Published in The Hindu, Sep 22,2010 - http://bit.ly/9Jlwx5 - Tinniam V Ganesh
We are progressively moving towards a more connected world, using a variety of devices to connect to each other and to the Net. We are connected to the network through the mundane telephone, mobile phone, desktop, laptop or iPads. We use the devices for sending, receiving, communicating or for our entertainment. In 2005, the International Telecommunications Standardisation Sector (ITU-T), which coordinates standards for telecommunications on behalf of the International Telecommunication Union, came up with a seminal report, “The Internet of Things.” The report visualises a highly interconnected world made of tiny passive or intelligent devices that connect to large databases and to the “network of networks” or the Internet.
This ‘Internet of Things' or M2M (machine-to-machine) network adds another dimension to the existing notions of networks. It envisages an anytime, anywhere, anyone, anything network bringing about a complete ubiquity to computing. In Mark Weiser's classic words, “the most profound technologies are those that disappear and weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it”. This will result in the metamorphosis of the network from a dumb pipe to intelligence at the edges. Embedded intelligence in the things themselves will further enhance the power of the network.
The portents of this highly revolutionary technology are already visible. The devices in this M2M network will be made up of passive elements, sensors and actuators that communicate with the network. Soon everyday articles from tyres to toasters will have these intelligent devices embedded in them.
RFID tags
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) was the early and pivotal enabler of this technology, with a tiny tag responding in the presence of a receiver which emits a signal. Retailers keep track of the goods going out of warehouses to their stores with this technology.
In a typical scenario one can imagine a retail store in which all items are RFID tagged. A shopping cart fitted with a receiver can automatically track all items placed in the cart for immediate payment and check-out. Another interesting application is in the payment of highway tolls. Similarly, plans are already afoot for embedding intelligent devices in the tyres of automobiles. The devices will be used for measuring the tyre pressure, speed etc., and warn the drivers of low pressure or tyre wear and tear. The devices will send data to the network, which can be processed.
This technology is also well suited for insurance companies which can give discounts to safe drivers based on the data sent by these sensors. Other promising applications include an implantable device capable of remote monitoring of patients with heart problems. It can warn the physician when it detects an irregularity in the patient's heart rhythm.
The ‘Internet of Things' can also play an important role in monitoring the stress and the load on bridges and forewarn when the stress is too great and a collapse is imminent. In mines, the sensors can send real-time info on the toxicity of the air, the structural strength of the walls or the possibility of flooding.
The day is not far off when devices will connect to the Internet to monitor and control the environment, improving our daily lives and warning us of impending hazards.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Cloud, analytics key tools for today's telcos
Published in Telecom Asia Aug 20, 2010 – http://bit.ly/dxKbsR
Operators facing dwindling revenue from wireline subscribers, fierce tariff wars and exploding mobile data traffic are continually being pressured to do more for less. Spending on infrastructure is increasing as they look to provide better service within slender budgets.
In these tough times telcos have to devise new and innovative strategies and make judicious technology choices. Two promising technologies, cloud computing and analytics, are shaping up as among the best choices to make.
Cloud architecture does away with the worry of planning the computing resources needed, the real estate, the costs of the acquiring them and thoughts of its obsolescence. It allows the CSPs to purchase processing power, platforms and databases almost as a utility like electricity or water.
Cloud consumers only pay for what they use. The magic of this promising technology is the elasticity that the cloud provides – it expands to accommodate increasing demands and contracts when the demand drops.
The cloud architectures of Amazon, Google and Microsoft – currently the three biggest cloud providers – vary widely in their capabilities and features. These strengths and weaknesses should be taken into account while planning a cloud system. Each is best suited for only a certain class of applications unique to each individual cloud provider.
On one end of the spectrum Amazon’s EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) provides a virtual machine and a wealth of associated tools for storage and notifications. But the trade-off for increased flexibility is that users must take responsibility for designing resiliency into their systems.
On the other end is Google’s App Engine, a highly scalable cloud architecture that handles failures but is a lot more restrictive. Microsoft’s Azure is based on the .NET architecture and in terms of flexibility and features lies between these two.
When implementing such architecture, an organization should take a long hard look its computing software inventory to decide which applications are worthy of migrating to the cloud. The best candidates are processing intensive in-house applications that deliver standardized functionality and interface, and whose software architecture is made up of loosely coupled communicating systems.
