REGULATIONS AND STANDARDS


PLAYING BY THE RULES


Two industry experts predict what will shape the all-important regulations and standards for telecoms in 2023 and beyond


Craig Tomas Vice President Strategic


Marketing and Business Development at Broadband Forum


firmly landed on achieving superior QoE, with consumers now expecting impeccable experience and consistent low latency that is relevant to the applications they demand. But we face the challenge of managing the experience of these users to further monetise and differentiate operator’s overall subscriber offerings.


Te demand for superfast next-generation technology experienced a sharp rise during 2022. Remote working and online leisure activities have risen exponentially in recent years largely due to the global pandemic, and required increased bandwidth inside homes. Te high demand for business, mobile and


residential Passive Optical Network (PON) bandwidth ultimately requires deployments that exceed 10Gb/s. 10 Gigabit Symmetrical PON (XGS-PON) is projected to play a huge role in the coming years as network capacity requirements grow. But, speed isn’t everything. We are at a turning point as operators look to differentiate beyond speed and price, and standards are set to play an even more pivotal role in helping the industry become more service aware. Te key conclusion for many operators is


that, once broadband speed is no longer an inhibitor, quality of experience (QoE) becomes as important – if not more important – than simply bandwidth. A seamless customer experience is therefore


more critical than ever. Te broadband industry’s emphasis must shiſt from simply achieving higher speeds and higher bandwidth. With traditional revenue declining, the majority of employers are willing to adopt home working and harness new revenue models that keep residential broadband and the home worker separate. Similar examples can be recognised in other


services, such as eHealth, eLearning and internet of things (IoT) services. Te spotlight has


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Improved latency = improved QoE Regarded as one of the key user experience botlenecks, latency heavily impacts on customer QoE and these customers are becoming increasingly more aware of this. Te subscriber understanding of the importance of latency to QoE has been traditionally restricted to a select niche of application users, such as cloud gaming or Industrial IoT. We are now entering a world where there will be new applications that have broader appeal and expose more people to the discomfort of having poor latency, 8k video and AR/VR is just the start to the demand to deliver latency critical applications. Te industry needs a way of explaining the benefits of low latency in concise terms that are


relatable to the average consumer to effectively monetise latency solutions. Recognised, defined and appropriate metrics need to be created to help the end-user understand latency in terms of their specific application needs and experience. Typical network quality metrics do not capture application outcome sufficiently. You can have identical bandwidth, average latency, jiter and packet loss values, and yet still experience remarkably different quality with different applications. Application outcome varies with how latency is distributed.


Te ‘game-changer’ for performance measurements One part of the journey is Broadband Forum’s Broadband Quality of Experience Delivered (QED) initiative, specified in TR-452, that addresses the need for improved performance measurements and analysis in broadband networks and services that run over them. Te framework uses Quality Atenuation


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The key conclusion for many operators is that, once broadband speed is no longer an inhibitor, quality of experience (QoE) becomes as important – if not more important – than simply bandwidth”


(writen ∆Q) to address the need for improved performance measurements and analysis required by innovative broadband networks, tackling factors such as latency, consistency, predictability and reliability. Te aim is to provide deeper insights and understandings than those currently obtained using conventional indicators, such as packet loss, latency and jiter. To achieve these results, QED decomposes


the packets’ network trip time into distinct components and matches them to the performance degradation sources, including geographical network topology, packet features and load/scheduling processes. QED is the ‘game-changer’ for performance measurements


Fibre Yearbook 2023


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