VIEWPOINT
Communication Service Providers (CSP) are now facing tremendous challenges related to network operations. The networks are becoming remarkably complex with evolution to multi-RAN technology coexistence (3G, 4G, and 5G), cloudification and containerization, and AI computing. The services on top of networks are also becoming remarkably complex in B2C, B2B, and B2X domains with increasing demands on customer experience excellence. The traditional, network-centric operation model is no longer viable in today’s digital era as it comes with limited automation, manual processes, isolated workflows and data silos, and outdated technologies and platforms. CSPs will be more and more difficult to achieve operation excellence in order to deliver service excellence. There is then an urgent need to transform traditional operation model to the New Generation Intelligent Operation model.
“There are three major trends for Intelligent Operation. Firstly, we need a more intelligent platform underpinned by Telecom specific automation and AI capabilities. Secondly, we need to move from the traditional, network-centric operation model to a new, service-centric operation model to deliver closed-loop management of customer experience. Lastly, we need a transformed operational organization not only with upskilled existing workforce but also with new roles like Network Strategist, Data Analyst and Application Orchestrator in order to realize agile development of operation APPs”, said Kevin Ye, President of Intelligent Operation Domain of Global Technical Service, Huawei.
Left: Kam-Shing Fung, HKT VP of Digital Operations Transformation.
Right: Kevin Ye, President of Intelligent Operation Domain of Global Technical Service, Huawei.
Three Zeros of Huawei Intelligent Operation
The vision of Huawei Intelligent Operation is Three Zeros: “Zero” Service Impact, “Zero” Intervention, and “Zero” Code Development. Huawei has continuously invested in platform, process, people and technology innovation to achieve this vision.
Elaborating on this, Kevin Ye said, “Huawei has introduced Intelligent Event Management (iEM) to enable the transformation from network-centric operation to service-oriented network operation and then to service-centric operation. iEM implements closed-loop analysis, diagnosis, and troubleshooting of network faults with multi-dimensional data sources and measurements of service impacts of each fault on end users”.
“Huawei Intelligent Operation solutions support multi-service convergent operations, such as MBB, 5GC, ToH, ToB, and Industrial Private Networks, helping CSPs quickly lunch new services with good network quality. The solutions also adopt a new “4+1” process framework (4 capability domains of Service, Enabling, Governance, and System, 1 transformation methodology) to facilitate digital operation transformation”, Ye added.
“Lastly, AUTIN also provides a powerful low-code development platform with scenario-based orchestration capabilities, which enables CSPs to shorten their operation APP development cycle from months to weeks” Ye added. “AUTIN is the brand name of Huawei Intelligent Operation solutions. It means “Automation + Intelligence”, Ye also explained.
With over 30 years of rich experience in ICT operations, Huawei is at the forefront of developing innovative network operation solutions for the industry. The company has successfully delivered over 200 Intelligent Operation projects in more than 100 countries and serving 1.6 billion end users worldwide.
Huawei has set up the first-of-its-kind O&M Lab to continuously explore technology innovations in ICT operation domain. The company has accumulated more than 1000 automation rules, 150 AI models, 300 knowledge graphs, 1000 scenario-based APIs, and 200 atomic capabilities. The powerful R&D capabilities has made the company one of the core contributors to the international standards, for example, Huawei’s recent contribution to TMF standard IG1294 EDNS (Expected Demand Not Served).
“We have been focusing on several root technologies in the operation domain, for example, network topology restoration. Huawei can provide high-precision multi-layer network topology for cross-domain intelligent risk identification and fault demarcation. Further, our Knowledge Centre has unique algorithms to enable automatic diagnosis of fault root cause analysis with accuracy rate of more than 80%”, Ye said.
“Another technology innovation example is our Automatic Alarm Behaviour Discovery Pro (AABD Pro). Based on the adaptive spatiotemporal data mining algorithm and expert experience, AABD Pro implements AI mining of fault propagation relationships and fault clustering and demarcation, helping users quickly identify root Network Elements and service impact scope. The fault clustering accuracy reaches 90%, and the root NE identification accuracy reaches 93%. Further, we have built measurement models to quantify the service impacts of network problems. This helps in bringing down CSPs’ business loss by more 5% to 10%,” Ye added.
Empowering CSPs’ Digital Operation Transformation
Huawei is partnering with a number of CSPs, including HKT, to transform their network operations. Kam-Shing Fung, HKT VP of Digital Operations Transformation, highlighted several key challenges faced by HKT for better running its modernized network infrastructure.
“HKT looked for something that would help Operations correlate multiple detected anomalies from different monitoring views to a single event or incident in order to quickly and accurately identify the root problem. This helps in quick resolution of the problem thus benefiting the customer. This will also help lift the pressure from our operation team as multiple anomalies are consolidated and correlated into a single event and team can focus on the root cause to quickly resolve the problem. So “Event Management” is one of the very important criteria or successful key in the transformation,” said Fung.
Digital Operation Transformation can lead to significant financial benefits. HKT has achieved considerable OPEX savings in the mobile domain in just one and a half years since initiating this transformation.
“We now plan to take similar steps in the ToB Area. We will work closely with Huawei to identify some strategic areas to enable Intelligent CAPEX Allocation. Additionally, we are very keen to drive the Transformation forward in a more holistic manner so that like Sales & Marketing can also benefit from it. As more and more business units realize its value, we can devote more resources to transformative investments, not just Operations.” Fung added.
Conclusion
Huawei’s Intelligent Operation solutions are helping CSPs, like HKT, to transform their network operations. In the future, Huawei will continue to strengthen such partnerships. Through continuous investments, improvements and innovations Huawei will continuously integrate the latest digital technologies and platforms into Intelligent Operation solutions to better help CSPs to embrace the digital transformation challenges and create lasting value to CSPs’ future growth.
