Wireless testing gets serious

Wireless networks may be the most complicated to test, considering the many components involved. Operators must constantly monitor connections between cell sites; between cell sites and the mobile switching center; between cell sites and users' handsets; to and from other neighboring or international networks; and from the wireless network to the public switched network.

The complicated path that a wireless call takes from start to finish provides countless opportunities for problems. "All this happens with degradations that aren't present in traditional networks," says Hans Mattes, wireless business manager for Hewlett-Packard Co.

Wireless networks are subject to interference from crowded spectrums that often lacks guard bands and changes in the environment such as new buildings, he says. And although most infrastructure vendors build testing capabilities into their products, operators must dedicate significant time and money to testing and monitoring their networks.

"Even when all parts of the network are operating as intended, the sum of the total isn't necessarily operating as intended," Mattes says.

Today more than ever, testing and maintaining networks plays a vital role in most carriers' strategies.

"The wireless industry as a whole is moving more to a mature stage in its life cycle," says Mark Cortner, manager of wireless systems marketing for Telecommunications Techniques Corp. "Now the focus is less on building capacity [and] more [on] maintaining capacity and quality of service metrics."

Serious about reliability With increasingly cutthroat competition in most markets, maintaining a quality network has become critical. "Service providers are more interested in the quality of service they provide than in the past," says Bill Gunning, vice president of corporate marketing for Ameritec. As recently as three years ago, sales calls to cellular providers for test equipment were commonly met with disinterest. Jokingly, Gunning says the typical response to a customer complaining about a dropped call used to be, So what? Dial again.

"Now those same wireless providers are budgeting and deploying test equipment," he says.

In today's competitive environment, price and quality drive AT&T Wireless Services' business. "Back in the days of the duopoly, it was largely a footprint game," says Jim Ellis, director of engineering for AT&T Wireless Services' central region. Now Ellis is always interested in test equipment that can help him distinguish AT&T's network as a higher-quality network than its competitors'.

Even when PCS carriers first launched service, cellular operators often didn't view them as competitors. But the early perceptions that PCS would never become ubiquitous and could never roam gracefully have been proved wrong. As a result, legacy operators are focusing on their abilities to compete with the new entrants, says Jim Barber, director of marketing for Sage, a test equipment manufacturer.

A quality network can retain customers that are likely to churn or win new customers looking for the best network. "Customers will change systems if you force them to change systems," Barber says.

New entrants may also use test equipment to build seamless coverage, using it as an advantage over competitors. "PCS operators have cleverly targeted holes in legacy systems," Barber says. Increasingly sophisticated test equipment lets these operators examine competitors' networks and leverage their own strengths against others' weaknesses.

In addition to competition driving the need for high-quality, extensive networks, U.S. consumer expectations require operators to offer extremely reliable service.

"Expectations have been honed by excellent wireline systems," Mattes says. Although wireless users may not expect their wireless service to equal wireline, they measure wireless against high-quality wirelinenetworks. Operators must constantly monitor and maintain their networks to meet these high expectations.

A skilled labor shortage The trend toward increasingly high-quality networks is one factor driving the test market in the wireless arena. Another is a shortage of skilled technicians. The proliferation of networks and the demand for quality networks require a sizable resource of skilled engineers-more than are available.

As a result, carriers demand products that less-skilled employees can operate. Carriers want these people to collect data and pass it on to highly skilled engineers who can then spend most of their time analyzing, diagnosing and repairing.

So manufacturers are building more intelligence into test equipment and developing products that leverage the limited skilled labor resource. For example, TTC is developing more centralized test systems.

"If you put the intelligence in a central location, from a maintenance standpoint, it lowers cost," Cortner says. "It also drives the philosophy of dispatch to fix, rather than dispatch to test, analyze and fix."

With centralized systems, equipment in the field gathers data and sends it back to the central site, where skilled technicians can analyze the information and identify problems. When skilled technicians visit a site, they already know the problem and have the right equipment and replacement parts with them.

The centralized approach can dramatically increase the number of sites a single technician can maintain and support. The industry standard is about is 12 to 15 sites per technician, Cortner says. TTC's customers often want to drive that standard to 20 to 25 sites per technician within 12 to 36 months of using centralized equipment.

TTC is so dedicated to the centralized concept that it recently formed a new division solely to develop systems-based products, in addition to its portable products.

Carriers also insist on an added level of capability in portable instruments. Some are asking that multiple instruments be consolidated into one or two multifunction instruments.

They also want more intelligence built into the portable instruments. For example, rather than listing test results and asking the user to draw conclusions, the device should analyze data for the technician. TTC's T-Berd 2207 responds to demands for intelligent portable instruments.

HP is also developing equipment that does more work for technicians. "If there is a single trend or theme HP is pursuing, it's building equipment and programs to allow carriers to get the most value out of their scarce human resources," Mattes says.

HP offers equipment that can launch tests with one button instead of requiring a technician to follow a series of steps. "It has different advantages for different people," Mattes says. The less-skilled technician initiating a one-button test has less chance of error, and the more experienced technician can work faster.

