This article covers the business drivers for IP NGN transformation, technological challenges faced by the carriers in India and emerging markets and how Cisco can transform their business through the SNO transformation model (Services, Network and Operations) especially in the context of outsourcing/Managed Services and BOT (Build, Operate and Transfer) business models.

1. IP NGN Transformation for Service Providers in
Emerging Markets
by Ayush Sharma (Contributions: Harpreet Singh and Kunal Bhatia)
Abstract ing and transforming the existing networks
with minimal disruption to existing services • Migration of live services seamlessly
This article covers the business drivers on the transformed network.
and the need for faster service creation.
for IP NGN transformation, technological
challenges faced by the carriers in India In order to counter settle the incumbent • Relatively expensive IP enabled end
and other emerging markets and how devices.
players and meet market challenges, new
Cisco can transform their business through
the SNO transformation model (Services,
entrants as well as existing telcos need to
distinguish themselves by providing supe-
• Price pressures in fiercely competitive
and price sensitive markets like India
Network and Operations) especially in the rior end user experience and value added and emerging markets.
context of outsourcing/Managed Services services. This differentiation needs a shift
and BOT (Build, Operate and Transfer) busi- in mindset, revamping of processes and In addition to the above, another key tech-
ness models. transformation of their networks. nology challenge faced today is to migrate
TDM based traditional voice as well as
Introduction The landscape in these markets is chang-
ing from separate Classical product and
Mobile voice subscribers seamlessly over
IP transport and at the same time take care
The fixed-line, mobile and broadband mar-
service delivery offerings to equipment of advanced technologies and service
ket in India and emerging markets is under-
vendors taking on SP business processes introduction at the access layer (Wi-Max,
going changes at a fast pace. Traditionally,
including headcount and priming multi- Wi-Fi, GPON etc.).
the market has been dominated by legacy
vendor integrated solution transformation.
government sector operators. Private sec-
tor Telecom companies have captured a
This article focuses primarily on the trans- Drivers for
formation piece.
reasonable market share in Mobile Voice Transformation
and Data, basic telephony, Broadband
and MPLS based VPN services in recent
Challenges • New Business Opportunities: Private
Telcos are jumping on the G, VoIP and
The key challenge for Service Providers is
years. However, these operators are facing Wi-Max bandwagon as they see de-
to keep the network capacity curve ahead
an environment of reduced profits and regulation taking place in India, China
of the projected market demand, while re-
constrained capital budgets for new invest- and other emerging markets. Increase
ducing both CAPEX and OPEX. This would
ment particularly on the voice side. These in data based services is expected in
improve profitability in this intensely com-
operators are facing an environment of coming years.
petitive market with little pricing power. It is
reducing margins and increasing OPEX. In
addition, there are challenges of integrat-
commonly agreed that packet switching is
the better strategic switching platform to
• Converged IP Core transport: Con-
solidation/Integration of their disparate
address these requirements, but a consen- networks towards IP/MPLS based
sus is lacking on its scale of use. transport core for superior control and
opex reduction. Migration from TDM to
Some of the key business and techno
IP and Fixed Mobile Convergence are
logical challenges identified for transfor-
also motivating factors for the carriers
mation are:
to reduce opex further in the long run
• Existing legacy network assets have and offer a variety of IP based value
still not reached the depreciation pe- added services at the same time.
riod originally planned and hence the
crunch for new CAPEX to build • Outsourcing the network to Vendor:
The primary driver is to overcome
new networks.
technology obsolescence and have
• Defining and enabling new services/ the vendor share the technology risks.
revenue streams. This also helps compensate for the
dearth in IP skills in such companies
IP NGN ARCHITECTURE THOUGHT LEADERSHIP JOURNAL - Q1 FY2010

