Reader Forum: Wireless – Plugging the service assurance hole for enterprise CIO's

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reader Forum section. In an attempt to broaden our interaction with our readers we have created this forum for those with something meaningful to say to the wireless industry. We want to keep this as open as possible, but maintain some editorial control so as to keep it free of commercials or attacks. Please send along submissions for this section to our editors at: dmeyer@ardenmediaco.com or tford@ardenmediaco.com.
Ask any CIO how their traditional IT network (LAN, WAN, routers, etc.) is performing, and he will be able to rattle off a number of metrics that will leave you quite impressed. However, ask him what kind of reliability, quality and overall assurance his company experiences in their wireless service, and it is very likely he will be able to tell you which wireless service provider the company is with, how expensive the bills are and problems they perceive with the services.
That’s right; wireless is still a black box with a bill for most CIOs. In the era of the voice-centric wireless world, this may have been somewhat acceptable, but with the volume of business applications running on smartphone’s today which are critical for business operations, no CIO can afford to be complacent. The good news is that with handset-based software solutions, it is now possible for the CIO to get valuable information on each and every corporate wireless user’s coverage experience and performance (voice, data, KPIs) experience totally independent of the wireless network or WSP. This data can be further aggregated for departments, office locations, and entire company or aggregated by individual WSP.
Needless to say the benefits of being able to negotiate better SLA’s and pricing with WSPs and/or provide feedback to WSPs on specific coverage, capacity or quality issues to rectify that exist on corporate premises affecting employee productivity is a tremendous asset.
The software is easily deployable over-the-air via SMS or e-mail and can be updated OTA as well. The technology uses the data-channel connection of the wireless device to upload key information regards the actual experience along with accurate geolocation stamped information. This information is available near real-time for reporting and can be accessed real time via an Internet browser.
Various companies implement different forms of this handset-based software technology; however it is important to select a solution that is not hardware or firmware embedded for three reasons. Firstly, it is very difficult to deploy on existing devices and cannot be updated OTA and secondly, a hardware-based solution involves working with the handset OEM, so true independence and objectivity in reporting any device-related problems will be questioned. Finally firmware-based solutions are more costly due to greater integration and testing costs with each device OEM and constant software updates with each OEM’s platform version change.
In summary, the technology exists for capturing end-user and enterprise-level mobile experience and should be employed by CIO’s seeking to understand the quality and reliability of their wireless voice and data-centric applications. Armed with this information, actions can be taken with the wireless service provider to both negotiate better rates and validate key SLA metrics (drop call, throughput rates, coverage etc) are maintained to ensure business continuity.
Sanjay Ambekar is the SVP at NIL Labs and can be reached for further information or comment at sanjay.ambekar@nil-labs.com