For those in the Service and Network management industry who are not aware of what is going to hit us in the next 5 years, I would like to give an overview of what LTE and SAE and then talk about the effects of these technology evolution on our ways of working. I am Software solutions expert and not a Network scientist and had to get in touch with a lot of folks, do a lot of research and dig a lot of books to find this data. Below are very high level abstract explanation of LTE and SAE networks and the purpose they serve.
LTE [Long term evolution] is the one of the proposed 4th generation radio access network technology and if all goes as planned the world will be wireless and with much higher data rate after a successful implementation. Recent tests on the field have been successful and all the investments planned by US telecom market indicates that this is definitely going to be the future of access Networks. The main node of this network would be the eNodeB which would encompass the functional behavior of multiple nodes of our current network paradigm. The end goal architecturally is to have a flat architecture for 4G networks. End goal from user perspective is increased data rate and quality, along with reduced cost and access anytime/anywhere.
SAE [System Architecture Evolution] on the other hand will be the core for the 4G networks, is focused on a all IP, flat architecture, improved data rate and reduced CAPEX/OPEX expenditures. Evolved packet core [EPC] to which the eNodeB will connect, serves as the central functional unit of the core architecture.
Now, what does all of the above mean to Service and Network management as it is known today to what it would become in the coming years of 4G networks. Will get to this in my next post. Stay tuned!
References:
“Self-configuring and self-optimizing network use cases and solutions: Release 9”; 3GPP TR 36.902; Sept, 2009
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