netcracker us government case study for tmf-libre

TM Forum Case Study February 2010 Page 1

2010 NetCracker Technology Corp.

Application of Frameworx for COTS-Based Business Transformation

Name of company/ies submitting case study: NetCracker Technology

Location: Waltham, Massachusetts, USA

Web links to company/ies submitting case studies: http://www.NetCracker.com

Contact for further information (to be posted on TM Forum website): Anh Le Director of Telecom Solutions NetCracker Technology 95 Sawyer Rd

Waltham, MA 02453, USA Email: [email protected]

Tel: +1-781-419-3300

Applicable TM Forum Technical Areas: Frameworx [NGOSS], Business Process Framework [eTOM], Information Framework [SID], Application Framework [TAM], Interface Program [TIP] (OSS/J, MTOSI) Applicable Industry Areas:

Viewpoint Business Areas Targeted

Service provider perspective X Business Process Management

X Software vendor perspective Revenue Assurance

Hardware vendor perspective X Streamlining of OSS

X System integrator perspective Streamlining of BSS

Fraud Management

X Service Lifecycle Management

Services X Fulfillment

Cloud X Fault Management

X Video Performance Management

X Data Billing Transformation

X VoIP X Network Management

IPTV X Service Modeling

X Voice X Network Inventory Normalization

X Other: OTN, ATM, Private Line, Private LAN, IP VPN

X Resource Lifecycle Management

X Integration

X Other: Data migration, New Service introduction



Table of Contents

1.0 CASE STUDY SUMMARY .........................................................................................................3

2.0 Business Problem To Be Solved...................................................................................................3

3.0 Organizational Division Affected (Marketing, IT, Operations, Network, etc.) ......................4

4.0 Partners Involved (Internal or External)....................................................................................4

5.0 Working Towards a Solution (What was the business / technical problem to solve?) ...........4

6.0 Solution (What were the technical / conceptual / business solutions employed?)...................4

6.1 Architectural Transformation......................................................................................................4

6.2 Business Process and Application Frameworks Alignment .......................................................6

6.3 Use of Information Framework [SID] and Interface Program [MTNM] ...................................6

6.4 Interface Programs (MTOSI) Application for Inventory and Configuration Management ......7

6.5 Interface Program (OSS/J) for Ticket Data Exchange................................................................8

6.6 OSS/J for Order Orchestration....................................................................................................8

7.0 TM Forum Frameworks, Best Practices, or Guidelines Employed and How They

Helped ..................................................................................................................................................9

7.1 TM Forum Business Process Framework [eTOM].....................................................................9

7.2 Information Framework [SID]....................................................................................................9

7.3 Application Framework [TAM]..................................................................................................9

7.4 TM Forum Interface Program [TIP] .........................................................................................10

8.0 Results ..........................................................................................................................................10



1.0 CASE STUDY SUMMARY

This case study is about the Frameworx [NGOSS]-based solution implemented at a major US federal

government organization (hereafter referred to as the Organization). The Organization provides

telecommunications and network services to many organizations within the government. In other words

it plays the role of an internal Telco and provides services on a par with other Tier 1 commercial

providers. As part of an organization-wide technology refresh, the Organization chose to update their

OSS suite and implement a SOA-based architecture. The result was an enterprise-wide business

transformation. This transformation was expressly based on TM Forum and Frameworx [NGOSS]

principles.

This case study looks at the following aspects of the Organizations OSS transformation:

Business Motivations

Top-Level Solution Architecture

Application of TM Forum and Frameworx Principles

2.0 Business Problem To Be Solved

The Organizations mission requires it to provide secure communications, rapidly deployed to meet the

needs of governmental organizations around the country. Lengthy fulfillment times, a lack of in-flight

order visibility, and the introduction of new services sparked a re-evaluation of the Organizations back

office.

In the framework of the legacy fulfillment, inventory, and assurance systems update, the Organizations

OSS architects were tasked to support the following top-level business values:

Build a Service Oriented Integration environment where data interfaces are published, self-describing, and reusable

Use common, shared information exchange schema for application integration

Support dynamic, on-demand provisioning and activation of voice, video, and data services

Provide end-to-end visualization of the network

Reduce order to fulfillment cycle time

Provide better order tracking transparency and reporting

Automate processes and facilitate ongoing process re-engineering

Create interoperable and interchangeable OSS components using one data interface per application

Provide integrated, real-time situational awareness of the network

The Organizations challenges included eliminating legacy systems, streamlining and automating the

order fulfillment process, centralizing inventory data, and finally, improving the customer experience.

To address these business needs, the Organization engaged NetCracker and other vendors to help

realize the SOA vision. The Organization made a decision to adopt TM Forum constructs like Business

Process Framework and Application Framework to provide the solution blueprint. NetCrackers close

adherence to TM Forum standards made it a logical choice to address Network Inventory, Discovery

and Reconciliation, Service Inventory, and Service Provisioning and Activation.