2. Most of Cisco’s SP large customers from
this region who want to become market
leaders in IP based service offerings in
India and rest of the world have
• Considerable number of GSM, GPRS,
2G, G and CDMA mobile subscribers
in India and SAARC region.
(India Telecom Value Chain – Changing Structure and Composition) • Basic ISP services.
• Basic telephony landline subscribers.
• ADSL2 based Broadband subscribers.
• SMB, Enterprise customers using MPLS
based VPN services.
• IPTV, Mobile TV, DTH, G, Wi-Fi, Wi-Max
and Femto (pilot customers).
For many SPs their IP/MPLS, CEN (Carrier
(India Telecom Value Chain – Increasing relevance of data)
Ethernet Network), RAN (Radio access net-
work) and TDM based networks are run and
and hence these providers are relying
heavily on the vendor to plan, design
Approach to managed by different groups. Each one is
and operate their current networks and Transformation planning to consolidate their networks and
build a unified Network Operations Centre
take it to the next level. Service Providers’ expectations from Cisco
to manage the IP based Super Core, ag-
are merely not only to help them build or
Furthermore, for better OPEX control, gregation and access networks.
transform their network infrastructure but
these service providers are looking to-
also bring business relevance. This can be Their mantra today is that their customers
wards equipment vendors to manage their
achieved by working in partnership to help should experience a consistent quality of
network on revenue shared basis and pro-
them to launch new services quickly as experience across all IP based devices
vide managed services to them as well as
well as manage there network effectively. irrespective of the access media and
their customers. By doing this, they will be
networks. This echoes with Cisco’s “Experi-
able to release the funds to venture in new Cisco has adopted a three tiered approach
ence provider” vision for Service Providers
business areas and grow their business for such customers. This three tiered mod-
powered by IP NGN framework.
early in the wake of fierce competition. el is explained below with by using one of
the customer examples from this region.
Opportunities
Low per capita GDP forces ultra low ARPU
in these regions. At the same time, market
stage, demographics and technical prog-
ress drives hyper growth. According to the
recent IBSG analysis, this shapes up 14B
USD product and services opportunities
in Emerging countries’ market transitions in
the following areas
• Pervasive Mobile Broadband
• Data Centre take-up
• IP NGN transport and Carrier Ethernet
transformations
CISCO PUBLIC

3. typically any engineer’s choice for sim-
plicity and better network operations.
However if there is a common resource
pool working on such projects then
time to market could be an issue here.
This is a Capex intensive approach and
perhaps can cause disruption to mul-
tiple businesses if migration/integration
is not managed well.
• Outside In: Build and/or expand wire
line or wireless access media using ex-
isting IP/TDM Core capacity and start
“The Connected Life” vision from Cisco
reflects the growing trend of “many ser- • Others: High Speed Internet-20MB,
the Core convergence process when
existing capacity becomes an issue.
80MB and 100MB, Data center vir-
vices to many screens anytime anywhere.” It gives rise to skepticism and this ap-
tualization, Cloud computing, Virtual
This vision will enable these SP customers proach can be perceived as reactive to
Contact center.
to shift their discrete service model to a the technical folks but very pragmatic
“multiple services, multiple devices with
consistent experience model.”
Network transformation: to the business folks in current market
situations.
For those large Service providers that
Services transformation have diversified into Wireless and Wire • Divide and Transform: Based on the
line business and maintain different kind immediate demands, perform transac-
Although Cisco’s proposal to each of its SP
of infrastructures (IP, MPLS, 2G, CEN, TDM tional network transformation in piece
customers is customized, in general the
and ATM networks), it becomes some- meals keeping the transformation point
idea is to set up a framework to help them
times challenging to draw boundaries and of arrival in mind. If there is too much
launch new services rapidly and customize
transformation roadmap to align with their delay reaching to the point of arrival
existing services in residential, business
market strategies and organizational struc- then the roadmap and philosophy can
and mobile domains.
tures. Although Cisco’s traditional model be distorted with the influence of new
Here is an example snapshot of expected of splitting the network infrastructure into technologies and perhaps planning
services from Transformed network: Access, Distribution/aggregation and Core folks within a SP’s organization.
• Voice: Class5 Voice (VoIP), Class4
helps, yet it’s important to keep the busi-
ness and organizational priorities in mind
Our approach to each customer is dictated
Voice, Business Voice, Voice over by their business and technical require-
while working on such a roadmap. At the
Broadband ments in general but the Outside In ap-
very high level the Network transformation
• Data: Enterprise VPN ( L-2 , L- ), Access piece was sub divided into the following
proach has been very popular with Service
Providers from this region. Some of the
network backhauling (DSL/ WiMax / categories:
technical challenges that were identified in
Ethernet etc.), Consumer VPN, Whole-
sale VPN • IP Super Core Network Transformation transformation are:
• Mobile Data traffic: GPRS/EDGE/HSPA/ • Distribution /Aggregation Network • SPs that are in POTS should be able to
Transformation continue using their existing services
SGSN-GGSN, IT, Billing, OAMP
• Video: IPTV/DTH, B2B Video con- • Access Transformation
without any degradation or downtime.
ferencing, Contribution and Primary After debating over the following three ap- • The transformation should be done in
a phased manner in order to avoid any
distribution (Studio to Studio , Content proaches in planning such a transformation
service loss.
owner to provider) activity
• Mobility: 2G/G Mobile RAN Access/ • Inside out: (Build a robust Core first fol- • The services that are running in tradi-
tional class 5 switches should also be
Core Backhauling, Mobile voice ( R4 lowed by aggregation and access): This
replicated to soft switch as well.
and later release), Class4 Voice, Mobile approach works well sometimes for
Phone as Wallet, Mobile office the Greenfield operators and would be
IP NGN ARCHITECTURE THOUGHT LEADERSHIP JOURNAL - Q1 FY2010

