Zeugma Extends Smart Series Applications with SmartMeter
New Application Helps Service Providers Define Fair and Flexible Broadband Policies
FEBRUARY 3, 2009, VANCOUVER, BC - Zeugma Systems, a supplier of open telecommunications solutions for broadband service providers, today announced SmartMeter, a new addition to the Zeugma Smart™ Series of applications introduced last fall. Smart Series applications run within the Zeugma Open Application Sandbox (OAS) to help service providers rapidly develop and deploy new services. SmartMeter gives service providers more granular choices for defining basic and advanced service parameters and greater control over how they implement broadband service policy. Unlike somewhat crude byte counters and per-gigabyte overage charges, Zeugma’s SmartMeter allows service providers to differentiate traffic types while also enabling more customer-friendly responses when users exceed the terms of their service agreements.
The release of SmartMeter allows carriers to address growing consumer and public policy requirements for supporting both basic and advanced broadband services. In a consumer survey conducted by IDC last August, 94 percent of respondents saw value in broadband services that dynamically allocate premium bandwidth for certain types of traffic, such as video, VOIP, gaming, and telecommuter VPNs, and 26 percent would be willing to pay their BSPs additional fees for premium bandwidth services. US policy makers are currently reviewing broadband proposals that make such service choices available to all citizens.
Teresa Mastrangelo, principal with research firm broadbandtrends.com, believes, “Broadband service providers have taken an archaic approach to implementing usage-based frameworks that could alienate their customers. Emerging technologies, like Zeugma’s SmartMeter, allow service providers to simultaneously improve network efficiency while enhancing customer experience.”
SmartMeter usage policies can optimize both basic and advanced broadband services in the following ways:
Time of day. SmartMeter allows service providers to tailor usage packages that are time-of-day specific. With this capability, service providers can provide incentives for consumers to move traffic from heavily congested peak usage hours to lightly congested off hours, thereby improving network efficiency without the need for capacity upgrades.
Traffic type. The requirement for both basic and advanced service policies means service providers need ways to treat certain traffic differently. An example would be the exclusion of all communications-oriented traffic—VOIP, IM, and possibly email—from the monthly usage cap of a basic service package. Since these services tend to be light consumers of bandwidth, such a usage package would improve customer satisfaction at little or no cost to the operator.
Special handling of video traffic. For consumers opting for video services such as IPTV, video on demand (VOD), and premium internet video, service providers also need a mechanism to enforce appropriate bandwidth parameters to ensure a quality video experience. Since these services encourage the consumption of bandwidth it is arguably necessary that the network exclude fee-based video traffic from the usage cap.
Customizable behavior. In order to improve customer satisfaction and reduce the likelihood of unusually high usage bills, service providers can, for example, reduce peak downstream bandwidth once a usage limit has been reached rather than apply overage charges. It is even possible to forecast usage and begin to take corrective action before the usage limit is reached.
According to Curtis Sherbo, Zeugma director of product management, “Broadband service providers are keenly interested in mechanisms that give them more control over how and when bandwidth is consumed on their networks. SmartMeter, a real-time application running within the ZSN gives them that control.”
A Smarter Approach to Bandwidth Control
Most existing capping and metering methods involve operations support systems (OSS) periodically dipping into access network equipment, such as DSLAMs and optical line terminals (OLTs), and extracting usage statistics. Such schemes typically do not allow policies that are time-of-day or traffic-type specific. As important, prevailing usage tracking technologies do not facilitate the modification of network behavior once usage limits are exceeded.
SmartMeter delivers more granular usage tracking and more dynamic bandwidth management through a combination of deep session inspection (DSI), policy, traffic quantification, and bandwidth shaping.
Availability
The Zeugma SmartMeter application is available now. Contact Zeugma for pricing information.
About Zeugma Systems
Zeugma Systems delivers open telecommunications solutions that accelerate new service deployment for broadband service providers of all types. The Zeugma Services Node, a service delivery router, combines massive compute resources with next-generation capacity, service awareness, and subscriber management to yield reliable application integration, rapid turn-up of new services, and a quality video experience. For additional information, please visit www.zeugmasystems.com.
Contact Information
Jeannette Bitz
Engage PR
510-748-8200 x207
jbitz@engagepr.com