Service Control Engine, restoring the subscriber's original service privileges.
Pay-As-You-Go Subscription Service - This option is ideal for subscribers who use the Internet intermittently and only want to buy time or bandwidth as needed. When users launch their browsers, they are redirected to a Web portal where they select the 2-hour "pay-as-you-go" option. After 2 hours, the session could either be terminated or the user could purchase more usage.
When users launch their browsers, the Cisco ISG recognizes the browser application and redirects the user to a Web portal. Once the subscriber selects the 2-hour option, the request is sent to the policy server. The policy server pushes the QoS policy to the Cisco ISG and Service Control Engine and it is applied to the user session to enable Internet access. The policy server tracks the time allotment and when the time expires the policy server pushes the QoS policy to terminate Internet access back to the Cisco ISG and Service Control Engine.
Broadband Light - To move dial-up customers to broadband and eliminate banks of access modems to support dial-up users, subscribers can be migrated to DSL with tiered access speeds. By providing a tiered service model, SPs can deliver a rate limited bronze tiered service layer (Broadband Light) that will be a significant improvement over the dial experience at a competitive price. Subscribers may be given high-speed bandwidth (1.5 Mbps) for their basic applications (such as Web browsing and e-mail) and provided lower, dial-up rates for sophisticated applications such as peer-to-peer streaming, VoIP, or video. The idea is to demonstrate how speed can enhance or degrade an overall application-level experience and motivate subscribers to upgrade their service.
Each time a subscriber launches a Web browser and sends e-mail, the Cisco ISG recognizes the subscriber and the application and sends a request to the policy server. Because the policy is to provide 1.5 Mbps, the policy server pushes the respective QoS policy to the Cisco ISG and that is applied to the user session. If the subscriber engages in a peer-to-peer session, or chooses to download video, the policy server pushes a QoS policy based on Broadband Light (64 Kbps) to the Cisco ISG and it is applied to the user session.
Peer-to-peer management and network optimization - Peer-to-peer traffic can cause massive traffic peaks and require providers to upgrade expensive backbone links or pay more at peering points. These applications, however, do not generate extra revenue to support these costly undertakings. The Cisco Service Exchange Framework enables providers to apply Fair Use Policies (FUPs) to effectively manage all network traffic.
Various operational features let providers limit maximum bandwidth utilization of specific applications and subscribers and prioritize delay-sensitive, mission-critical and premium applications and services. These features help ensure that subscribers receive a fair share of network resources and eliminate bandwidth over-consumption. Subscriber usage is tracked and policies are implemented based on consumption, peak versus off-peak periods, and type of traffic.
Summary
To meet changing customer expectations and differentiate their service offerings to compete effectively, service providers must transform themselves from access suppliers into experience providers. The Cisco Personalized Subscriber Management solution lets them customize subscriber services, offer self-service, and apply intelligence and policy management to applications on converged IP networks. The Cisco Service Exchange Framework within the Cisco IP NGN provides powerful technologies and products that make this possible.
Personalized Subscriber Management lets providers reclaim customer intimacy that a new generation of Web-based content providers has forged with users. Besides subscriber-based "pull" techniques - such as parental control and turbo-buttons - new "push" features allow subscribers to select an application or set of applications for automatic prioritization based on individual needs and preferences. By integrating policy-management capabilities with products and technologies on the network edge and gateways that carefully manage and optimize network traffic, providers can deliver customized services that customers can enjoy, value, and afford.
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