1. This document is offered compliments of
BSP Media Group. www.bspmediagroup.com
All rights reserved.

2. Delivering a Better Data and
Video Experience
Case Study: Vodacom
Mark Davis, Sr. Director, Product Marketing, Citrix Service Provider Platforms
Jannie Van Zyl, Executive Head: Innovation, Vodacom SA
14 November 2013

3. Topics
• The effects of data and video traffic on the network – and on
subscribers
• Techniques for managing the data traffic growth and QoE on 2G, 3G
and 4G networks
• Case Study: Vodacom South Africa - delivering a better smartphone
experience
© 2013 Citrix | Confidential – Do Not Distribute

4. By the numbers…
$2.6B revenue
8,300+ employees
250,000+ customers
10,000+ partners in 100 countries
#1 Desktop & App virtualization
#2 Cloud Networking
#1 Public Clouds
#2 Web Collaboration
#1 in web and video optimization
for mobile networks
© 2013 Citrix | Confidential – Do Not Distribute

5. 12+ years as web & video optimization leader
135+ operator customers in 60+ countries
55+ video optimization deployments
48% market share
4
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7. The global impact of mobile video
Video is the Majority of Traffic on Mobile Networks
iPad Owners Are Videoholics
6
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Source: Citrix ByteMobile Mobile Analytics Report, October 2012

8. Insufficient network capacity to accommodate peak
video demand
Excessive network utilization = poor subscriber experience
7
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Source: Citrix ByteMobile data from live customer network

9. What is a good or bad experience?
8
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10. What is a good or bad experience?
Subscribers will select a lower resolution video to ensure continuous playback
9
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12. Phase 1 for constrained networks: optimize
everything, reduce data volume
Operator Impact
Techniques
Optimize
Protect the network. Control costs. Reduce stalling.
Allow more subscribers to access the network.
11
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13. This approach has worked well
• T-Mobile Germany and Vodafone have far better mobile
Internet performance, as measured by 2012 benchmarking
(measured by both 2012 Netztest of ‘Chip’ magazine and P3 Communications)
• Both are Citrix ByteMobile video and web optimization
customers
12
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14. For LTE networks: selective & smarter optimization,
user experience-centric
Operator Impact
Techniques
Improved experience = more video consumption= higher data revenue
13
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15. This approach has worked well, too
Without
optimization, video
experience ranges
from bad to terrible
Video stalling and data volume over 24 hours
Stalling / 60 Seconds of Video
90
80
70
60
50
40
With optimization,
video experience is
dramatically
improved and
consistent
throughout the day
30
20
10
0
12:00:00 AM
4:00:00 AM
8:00:00 AM
Stalling without Optimization
14
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12:00:00 PM
4:00:00 PM
8:00:00 PM
Stalling with Optimization
12:00:00 AM

17. About Vodacom
South Africa’s Leading Mobile Network Provider
• Subscribers
ᵒ
ᵒ
ᵒ
ᵒ
36 Million Subscribers
20 Million Data Capable Devices
15 Million Active Data Users
7 Million Smartphones & Tablets
• Network
ᵒ ~ 10 000 Base Stations
• ~ 6000 43.2Mb/s
• ~ 750 LTE
ᵒ 99.8% 2G Coverage
ᵒ 90% 3G Coverage
ᵒ 7Mb/s (netindex)
• Traffic
ᵒ 3 Petabytes per Month
• 1.5PB from Smartphones
ᵒ >400 TB Video per Month
ᵒ 80%+ YoY growth
16
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18. The problem
• Users expect instant gratification
ᵒ Won’t wait for a web page to load
ᵒ Don’t want their video to stall
ᵒ Experience on Vodacom network not where
we wanted it to be
• Continuous pressure on available
network bandwidth
• Deployed the Citrix ByteMobile traffic
management platform in 2012
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19. Compression techniques offer greatest user
experience benefits
Avg. stalling duration per minute of video
Daily video stalling
% videos stalled
15.0%
17.6%
10.0%
7.3%
5.0%
0.0%
w/out compression
w/ compression
Stalling time (s)
-59%
20.0%
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
40.8
-79%
8.4
w/out compression
w/ compression
• 55% of videos being optimized using compression
• 45% of videos being optimized using lossless techniques (e.g. just-in-time)
• Compression trades resolution for smooth delivery
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20. Complementary benefit: bandwidth is made
available to more users
Average video throughput
1600.0
• Compression yields lower
bandwidth utilization per
video
Throughput (kbps)
1400.0
-34%
1200.0
1000.0
800.0
1485
kbps
980
kbps
600.0
400.0
200.0
0.0
Lossless
w/out compression
© 2013 Citrix | Confidential – Do Not Distribute
Lossy
w/ compression
• Allows network to support
more video users, while
improving video experience

21. Stalling reduction made the user experience so
good, we decided to make an advert
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pvmEzr7FXI
© 2013 Citrix | Confidential – Do Not Distribute

22. Stalling reduction made the user experience so
good, we decided to make an advert
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pvmEzr7FXI
© 2013 Citrix | Confidential – Do Not Distribute

23. What’s next for the Vodacom network?
Address delivery delays caused by content
servers: media caching
Actively manage streaming video:
streaming policy control
Measure and score the user experience in order
to further improve it: user experience indexing
© 2013 Citrix | Confidential – Do Not Distribute

25. Vodacom
Stand E08D
Citrix ByteMobile
Stand B23