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Total Telecom spoke to Esri Uk’s Telecoms Commercial Lead, Richard Stevenson, to better understand the many benefits of digital twinning when building networks
In short, what are Digital Twins and how are they used in the telecoms world?
A Digital Twin is a digital representation of the real-world. This could be a visualisation of the telecoms network and its surroundings, a product, subscriber behaviour, process, or all those combined. It acts as a mirror to simulate, predict, and forecast the behaviour of its physical counterpart, and in some cases can control it. Digital Twins deliver a broad range of business benefits, including operational efficiencies in planning, design, deployment, and network optimisation. This saves time and resources, while simulated outcomes deliver insights into new business models.
Fig 1. Urban Digital Twin – “Digital twins can help telecoms operators increase their understanding of network performance, business processes and customer behaviour, in addition how each impact one another.”
What advantages does a geospatial Digital Twin offer an engineer compared to more traditional methods?
In relation to designing and deploying new 5G, fixed wireless access (FWA) or fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) networks, a Digital Twin capability allows the engineer to visualise a telecoms network and its environment from the desktop in 2D, 3D and 4D (time enabled) rather than making several trips to the field. The engineer can turn on and off different layers within Esri’s ArcGIS software to view coverage, network assets, building detail (inside and out), vegetation, network performance, competitor information, demographics, and much more. These visualisations, combined with geospatial analysis, speed up the design process and reduce time to market. They also offer a greater insight into the network optimisation and create operational efficiencies contributing to carbon neutral targets and the bottom line.
For example, rather than visiting and inspecting several urban rooftops to find the best location for a mast or visiting a building to optimise plans for internal cabling, an engineer can quickly inspect the location from the comfort of their office and make faster, more accurate decisions. This information can then be shared securely with the wider team.
Fig.2 BIM and 3D models of buildings
We understand that your ArcGIS Utility Network solution, which is already deployable for other utilities like water and gas, will soon be launched for the telecoms industry. What unique challenges does the telecoms industry pose when designing a solution like this?
Communication networks are continually evolving and as these complex networks converge, planners and engineers require the right tools and data to plan and design networks as effectively and efficiently as possible.
The ArcGIS Utility Network plays a role in asset management, analytics, and collaboration. Esri designed the Utility Network to support the challenges faced by the telecoms industry knowing that telecoms networks are becoming increasingly more complex. In addition, competition is now fierce with many new operators seeking to land grab their share of the FTTP market.
The Utility Network substantially increases the precision and completeness of network modelling, logical & physical connectivity, and schematic diagrams, whilst providing additional visualisation and analytics. It also delivers automation and the immediacy of access which modern workforces have come to expect because of the rise of social media in their personal lives, providing enhanced communication, collaboration, and coordination.
Fig.3 – Utility Network – Automated workflow
How can real-time insights change the way in which a network is managed?
Esri’s open services architecture ArcGIS platform can manage near real-time information and integrate with other systems. Therefore, the ArcGIS platform offers the ability to create robust, scalable operational dashboards for Network Operational Centres (NOC’s) integrating enterprise systems data from the network, i.e. streaming near real-time NEMS data. Alternatively, it is possible to create light weight on-the-fly dashboards for individual users or small teams to have a tailored real-time operational view, for example to monitoring the progress of fibre deployments in a town or city.
This, combined with our geo-spatial analytics, enable a 360-degree view of the network, monitoring coverage and capacity and providing rapid intelligence on the impact of major events or increased usage.
Fig.4 – Operational Dashboard – Monitoring the progress of fibre deployments
What positive impacts can this technology have on the environment?
Firstly, new mobile standards such as OpenRAN are helping mobile operators share network equipment on cell sites. Operators can use the Esri platform to securely share where these sites are located between organisations, improving collaboration and decision making. This exchange of information helps operators quickly decide whether to build a new site or share an existing one, reducing the number of macro sites being built in the environment.
Secondly, with the development of the new Underground Asset Register, operators will be able to understand where underground assets are located and use this information to reduce the need and expense in digging up roads to lay fibre, helping communities and commuters. This information can also be downloaded and securely shared between organisations using the Esri platform.
Finally, Esri’s Digital Twin technology allows organisation to complete more tasks from the office rather than traveling to site. This helps consolidate their workforce, reducing CO2 emissions, which all has a positive impact on air pollution and the congestion on the roads.
Fig. 5 – Visualisation of underground assets
In what ways can using this technology lead to cost and time savings for telcos?
With Esri’s latest advancements in 3D and spatial analysis capabilities and the evolving integration of technologies such as building information model (BIM), augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR), GIS offers tremendous benefits for modelling impacts and improving operations through the use of Digital Twins. These deliver efficiencies by optimising operations and workflows, and proactively improving asset management through working with virtual objects and systems.
Creating a feedback loop between the design and production and between the virtual and real worlds yields substantial savings in time and money and a better understanding of processes and impacts.
In addition, the Utility Network substantially increases the precision and completeness of network modelling, while providing additional visualisation and analytics.
In summary, ArcGIS brings value to every telecom’s organisation, providing the best technology to improve their processes and empower employees and contractors. Where infrastructure, customers and suppliers are in the real world is hugely significant. The ArcGIS platform, including the Utility Network and Digital Twin capabilities, modernises a telecoms organisation’s digital strategy and lays a solid foundation for future digital transformation.
Want to know more? Esri are exhibiting at this year’s Connected Britain. Register your place now for more information.
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