Position Statement

Operations and Management of 4G Networks and Services


James Won-Ki Hong, Dept. of CSE, POSTECH, jwkhong@postech.ac.kr

Driven by the need to support a variety of mobile, personalized,
context-rich multimedia services and applications, the fourth
generation (4G) mobile communication systems have been under
development by researchers and vendors around the world. 4G systems
are expected to be deployed and operational within the next several
years. With the advances in networking, multiplexing, scheduling and
physical layer technologies, 4G systems are also expected to provide
higher bandwidth to more users and thus provide more cost-effective
services than currently existing systems.

The 4G networks are expected to co-exist and inter-work with existing
2G and 3G mobile communication systems as well as satellite, wireless
LAN (WLAN), and IEEE 802.16e (WiMAX and WiBro) networks, all
interconnected through the service provider IP backbone networks and
the Internet. Effective, secure and efficient operations and
management of the envisioned 4G network environment is a huge
challenge. Traditional network operations and management methods and
protocols such as CMIP, TMN, SNMP, WBEM themselves are not going to be
sufficient enough to support such complex communication and service
environment. New, intelligent, and self managing operations and
management architectures and methods are needed to meet the
challenges.

In the 4G network environment, the traditional challenges related to
FCAPS (fault, configuration, accounting, performance, and security
management) still exist. New challenges related to FCAPS and new
functional areas such as mobility management, customer management and
terminal management exist.

More research needs to be carried out on the following new challenges:

o Fault Management - automatic, end-to-end fault detection, location
  and analysis

o Configuration Management - dynamic device
  configuration/re-configuration, network discovery & selection, and
  resource provisioning & management

o Accounting Management - authentication, authorization and accounting
  (AAA), usage-based, content based charging & billing management, and
  session management

o Performance Management - end-to-end QoS monitoring and management, SLA

o Security Management - information security and network security

o Mobility Management - domestic & global roaming, horizontal &
  vertical handoff management

o Customer Management - customer subscription management and profile
  management

o Terminal Management - autonomic (i.e., self-x) terminal management,
  location management and terminal trace management