CNM: A delicate balance for service providers
internettelephony.com
Giving customers control without sacrificing security, performance, cost and
scalability will be the true test of customer network management technology
PAMELA DODGE
Pamela Dodge is Director of Product Marketing, Network Management
Systems, for the Core Systems Division of Ascend Communications Inc.
By enabling subscribers to view their portion of the public network, Customer
Network Management (CNM) technology is eliminating the issue of control, which
has long been a stumbling block for enterprise users who are considering a move
away from private networks. Because offering this capability represents a
fundamental shift in the way service providers normally conduct business, checks and
balances are essential.
Before delivering CNM services, service providers should balance the recognized
advantages of sharing control with customers by putting a number of checks in place.
These checks include ensuring scalability and security, closely defining types of
services offered and establishing cost-effective delivery methods for CNM services.
In the area of scalability, service providers should realistically evaluate how the CNM
solution is designed so as not to overload the network with management traffic. For
example, CNM solutions should be able to isolate historical and real time requests,
fulfilling these requests in the most optimum manner. Real time requests must be
fulfilled via a direct query to the network (resulting in the generation of management
traffic), but much information--such as confirmation or reporting--can be obtained
from a local cache of historical information.
To be effective, CNM services should tightly link service providers and customers
while isolating customer inquiries from day-to-day public network management
operations. This approach not only minimizes network management traffic but also
eliminates potential security risks.
In further addressing the issue of security, service providers must ensure that
customers can only view their piece of the public network and do not have access to
other information. Each customer must be restricted to the network resources that
they use to transport their traffic.
For instance, the physical ports, logical virtual circuits or trunks that are dedicated to
them must appear only to them. This means that one customer must not be able to
see another customer's elements at the enterprise level, or that competitive local
exchange carrier (CLEC) A must not be able to see CLEC B's resources. The
security must be implemented throughout the network, from the resource level up
through the service management applications. Security of transport for the data also
is critical.
Mechanisms such as encryption and secure socket layer (SSL) must be deployed to
ensure that the information path is secure. Service providers also must consider the
level of CNM flexibility they want to offer. The CNM technology should allow a
service provider to create various types of services with differing levels of privilege to
meet the requirements of different network segments. Services can be defined to
include read-only capability or read/write capability as well as reports on, or views
of, fault and configuration performance information.
Read/write access, for example, reduces provisioning time and provides a level of
ownership for customers with all the benefits of a private network. In offering such
CNM services, service providers must formulate strict definitions of the types of
services they will offer and to whom.
For example, a CMN customer who is a CLEC may be given access to
configuration fault and statistics information with a partner's service, while a CNM
customer who is an enterprise manager may be only given view access to service
level agreement (SLA) reports. In addition, although service providers may not be
considering offering write services today, it is important to prepare to offer such
services in the future.
The best CNM applications will enable service providers to package new services
so they can deliver different CNM services to different customer groups. At a
minimum, CNM service packages must allow end users to monitor their subscribed
portion of the public network.
Services can be defined that differentiate what the user sees, such as activity and
performance information including circuit utilization, error performance and mean
downtime or to view configuration information about committed information rate
(CIR) levels, quality of service settings and outstanding faults.
Services such as these greatly enhance the appeal of network outsourcing and port
wholesaling by giving subscribers unprecedented 24-hour access to network data so
they can monitor link, congestion and service quality at any time. This allows
enterprise network managers to maintain a high degree of control while their traffic is
being carried over the public network.
The ability to monitor the performance of their portion of the public network also
helps enterprise managers to proactively plan for network growth just as if it was a
private network.
When offering CNM information, service providers must reformat information to
make it useful to the customer's business. Delivering graphical information on
network activity with tables, charts and graphs, for example, provides
easy-to-understand access to network data for internal and external customers. End
users want to be able to see reports that show service level conditions at a glance to
determine whether or not the service they are getting meets the contract
requirements.
New technologies such as Java are allowing CNM services to be an operational
reality. Making the reports available using standard web browsers opens the public
network to end users, allowing them to monitor the operational status of network
devices and connections, configuration information, performance statistics,
accounting or billing data, and trap alarm conditions.
Making use of web technology to deliver CNM services is cost effective. It allows
platform independence at the customer level and no software distribution control for
service providers. Customers can simply access information via web browsers from
their desktops.
In addition to the enterprise applications discussed above, CNM services also can
be used for delivery of information to internal service provider employees such as
account managers, business managers or network planners.
The ability to gather detailed service usage statistics will enable service providers to
review network performance and usage to properly plan for network growth and
design. The ability to proactively examine the network activity of accounts will help
account managers strengthen customer relationships and possibly lead to new sales
opportunities.
As CNM breaks down the barriers keeping enterprise users from turning their
private networks over to public transport, service providers must carefully plan their
CNM offerings before simply giving users the control they are demanding. Ultimately,
a service provider's success will hinge on putting in place a system of checks and
balances for scaling the network to maintain performance, ensuring the security of
each customer's data, tailoring service offerings and keeping costs down.
The final reward will be a value-added service offering that will tightly tie service
providers to their customers.
Pamela Dodge is Director of Product Marketing, Network Management
Systems, for the Core Systems Division of Ascend Communications Inc.
Visit the Ascend Communications website.
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Selections from our Archives
March 30, 1998 InFocus
Which end is up?
Making room for competition in a deregulated world
PAMELA MOFFITT DODGE
June 23, 1997 Intelligence & Software
Network with a view
Newbridge, Siemens broaden customer control
CHRIS BUCHOLTZ
January 13, 1997
An ongoing OPEN HOUSE
Thanks to quality-of-service guarantees, customers are no longer in the dark
about network performance. Increasingly, performance reports-- and their
delivery mechanisms--are differentiating carrier services
PAMELA MOFFITT DODGE
November 11, 1996 Intelligence & Software
Merger aids management
BT/MCI alliance could focus customer network management solutions
CHRIS BUCHOLTZ
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Additional resources on the Net
The Committee on Network Operation and Management (CNOM)
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Any Comments?
Send them to Karen Murphy at msblues@earthlink.net.
www.internettelephony.com
InFocus May 25
c1998 Intertec Publishing Corp., a Primedia company
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