4. • Heterogeneous networks with multi
vendor and protocol devices.
• Currently there are plans to have differ-
ent last mile access transport mecha-
nism such as Wi-Max, Fiber, design
should be able to handle this seam-
lessly with less impact.
The network segment wise transformation
approach is explained below:
IP Super Core Network
Transformation
Cisco’s proposal here is to consolidate
disparate networks into IP based NGN
transport by creating a high bandwidth
IPoDWDM super core and by pushing
complexity at the edge through service
separation mechanisms such as dedicated
service Provider Edge routers or using Se- From a network perspective, if a new provide IP based backhauling services for
cure domain routers in low density areas. service is required, then there is a need Mobility as well as act as a transport for R4,
to simply define the service and provision SS7 while providing backend connections
This fundamental concept of “simple core,
the intelligent gateway function located at to infrastructure needed for the residential
complex edge” has been incorporated
the edge of the network. The interior of the triple play customers.
into a number of functional enhancements
network remains unchanged. For example,
to the IP protocol suite introduced over
the years including IP Security (IPsec),
if a service provider wishes to support a Access Transformation
VoIP service then all that is involved from Most of the SP customers in this region-
Differentiated Services (Diffserv) and
the network perspective is the deployment have access network predominantly com-
Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS).
of VoIP media gateways at the ingress and prising of two types of access transport
Thus in the case of Service Providers, it is
egress (to (de)packetize) the voice stream networks:
possible to establish a single IP/MPLS core
that provides a fast and efficient transport
and a media gateway controller to assist
in the call control signaling process. No • IP Based Carrier Ethernet: This network
network. Rather than support multiple logi- today exists in major cities/regions
changes are needed in the core.
cal network infrastructures, this single core of India and Sri-lanka. At the time of
network utilizes a uniform set of functional, Packet based MPLS has very tight integra- discussions and workshops with each
protocol and operational disciplines. In ef- tion with IP and scales accordingly. It is of these customers, it is envisaged
fect the complexity factor of the backbone also independent of the transmission over that this kind of infrastructure will be
network is reduced from SP (N) to SP (1) which it operates, allowing providers to buy replicated into more metro cities. There
given N number of different networks. the most cost effective transmission solu- are plans to build this kind of green field
tion while still running the same services. network in 45 cities witn India.
Furthermore, the all-important services are
realized through specific per-service func-
Aggregation/ • TDM based network: This network ex-
tions located at the edge of the network ists in most of the regions today where
inside intelligent gateways (Examples are Distribution Network SPs are offering landline voice (POTS)
IP routers that classify, police and sched-
ule traffic to support a Diffserv per-hop
transformation services.
Keeping in mind existing Carrier Ether- Besides the above mentioned network
behavior or IP/PSTN media gateways that
net Aggregation expansion plans, Cisco infrastructure, SP customers have the fol-
transform a voice stream into packets and
proposes to enhance the capacity of lowing additional components/segments
vice-versa).
the MPLS based aggregation rings and in their network
CISCO PUBLIC

5. with transition roadmap to comple-
menting FTTx.
Benefits:
• Faster deployment and reach by using
Wi-Max/Wi-Fi in smaller towns.
• Reuse of TDM infrastructure from Met-
ros to Cities.
• Better Capex control and ROI by
targeting more investment in SMB and
Enterprise areas.
Beyond Access Node (Towards Core)
Recommendations:
• Take the existing CEN to IP next gen-
eration CEN level by introducing high
availability and optimization methods.
• Network base lining, standardizing the
operational procedures and improved
change control process validated
through lab augmentation or pilot trials.
• Shift from SDH to IPoDWDM w/
ROADMs in Metros to allow bandwidth
scaling in line with the service/sub-
scriber density projections at the edge
• Distributed BRAS architecture
• BRAS Network: Both Centralized
CPE, Access Node and Access Media
Recommendations
• New Service introductions (HDTV,
Telepresence, Cloud computing, Data
and distributed BRAS model has been
used by different SP customers. • Ethernet as UNI and NNI (Similar tech- centre and Contact centre virtualization,
nologies) Content and IP RAN backhauling).
• Last mile access nodes: Their
• View access infrastructure from the Benefits:
network comprises of wide variety of ac-
cess nodes from multiple vendors in their
long term perspective. Deploy Fibre
where possible. P2P or Passive WDM.
• New revenue streams through New
network today. The node type varies from Services.
MSANs/DSLAMs to DLCs. The new MSAN • Retain ADSL/2+ where in use today
• KPI/IP SLA improvements.
installations are IP ready/capable. until new fibre allows shortening of the
• Improved Customer quality of experi-
• Last mile Loop/Technology: Most
loop.
ence.
of the residential customers use copper • Use VDSL2 technology with FTTC for
• Predictable Network performance and
media with ADSL2 technology to access HSI on copper. For new wireline SMB
High speed internet and traditional voice users in Metros, FTTH, FTTC and FTTN quality.
services. PRI, ISDN and Ethernet media are
used for SMB and Enterprise customers.
and appropriate HAG usage is recom-
mended.
• Faster time to market.
It is known that a network cannot be trans- • For Enterprise users, CPE based point Operational
formed without anticipating the services, to point high capability Ethernet model transformation:
subscriber and infrastructure growth. Here is suggested.
are some recommendations and benefits:
• Use Wi-Max for low density new circles,
IP NGN ARCHITECTURE THOUGHT LEADERSHIP JOURNAL - Q1 FY2010

