Network Measurement & Testing Network Measurement & Testing

Worldwide End-to-End Service Quality Measurements

International
Service Benchmarks

Customer Experience

Smart

phone

Network Certification

Drive tests
OPtiMizAtiON
Measurements

Mobile Broadband Performance

Public Benchmarks

Unattended Probing

International Benchmarking
P3 communications is the leading provider of worldwide End-to-End user focused service measurements in conjunction with delivering management level customized reporting. We operate an extensive fleet of measurement vehicles and portable measurement systems for operation in overseas markets to offer high flexibility and a worldwide footprint to our customers. At P3 communications, our highly experienced project managers ensure that your benchmarking project is delivered as a turnkey service: in time, in budget and with exactly the added value and analysis capabilities that both your engineering/ optimization as well as your medium and top-level management are looking for. This way, P3 communications is not only delivering towards your need for measurement data and analysis but also towards your need for support in your internal and external communication. Service Description: The main objective of the benchmark is getting a clear and independent look on network performance from the customers point of view. The benchmark is a representative snap shot of the End-to-End quality, highlighting major differences between competitors (or regions or vendors). Basically, there are two different main focuses for benchmark measurements: Technical Performance Benchmarking: The focus of this kind of benchmark is the technical capability of mobile radio networks to support and carry services like voice, web, YouTube video, File transfer etc. Key properties of the network here are coverage, signal quality, capacity, available technology (2G, 2.5G, UMTS, HSxPA, LtE) and performance (e.g. throughput, latency). this kind of benchmarking is done by scanner measurements as well as service tests. One main objective of the technical network performance benchmarking is to get a picture of the whole network. Customer Experience Benchmarking: In contrast to the technical benchmark an End-to-End service benchmark is executed to observe the performance of a mobile radio network from a customers point of view, i.e. commonly used services are measured the applications and equipment the end customer uses. Furthermore, for data services the particular devices and connection manager SW sold to the end customers have a significant influence on the perceived service performance and form an integral part of the P3 communications measurement methodology.

Network Testing Activity Record / Reference Projects

Many projects with focus on network testing, roll-out verification and network benchmarking. Long term network / service assurance monitoring & alarming. Benchmark experience in more then 50 Countries (EMEA, APAC regions and beyond). International operator group benchmarks covering up to 20 countries in EMEA and APAC. Regular public benchmarks in cooperation with Connect Magazine (covering Connect-Countries Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Serbia).

P3 communications drive test facts in 2011

18 circumnavigations of the world, 720.000 measurement kilometers 104 projects in 30 countries worldwide 3.000 days of measurement, 20.000 measurement hours

Smartphone Customer Experience and Network Capability Testing

Todays market for mobile data services is driven by the progressing convergence of telephony and mobile computing and networking in integrated portable devices like tablet PCs or smartphones. Smartphones contribute significantly to the transferred data volume and play an important role concerning mobile data usage. The usage of smartphones differs from laptop usage concerning mobility as well as transferred content and traffic mix. P3 communications favored measurement approach reflects the specific requirements that smartphones and the respective applications pose towards cellular radio networks. Services such as mobile web browsing, cloud services, usage of social networks and other web-based services as well as online mobile media consumption demand among others ubiquitous availability, responsiveness and a reliable base connectivity. In brief, our 2012 test methodology and best practice approach comprises the following: 1. on-device usage oriented End-to-End service quality testing for smartphone data, 2. network capability testing for smartphone data generally focusing on base connectivity and responsiveness. In order to get a complete view of the network and services quality one should also consider smartphone voice in a multi-RAB environment, i.e. CS voice with simultaneous background data traffic. Usage Oriented Services: App download from reference server (HttP), Download from live service (HttP) Upload to reference server (HttP), Upload to live service (HttP), Web browsing (popular live pages), e.g. CNN, NYtimes, Google, GMX, Facebook), Youtube live video download and playout. Smartphone data tests are done using state-of-the-art Android against dedicated reference servers and live servers with changing content. Network Oriented Measurements: Fixed duration download (HttP), Fixed duration upload (HttP), Latency measurements. These tests focus on the maximum capabilities offered by a network to tCP based applications. Pre-defined (fixed) transfer durations with pre-defined pauses are used to spread tests in time domain and geography.