3.0 Organizational Division Affected (Marketing, IT, Operations, Network, etc.)

The OSS touches most portions of the Organizations network. However, the changes most directly

affected the divisions responsible for:

Engineering and operations, including global voice, video, messaging, and data networks

Customer service, including CRM and service order management

Installation and implementation

OSS and network management

4.0 Partners Involved (Internal or External)

NetCracker played the central role in the Organizations solution implementation. Apart from

that, a number of partners also participated in the project.

5.0 Working Towards a Solution (What was the business / technical problem to solve?)

The legacy architecture was a collection of systems specifically built

for the Organizations use, the legacy CRM portal being a customized

GOTS (Government Off The Shelf) system. The service fulfillment

process thus caused inconvenience and was endangered by slow

service delivery times, high risks of data inconsistency, and human

factor interferences.

The legacy inventory system was a collection of COTS and GOTS

products used for network documentation. It had basic workflow

capabilities, but lacked automated fulfillment.

6.0 Solution (What were the technical / conceptual / business solutions employed?)

The details of the NetCracker solution for the Organization are given in the following six

subsections.

6.1 Architectural Transformation As stated, the Organizations OSS architects chose to base the architecture on Frameworx

[NGOSS] principles and SOA technologies. A Common Communications Vehicle (CCV) is

used to integrate systems. Systems without SOA-style interfaces integrate directly into the CCV

on native APIs. The CCV then converts these integrations into web services where inventory,

fault, ticketing, and order data is published / consumed by other SOA-capable systems.



The Customer Relationship Management Layer: The Order Entry Portal replaced the legacy application with an SOA-capable back end

(NetCracker Order Management module), while product definitions are held in a product

catalog. OSS/J order definitions are carried over web services to the Order Management

system.

The Service Management and Operations Layer: The Order Management System (NetCracker Service Inventory and Service Provisioning &

Activation modules) receives orders from the Order Entry Portal. Manual decomposition is

replaced with advanced workflow which carries the order through to fulfillment. Service order

definitions may be reused to aid the rollout of new services or changes to existing ones.

Workflow notifies network engineers to plan and design the needed resource allocations. All

designs are made in the Network Inventory System.

The Resource Management and Operations Layer: The Network Inventory System uses NetCracker Resource Inventory, Design & Planning, and

Discovery & Reconciliation modules. Network discovery occurs across the CCV to EMSs. The

CCV publishes web services with MTOSI definitions for device and circuit inventory. All

inventory and capacity is automatically tracked.

Assurance: The Service Quality System exposes the service portfolio for a given customer on the Service

Portal. The Service Portal is outside the secured OSS enclave. Data is pushed to a replication

instance where JSR-268 portlets feed the service portal inventory, status, and order data.



6.2 Business Process and Application Frameworks Alignment A mapping of NetCracker modules to TM Forum Application Framework and Business

Framework components is shown in the following diagram:

6.3 Use of Information Framework [SID] and Interface Program [MTNM]

The following table describes the elements of the Information Framework which were used in

the underlying data architecture:

Function Information

Framework

[SID]s

Domain

Interface Program

[TIP]s Specification

Java XML/JMS WS

Trouble Ticket Common OSS/J TT Yes Yes Yes

OSS/J FM Yes Yes Yes

MTOSI No Yes Yes

MTNM (CORBA) No No No

Event Mgmt Resource

QoS Yes Yes No

Service

Inventory Service OSS/J Yes Yes Yes

Resource

Inventory Resource MTOSI No Yes Yes

Resource Usage Resource IPDR Yes No No

Order Mgmt Service OSS/J Yes Yes Yes

Service

Activation Service OSS/J Serv Act Yes Yes No

QoS Service OSS/J QoS Yes Yes No



6.4 Interface Programs (MTOSI) Application for Inventory and Configuration Management

NetCracker used web services to expose resource inventory to the CCV environment. In this

case, NetCracker was communicating with Element Management Systems to:

Upload inventory from the EMS

Create an inventory database from multiple EMSs

Represent state changes in inventory as reported by the EMSs

Upload circuit information

The following diagram shows the implementation environment:

In this case, an Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) was used as the CCV. The CCV provided significant message and protocol conversion. The subtending EMSs were

connected to the CCV via CORBA. CORBA is a legacy standard that was used for

system integration in OSS environments. The CCV provided object mapping from

the various vendor artifacts back to the standard MTOSI objects.

MTOSI 1.1 is used as the standard for network event and alarm messaging integration:



6.5 Interface Program (OSS/J) for Ticket Data Exchange

OSS/J has been identified as the standard to use for trouble ticket messaging integration. The

SQM module generates associated resource and service trouble tickets and exchanges the

tickets with the Trouble Ticket Management system.

Tickets that are processed in the TT Management module may carry updated information about

services and resources via tickets in the Service Management System module:

When a trouble ticket message is received, the fields populated in the OSS/J xml message are

stored in the Service Quality System DB.