The future of drive tests-in which an engineer literally drives around a region in a van full of test equipment looking for problem areas and measuring RF interference and signal strength-will not require highly skilled engineers as drivers.

"We're increasingly going toward making drive systems more and more automatic," Mattes says. The equipment will have the intelligence to collect, store, calculate and then send data wirelessly back to the central office. Some of today's equipment approaches this model.

Ameritec's Subscriber Wireless Automated Remote Measurement system aims to keep skilled engineers out of drive vans and in central locations (Figure 1). SWARM consists of small "cigar box-sized" responders that carriers can, through special agreements, place in vehicles such as taxis, city buses or parcel delivery trucks.

The box, which connects to the vehicle's battery, contains a phone of the operator's choice and a global positioning system receiver. The centrally located SWARM Master simulates calls to the many responders in vehicles following criteria set by the operator. Carriers can set criteria to track blocked calls, continuity and signal strength. "The primary goal is to say, 'This is what subscribers are experiencing,'" Gunning says.

At a central location, a Windows NT based graphical user interface called SWARM Analysis displays the gathered data on a map of the area. When the carrier has pinpointed problem areas, it can dispatch its expensive test equipment to analyze the problem. Hard-to-find skilled engineers can analyze data rather than drive around searching for problems.

Such systems don't come without a downside, though. The vehicles that carry the responders may not cover important areas and may produce unwanted data, AT&T Wireless' Ellis says. In addition, responders could be installed incorrectly, producing inaccurate data, he notes.

Along with increasingly intelligent products, some test equipment companies actively build complete training programs for technicians. BellSouth works with local colleges to train technicians, and HP works with Bellcore on a training program for technical field people. The shortage is so severe, however, that training programs-which can be intensive, expensive and not suitable for all carriers-may do little to solve the problem. "It's like using a bucket to bail the ocean," says Mattes.

In addition to increasingly intelligent test equipment, infrastructure equipment has changed the test and repair process. The implementation of small base stations lets carriers dispatch less-skilled employees to retrieve and replace a faulty base station, returning the faulty equipment to a depot where a skilled technician can perform diagnostics and repairs.

Always the chicken and the egg While test equipment advances in some ways, such as added intelligence and automation, it falls behind in others. As technology in many portions of networks continues to develop, test equipment can lag behind. For example, operators have few choices in test equipment for networks that operate in the PCS band, Ellis says. "It's always a chicken and an egg," he says. "They say, 'We'll develop a product for you if you tell me how many units you'll buy.'"

Test equipment vendors also try to tie up exclusivity contracts with infrastructure vendors, narrowing carriers' choices.

Operators value products that can test the network end to end-all the way from a landline call placed to a mobile phone. While such products exist for cellular networks, few are yet available on 1900 MHz systems.

Carriers are also looking for solutions to make testing multiple networks easier. Carriers that operate multiple networks in single markets must test and maintain each network. For example, Ellis' colleagues in other AT&T markets may have to monitor analog, PCS and cellular digital packet data networks. In Chicago, part of Ellis' region, AT&T Wireless operates only one network.

New developments in enhanced features also present challenges to test equipment manufacturers. Carriers constantly add and alter services on their networks, hoping to differentiate their offerings. Speed to market is particularly important as they race to deploy services first. Each of these new offerings must be tested to ensure they operate properly. Tekelec's MGTS/GSMT Signaling Diagnostic System can test today's complex systems and will operate with future intelligent network services (Figure 2). The products are prepared to test services that will be deployed based on wireless intelligent network platforms, says Dan Bantukul, product manager at Tekelec.

"We're concentrating on the next up-and-coming trends," Bantukul says. Tekelec closely follows developments in future services such as local number portability and future technologies such as third generation networks so it can be prepared to offer test systems for those services, he says.

Working together, carriers and manufacturers can prepare for the features and services of the future, avoiding lag times that plague some of today's technology rollouts.

Rather than dedicate expensive human resources and equipment to testing, some carriers outsource portions of their testing activities. But the third-party testing company plays different roles for different carriers.

For example, most of Telecom Network Specialists' customers hire the firm for project management before launching their networks commercially, says Michael Eubank, marketing manager for the third-party testing company. Carriers can save money by outsourcing initial testing procedures because they avoid investing in expensive test equipment that is only used prior to launch, Eubank says. In other words, a carrier may opt to invest only in equipment that it can use for ongoing testing and maintenance, while outsourcing expensive pre-launch services.

Outsourced test companies can be valuable for other reasons, too. Small carriers that may not want to hire a full-time staff of engineers may turn to outsourcers, according to Jim Ellis, director of engineering for AT&T Wireless Services' central region. On the other hand, larger carriers may turn to third parties for a fresh view of their networks or for outside expertise. Large carriers may also hire outsourcers to gather data on competitors' networks rather than invest in equipment for testing a different type of network.

Carriers may also turn to an outside expert to compensate for labor shortages. "It's mostly a workload issue," says Keith Radousky, director of engineering for BellSouth Cellular.