Network Certification
Our certification service provides a unique benefit to you as a certified operator: it enables your marketing to communicate your networks strengths to your customer base by means of an independent assessment and 1. support print and online Marketing campaigns, 2. support roll-out of new devices and services and 3. support technology upgrades and successful optimisation activities (see http://www.p3-certificates.com). the certification also eases internal communication of your technical market position in terms of service availability, integrity, coverage to senior management and stakeholders. Service Description Over recent years P3 communications has earned a high reputation in the European mobile telecommunications market. P3 communications is internationally accepted for its crossbench and respectable work for many reputable network operators. Based on this assurance, P3 communications already performed and published independent measurements, for example for the well-known CONNECt-magazine and also tests and verifies the quality of services in order to issue a certification. thus P3 communications enjoys industrywide trust as an independent expert. On that behalf, P3 communications is acting as an acknowledged certification authority and P3 communications certificates are widely used in public relations and both internal and external communication.

Certification Process
the goal is the independent audit, verification and certification of clients statements about the quality of their telecommunication network or services. 1. First step: the customer choses from a set of certifiable statements which are fixed in a certification contract between P3 communications and customer. 2. + 3. P3 communications uses an accepted methodology suited to test the intended statements and independently plans and executes the campaign. 4. P3 communications performs a statistical analysis of the results to verify the statements. in case of a successful verification of the statements is documented by a certificate, which is published by P3 communications after clients authorization. 5. the client can start to use the certificate according to the contracts regulations.

Unattended Long-Term Probing

Operators seeking a high QoS are concerned about both customer experience and network performance, which cannot be covered by regular information from network counters. To assure service quality permanent End-to-End measurements from a customers point of view outside the network are needed. For years, customers worldwide have been relying on SAM as P3 communications unattended monitoring framework for stationary 2G/3G KPI and SLA measurements, including live overviews, alarming & trace access. 2012 will see the harmonization of service measurement capabilities in the drive testing and monitoring areas of P3 communications inhouse tool chain based on the latest generation of the known peeqBox Hardware, the powerful but unobtrusive peeqBox nano. SAM is a full fledged End-to-End monitoring framework meeting these requirements. Operators get live network overviews at a glance. Its online result presentations and network traces allow in-depth engineering. These overviews and an integrated alarming ensure a fast response to network problems. SAMs autonomous probes measure multiple services and upload their data to a central server which handles result presentation via a web portal. Data upload is either done over the air or by a fixed LAN connection. Popular examples of attractive use cases enabled by the SAM solution are 1. Long term service and network monitoring to support operational and engineering tasks, 2. Performance comparison between different regions/ vendors/operators/settings or before and after soft- and hardware changes, 3. Detection of system failures (e.g. per RNC/BSC area or MSC/SGSN area) and 4. Detection of overload situations in the network (e.g. with Mean User Data Rate, etc.). The unattended probing solution offers the following benefits from the operators perspective: 1. Out of the box End-to-End measurements from the customers point of view with probes that can freely be positioned and do not need any on-site attendance. 2. 24/7 measurements with no integration into the operators infrastructure. 3. Slim but powerful and intuitive online platform for measurement configuration and result access no complicated training needed (expert in 15 minutes), webbased without additional client license cost. The system is offered as a turnkey solution provided as a managed service customer gets results and does not have to operate the probes, test servers, backend systems, web servers etc. As a result, we offer very short lead/deployment times compared to the in-house deployment of rented or purchased solutions. SAM Concept: Unattended measurement units Permanent KPI and SLA monitoring (CS, PS and Messaging Services) Customer approach with no integration into the operators infrastructure Online (browser) access to measurement results and configuration Easy & intuitive web interface

Reference projects:
Long term End-to-End monitoring of most relevant customer services Monitoring of end user experience during new vendor roll-out Performance validation of network optimization

P3 communications GmbH Dennewartstr. 25-27 52068 Aachen / Germany phone +49 241 9437 400 info.communications@p3-group.com