6.6 OSS/J for Order Orchestration

In order for NetCrackers Service Provisioning & Activation (SP&A) module to communicate

with the customer order management system (i.e. to receive orders and return fulfillment

results), such operations as order creation and order updates are executed in OSS/J OM:

NetCracker Service

Provisioning & Activation

Customers Order

Entry and

Management

CCV

Web Service

Interface

Order Creation

Module

Call Order

Provisioning

Module

Call

Exception 1 No Exception

Web Service

Call 1

Web

Service

Response 1

Web

Service

Call 2

Web

Service

Response 2



7.0 TM Forum Frameworks, Best Practices, or Guidelines Employed and How They Helped

7.1 TM Forum Business Process Framework [eTOM] The Organizations OSS architecture reflects major elements of the operations side of the

Business Process Framework. A siloed inventory and design system was replaced with a true

Resource Management Layer. The Resource Layer includes modules for Resource Inventory,

Design and Planning, Discovery and Reconciliation, and Outside Plant.

The most sweeping change was the addition of a true Service Management Layer. A technically

outdated system was replaced with modules for Service Inventory and Service Provisioning and

Activation. At the center of the Service Layer is a Services Catalog with specific constructs for

Customer-Facing and Resource-Facing service templates.

7.2 Information Framework [SID] NetCracker makes use of TM Forums Information Framework common language to accurately

describe various business entities engaged in the process of end-to-end service delivery.

NetCracker physical and logical data models are Information Framework compliant and cover

both the standard objects and relationships. NetCrackers adherence to the Frameworks

common language proves crucial for multiple interface integration and facilitated data

modeling, and in the long run, proves crucial for cost-effective business transformation.

The Organization has leveraged this native alignment with the Information Framework within

NetCracker to make their CCV implementation more closely aligned with industry data models.

Examples of this are the inventory and fault artifacts in MTOSI format.

7.3 Application Framework [TAM] The Organizations general application of Business Framework [eTOM] in its business

transformation lends itself to implementing elements of Application Framework [TAM]. Since

the Organization is not a commercial Telco, there are several areas where the Application

Framework does not apply. However, certain of its constructs are evident in the current

architecture:

Service Order Management as part of Fulfillment

Customer Quality of Service Management as part of Assurance

Resource Process Management (across OS&R, Fulfillment, and Assurance) under workflow control

Resource Inventory Management (across OS&R, Fulfillment, and Assurance)

The utilization of TM Forums Applications Framework allowed for effective classification of

hundreds of legacy applications by mapping their roles to Application Frameworks

components. It also facilitated design migration and integration strategy development.



7.4 TM Forum Interface Program [TIP] A series of TM Forum Interface Program standards-based integrations was realized in the OSS

transformation project:

MTOSI: the Organization makes use of MTOSI over web services across a CCV for inventory discovery and reconciliation. It also uses MTOSI for fault information collection.

The integration was later enhanced through notification capability and external systems

connection via web service.

OSS/J FM over web service is used for ticket data interchange. The Service Quality Management module uses OSS/J ticketing objects to implement customer-facing service

portals showing ticket data, order data, and other assurance information.

OSS/J OM is used for service and order data communication between the Service Layer and the Customer Layer (NetCracker Service Provisioning & Activation to integrate with

an Order Management system)

8.0 Results

Industry-standard specifications bundled with COTS solutions reduced delivery times, enabled fast

service introduction, and consequent integration cost reductions.

To date, the Organization has reduced the system count in the fulfillment chain. Now a unified

Resource Layer holds all as-built and to-be inventory data. In addition, this also eliminates several

GOTS systems, which was also a key goal. This has driven down costs and updated the underlying

technology. The Organization has also received the capability to report on exact order statuses.

Future plans include self-service portals where secured users can get instant status and order

tracking information.

Other benefits of the solution include:

Centralized, integrated, and granular security control: The solution also provided for greater security control and allowed the Organization to parse inventory visibility among

various users and groups.

Avoid vendor lock-in: The use of TMF constructs over a web services infrastructure reduced the Organizations dependency on vendors. Since all integrations use standard

object definitions and standard protocols, the organization can now replace any system with

reduced impact on the overall operation, thus minimizing integration risks.

Flexible, change-proof solution: Standard Telco practices need to be flexible enough to incorporate the Organizations special requirements. The greater flexibility enabled by the

solution promotes interchangeable component integration, while greater scalability ensures

minimal impact to existing systems.

Knowledge sharing and training cost reduction: The opportunity to re-use data interface specifications across multiple systems helped to maximize the knowledge pool and lower

training costs. Finally, better information dissemination provided for on-time information

exchange.

Moreover, the openness of the standard helps the customer to own the solution themselves. Relying

on the TM Forum-based consolidated solution and using TM Forum specifications, the customer

gets a clear understanding of what to look at when deciding to introduce a new service or new

network equipment.



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May we re-print the case study in outside publications? Anything that will go outside the TM Forum

will first require permission from the authors.

Yes

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