6. challenges mentioned above, but also
move from an EMS based approach to
network centric approach and eventually to
a service centric approach in phases.
This is done through a series of transfor-
mation steps including gaps in the three
pillars of the NOC viz. people, processes
and tools.
Conclusion
Cisco’s SNO approach is a top down ap-
proach to transformation and takes a
holistic view of all aspects of any SP
business transformation. By starting from
services transformation, the approach
ensures that the business challenges
are addressed in the first place and the
business model and the strategic vision of
the company is addressed before making
any investments in the network or opera-
To meet these SP business goals, reduce Three key environmental changes create
tions. The network transformation step
operational expenditure and improve three parallel NOC specific business driv-
ensures that the network transformation
efficiency thereby improving end to end ers that in turn drive three critical goals of
aligns to the strategic vision as defined in
Service level assurances, Cisco’s proposal NOC Transformations:
the services transformation stage and the
is to work with them and other third party
Cisco’s NOC Transformation Methodolo- transformation is an evolutionary approach
vendors to improvise on overall operational
gies for these SP customers are designed to ensure that the existing revenue streams
quality through processes, people and us-
and implemented to not only address the are not compromised in the process of
ing industry best practices.
adding new ones. Finally the operations
transformation ensures that the NOC is
equipped to meet the challenges of a
transformed network, and an end-to-end
service view is taken rather than an ele-
ment based approach. The operations
transformation ensures an enhanced cus-
tomer experience and reduced OPEX per
unit of network/ service deployments.
The SNO approach thus is a holistic
approach to transformation starting from
the point where it matters the most:
strategy, and ending at where all SPs want
to be: reduced costs and increased cus-
tomer satisfaction.

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The Fastest Way to Increase Your Internet Quotient, TransPath, WebEx, and the WebEx logo are registered trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries.
All other trademarks mentioned in this document or website are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company. (0903R)
Americas Headquarters Asia Pacific Headquarters Europe Headquarters
Cisco Systems, Inc. Cisco Systems (USA) Pte. Ltd. Cisco Systems International BV
San Jose, CA Singapore Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Cisco has more than 200 offices worldwide. Addresses, phone numbers, and fax numbers are listed on the Cisco Website at www.cisco.com/go/offices.
CCDE, CCENT, CCSI, Cisco Eos, Cisco HealthPresence, the Cisco logo, Cisco Lumin, Cisco Nexus, Cisco Nurse Connect, Cisco Stackpower, Cisco StadiumVision, Cisco TelePresence, Cisco WebEx, DCE, and Welcome to
the Human Network are trademarks; Changing the Way We Work, Live, Play, and Learn and Cisco Store are service marks; and Access Registrar, Aironet, AsyncOS, Bringing the Meeting To You, Catalyst, CCDA, CCDP, CCIE,
CCIP, CCNA, CCNP, CCSP, CCVP, Cisco, the Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert logo, Cisco IOS, Cisco Press, Cisco Systems, Cisco Systems Capital, the Cisco Systems logo, Cisco Unity, Collaboration Without Limitation,
EtherFast, EtherSwitch, Event Center, Fast Step, Follow Me Browsing, FormShare, GigaDrive, HomeLink, Internet Quotient, IOS, iPhone, iQuick Study, IronPort, the IronPort logo, LightStream, Linksys, MediaTone, MeetingPlace,
MeetingPlace Chime Sound, MGX, Networkers, Networking Academy, Network Registrar, PCNow, PIX, PowerPanels, ProConnect, ScriptShare, SenderBase, SMARTnet, Spectrum Expert, StackWise, The Fastest Way to Increase
Your Internet Quotient, TransPath, WebEx, and the WebEx logo are registered trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries.
All other trademarks mentioned in this document or website are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company. (0903R)