Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Capacity Utilization in Cellular Networks of Present and Future Generation

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 18 Oct 2003 14:15:53 -0400

Capacity Utilization in Cellular Networks of Present and Future Generation

Managing the mobile lifeline
Having a mobile phone may seem
like a lifeline to the rest of the
world. But what happens when
the rest of the world is also using
theirs? In a disaster mobile
networks become congested and
can collapse under the weight of
calls. Effectively managing traffic
is therefore essential to
maintaining communications links
and in extreme cases saving
lives. Recognising this need,
CAUTION has developed a mobile
network traffic management system.

"The original motivation for the project was to avoid traffic congestion in
emergency situations," explains CAUTION project manager Sofoklis Kyriazakos of the
National Technical University of Athens, Greece, "but when we started talking to
mobile operators we realised that congestion occurs on an everyday basis, during
peak hours or a sports event for example."

Funded under the IST programme, the CAUTION project has indeed resulted in a
system that offers broader benefits to both mobile operators and end-users than
the consortium expected at its conception.
"On a day-to-day basis operators avoid a loss in profit resulting from blocked
calls due to congestion while user satisfaction is increased from a quality of
service perspective," Kyriazakos notes.
While CAUTION was designed for and tested on GSM and GPRS networks, a subsequent
IST project CAUTION++ is adapting and expanding the system for use on new UMTS and
WLAN networks.
Both systems are built around two core network elements, an Interface Traffic
Monitoring Unit (ITMU) and a Resource Management Unit (RMU).

The RMU automatically and intelligently responds to congestion alerts from the
ITMU, blocking non-essential traffic, prioritising certain calls and freeing
network bandwidth. It also learns the best responses, building its own database of
different traffic scenarios and effective reactions to them.
CAUTION also includes two other elements, the Emergency Call Server (ECS) and the
Priority Call Server (PCS), which operators can use to manually decongest the
system during emergency situations.  CAUTION++ will include an additional
coordination element to divert traffic from a congested network access point to
non-congested ones.

The everyday benefits of the system and its proven ability to improve
communications in crisis situations have drawn a large amount of interest from
mobile operators, Kyriazakos says.
"The project partner who participated in the trials, the Greek mobile firm
Cosmote, is planning to incorporate CAUTION into its network and we have also had
interest from operators both inside and outside of Europe," the project manager
notes. "We firmly believe the same will be true for CAUTION++."

http://istresults.cordis.lu/index.cfm?section=news&tpl=news&ID=57042

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