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Through developing wireless networks that serve more mobile subscribers, in more places, with more devices, over licensed and unlicensed spectrum, mobile operators have developed remarkably diverse infrastructure. With networks reaching macro towers to microsites, central offices to data centers, outdoor to in-building and ultimately to the desktop, mobile operators must manage millions of physical connections and be able to respond quickly anywhere across a service network when an outage occurs.
In the past, a service provider owned the outside plant serving the customer from end-to-end. Much of today’s mobile network infrastructure is in shared or third-party facilities: communications shelters at the base of cell towers, co-location data centers, stadiums, hospitals, casinos, airports and other private venues not owned by the mobile service provider. Both widespread service areas and critical infrastructure in shared locations drive the need for enhanced network change visibility and management. Keeping track of network changes – what is happening in the network, when, and where – is key to maintaining outstanding service levels. Many layers of the network provide outstanding visibility. Element management systems keep track of IP devices; network management systems keep track of application performance, firewalls, appliances and software monitor and manage network security. One of the mobile operators’ greatest challenges running more complicated networks over more locations today is tracking changes to the physical layer. Mobile operators often have little or no visibility into specifically which ports are affected when there is an outage. Managed connectivity is a means of gaining visibility into and management over the physical layer of the network.
Traditionally, physical layer networking has been managed manually through network diagrams and spreadsheets, where changes are updated after the fact. With dozens or hundreds of technicians making changes constantly over broad service areas, at tower sites, in data centers, on customer premises, manual diagrams and spreadsheets quickly become out of date. Additionally, service providers I have spoken with have consistently said for every hour of service outage, 50 minutes are spent determining what has happened. As long as the technician has the right equipment at hand, restoring service often only takes ten minutes. This cuts to the heart of the issue. With poor network mapping, it takes longer to fix problems. In some cases, technicians arrive at a tower or central office without the needed parts to fix the problem and have to return to the dispatch center to stock up on the necessary items. When the site is remote or the facility is not readily accessible, not having the right equipment can mean an entire day of lost technician productivity. With the scale of today’s network infrastructure, these individual delays add-up to higher operating expenses, delayed network uptime and reduced quality of service.
According to Gartner, 59% of unplanned network downtime happens in the physical layer, so by addressing the need for visibility into the physical network, operators can go a long way towards improving uptime, operating expenses and quality of service. So, how can mobile operators better track their networks to slash the 50 minutes it takes to identify a root problem, and help make sure the service technician has the right tools to restore service before the truck roll?
Managed connectivity is the key. In a managed connectivity system, each physical cable connector has an identity chip that stores information about the connector type, color, cable length, location, and other metrics. A patch panel reads the information and forwards it to a database and software management system. When a change happens in a managed connectivity network, authorized personnel are automatically updated, in real time. With such a system in place, the mobile operator can precisely pinpoint problems because the physical layer is in control, knowing what changed, when it changed and where it changed. Managed connectivity keeps the network map current.
Additionally, the managed connectivity system can help prevent the unintended consequences of plugging a cable into the wrong port. For example, if a network is segregated between a high-performance network and a standard-service network, with a managed connectivity system the network operator is alerted immediately if a technician plugs the wrong cable into a given network. Without visibility into the physical layer, it could take weeks or months to discover such a problem.
Aside from reporting the state of the network to improve repair time, managed connectivity systems free technicians from having to document changes to the network. Some mobile operators estimate that technicians today spend up to 70% of their time documenting network changes, but with a managed connectivity system the changes are documented automatically. This frees up technicians to perform the value-added work that makes better use of their talents and improves productivity.
Network security is also improved with a managed connectivity system in place, because the network operator knows immediately when changes are made. All the visibility in the world from the application layer to the data link layer can’t identify a basic change in the physical layer. According to a data breach investigations report, Verizon estimates that 75% of data breaches go unnoticed for weeks or months because the operator has no visibility into the physical network.
In short, managed connectivity brings the same management capabilities to the physical network as do other management solutions for layers 2-7 of the network. By providing a precise, real-time map of the network managed connectivity solutions make it possible for technicians to identify and solve problems much more quickly, leading to higher network uptime, much higher opex efficiency and better quality of service. By knowing when and where physical layer changes happen, managed connectivity puts the mobile operator back in control of their service delivery.
