VoLTE

Using Policy to Deliver High

Denition Voice Services
The continued roll out and growth of LTE places operators plans for voice
services increasingly in the spotlight. Providing data services on one network
and voice services on older circuit switched networks, may not make best use
of scarce resources. LTE provides lower cost of ownership over older networks,
so consolidating data and voice services on LTE makes nancial sense. It can
also deliver customers a better service experience and enable operators to be
better equipped to compete against OTT VoIP and messaging providers. Voice
over LTE (VoLTE) enables operators to consolidate network expenses, provide
much more ecient use of spectrum, and deliver a wider range of services for
their customers.
While the initial function of VoLTE is voice services, as its based on IP
Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), it enables operators to deliver many more
services, such as Rich Communications Suite (RCS) oers including messaging
and video calling. These can be oered and bundled with voice services that
can be easily used by the operators subscribers.
As VoLTE is delivered as a voice service over a data network, it will require
control and delivery capabilities that, while used extensively in data services,
were not required in traditional circuit switched voice networks. One of
the main control and delivery functions needed by VoLTE will be policy
management to ensure the consistent and quality delivery of a High Denition
(HD) voice service.
VoLTEThe New Voice (thats Data)
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The Growth of HD Voice and LTE
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There is already a fast expanding market for HD voice. As of September 2013, 83
mobile operators in 61 countries oer HD voice services.* While most of these
are on 3G HSPA, a number are VoLTE. This is set to increase as several large tier
one operators look to launch VoLTE in the near future, taking advantage of the
success of LTE.
The rate of growth of LTE continues unsurpassed: by December 2013 there
were 244 live LTE networks with a total of 499 operators in 143 countries
investing in LTE. The number of LTE subscribers is also growing fast (126M Q2,
2013up 98M in 1 year, with a forecast of 2 Billion by 2017).*
* SourceGSA, LTE Data, September, December 2013
There is a strong demand from operators to roll out VoLTE. In August 2013
Openet surveyed over 80 mobile operators71% said that they were looking
to introduce VoLTE services.* This number is backed up by research from
leading research rm telecoms.com intelligence who ran a survey asking mobile
operators how long after a commercial launch of LTE would they start to
provide VoLTE services. The answers showed that 34% expect to see VoLTE
launched commercially between 12-24 months after initial LTE launch while
almost 19% expect a timescale of 6 months or less and over 27% see 6-12
months.
Looking ahead, Infonetics projects the number of VoLTE subscribers to grow
at a 145% compound annual growth rate from 2012 to 2017 and ARCchart
forecasts that VoLTE subscriptions will represent 10% of all LTE subscribers by
2016. No matter which way you look at the numbers, LTE is enjoying massive
adoption and it makes commercial sense for operators to leverage this to
provide HD voice services to their LTE customers using VoLTE.
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VoLTE Roll Out and Growth Forecasts
Source - Telecoms.com Intelligence Voice over LTE survey, January 2013 * Source: Openet SurveyCharging and Billing in the Digital Economy, August 2013
Enabling QoS in VoLTE
Traditionally policy management has been a preserve of data services. But
as VoLTE is a voice service enabled by IMS, advanced policy management is
needed. In order to deliver HD voice services, the policy management system
needs to dynamically manage unpredictable mobile resources associated with
each VoLTE call. Policy is essential to manage the quality of service (QoS) of
every VoLTE call, as the quality needs to be better than low-cost or free over-
the-top services.
With VoLTE, delivering QoS is not just limited to voice. Rich communication
services such as video messaging also need to be managed. Just like the HD
voice services, these messaging services need to have policy to dynamically
manage every call and session.
PolicyDelivering Quality on Every VoLTE Call
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VoLTE - System Performance and Virtualization
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Supplementing LTE with Existing Circuit Switched Networks
One of the components of rolling out a VoLTE service is the ability to use the
existing circuit switched network when LTE coverage is not available. Circuit
switched fall back (CSFB) is important so that operators can launch a VoLTE
service even if they dont have full national LTE coverage, and rely on existing
circuit switched networks to handle calls when a customer goes outside an area
of LTE coverage. This handover from LTE to 3G will add to the large number of
call records that VoLTE will generate. This can place additional pressure on the
business support systems (BSS) used to collect, rate, dynamically manage and
charge for VoLTE calls. Its therefore important that BSS for VoLTE (and all LTE
based trac) can provide cost eective, very high performance transaction
management.

VoLTEDriving the Economics for Virtualized Policy
To commercially deploy VoLTE, the policy solution needs to scale to handle
a dramatic rise in transactions per second (TPS) rates and network signaling.
VoLTE requires all subscribers to have a permanent data bearer channel
available together with the signaling associated with the IMS application
function. This will drive the requirement for additional hardware and add to the
cost of providing the systems to enable delivery of VoLTE.
Virtualization of policy management is critical to meeting this scaling
requirement in a cost eective manner.
The GSA reports that as at December 2013, there are six operators who
have launched VoLTE services. They are SK Telecom, Korea Telecom and
LG U+ in Korea, O2 in Germany, Evolved Broadband in the USA, and Azercell
in Azerbaijan.
Two of the current VoLTE oers are discussed below:
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Existing VoLTE Oers
SK Telecom HD Voice on LTE
South Korea Telecom launched VoLTE in August 2012
and by May 2013 had more than 4.5 million customers using VoLTE. *
Using the brand of HD Voice SK Telecom see VoLTE as an opportunity to
better compete with OTT and VoIP services and deliver a superior voice service
for customers. According to SK Telecom VoLTE dramatically improves audio
quality (able to handle 2.2 times wider frequency bandwidth as 3G voice) and
has much improved call setup times which range from 0.25 to 2.5 seconds on
LTE, compared with a ve second setup time on 3G.*
LG U+ 100% LTE for Voice Calls
Korean mobile operator LG U+ is promoting 100% LTE
which means that all voice calls are pure LTEin other words no circuit
switched fallback on LG U+ network. In September 2013, LG U+ CEO said call
success rates on 100% LTE is as high as 99.89 percent. They have emphasized
that there is no need for a 3G network to back up LTE and that 100% LTE also
uses less battery power. **
Since launching LTE and its associated services, all operators in South Korea
have seen an increase in ARPU.*
*Sourcetelecoms.com, May 2013. **SourceKorea Joongang Daily, August 2013
VoLTE
THE FUTURE IS CALLING
A
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Openets Policy Manager provides a standards compliant (3GPP and GSMA
VoLTE) solution that enables the easy conguration of policies related to IMS
applications and QoS prole from a central decision core. Once Policy Manager
is congured, IMS applications can be enabled through a single decision core
command which greatly simplies the deployment process. Openets Policy
Manager for VoLTE can be implemented as part of a larger policy solution from
Openet, or as separate VoLTE / IMS policy solution for operators who have
invested in other policy solutions. Openets Policy Manager provides proven tier
1 performance in a virtualized environment.
Openets VoLTE Solution
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For more information,
please visit www.openet.com
Since the introduction of mobile data services in 1998, Openet has helped
service providers capitalize on opportunities and overcome challenges. With
competitive pressure accelerating, todays service providers rely on Openet
software to evolve business models around networking smartphones, M2M
devices and third party services. Openets portfolio combines policy and
charging control with device and third party interaction to enable innovative
charging models, to control operating cost and to personalize services. More
than 80 of the worlds largest service providers across over 30 countries use
Openets high performance software.
Openet has helped operators worldwide take advantage of growth
opportunities by evolving legacy platforms to provide a exible, real-time
charging/OCS capability integrated with policy control (PCC).
About Openet
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Learn More About Openets VoLTE Solution