Applications that deal with sensitive data should be retained within the organization’s internal computing infrastructure, because security is currently the most glaring issue with the cloud. Cloud providers do provide various levels of security to users, but this is an area in keen need of standardization.
But if the CSP decides to build components of an OSS system – rather than buying a pre-packaged system – it makes good business sense to develop for the cloud.
A cloud-based application must have a few essential properties. First, it is preferable if the application was designed on SOA principles. Second, it should be loosely coupled. And lastly, it needs to be an application that can be scaled rapidly up or down based on the varying demands.
The other question is which legacy systems can be migrated. If the OSS/BSS systems are based on commercial off-the-shelf systems these can be excluded, but an offline bill processing system, for example, is typically a good candidate for migration.
Mining wisdom from data
The cloud can serve as the perfect companion for another increasingly vital operational practice – data analytics. The cloud is capable of modeling large amounts of data, and running models to process and analyze this data. It is possible to run thousands of simultaneous instances on the cloud and mine for business intelligence in the oceans of telecom data operators generate.
Today’s CSP maintains software systems generating all kinds of customer data, covering areas ranging from billing and order management to POS, VAS and provisioning. But perhaps the largest and richest vein of subscriber information is the call detail records database.
All this data is worthless, though, if it cannot be mined and analyzed. Formal data mining and data analytics tools can be used to identify patterns and trends that will allow operators to make strategic, knowledge-driven decisions.
Analytics involves many complex areas like predictive analytics, neural nets, decision trees and classification. Some of the approaches used in data analytics include prediction, deviation detection, degree of influence and classification.
With the intelligence that comes through analytics it is possible to determine customer buying patterns, identify causes for churn and develop strategies to promote loyalty. Call patterns based on demography or time of day will enable the CSPs to create innovative tariff schemes.
Determining the relations and buying patterns of users will provide opportunities for up-selling and cross-selling. The ability to identify marked deviation in customer behavior patterns help the CSP in deciding ahead of time whether this trend is a warning bell or an opportunity waiting to be tapped.
Operators facing dwindling revenue from wireline subscribers, fierce tariff wars and exploding mobile data traffic are continually being pressured to do more for less. Spending on infrastructure is increasing as they look to provide better service within slender budgets.
In these tough times telcos have to devise new and innovative strategies and make judicious technology choices. Two promising technologies, cloud computing and analytics, are shaping up as among the best choices to make.
Cloud architecture does away with the worry of planning the computing resources needed, the real estate, the costs of the acquiring them and thoughts of its obsolescence. It allows the CSPs to purchase processing power, platforms and databases almost as a utility like electricity or water.
Cloud consumers only pay for what they use. The magic of this promising technology is the elasticity that the cloud provides – it expands to accommodate increasing demands and contracts when the demand drops.
The cloud architectures of Amazon, Google and Microsoft – currently the three biggest cloud providers – vary widely in their capabilities and features. These strengths and weaknesses should be taken into account while planning a cloud system. Each is best suited for only a certain class of applications unique to each individual cloud provider.
On one end of the spectrum Amazon’s EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) provides a virtual machine and a wealth of associated tools for storage and notifications. But the trade-off for increased flexibility is that users must take responsibility for designing resiliency into their systems.
On the other end is Google’s App Engine, a highly scalable cloud architecture that handles failures but is a lot more restrictive. Microsoft’s Azure is based on the .NET architecture and in terms of flexibility and features lies between these two.
When implementing such architecture, an organization should take a long hard look its computing software inventory to decide which applications are worthy of migrating to the cloud. The best candidates are processing intensive in-house applications that deliver standardized functionality and interface, and whose software architecture is made up of loosely coupled communicating systems.
Applications that deal with sensitive data should be retained within the organization’s internal computing infrastructure, because security is currently the most glaring issue with the cloud. Cloud providers do provide various levels of security to users, but this is an area in keen need of standardization.
But if the CSP decides to build components of an OSS system – rather than buying a pre-packaged system – it makes good business sense to develop for the cloud.
A cloud-based application must have a few essential properties. First, it is preferable if the application was designed on SOA principles. Second, it should be loosely coupled. And lastly, it needs to be an application that can be scaled rapidly up or down based on the varying demands.
The other question is which legacy systems can be migrated. If the OSS/BSS systems are based on commercial off-the-shelf systems these can be excluded, but an offline bill processing system, for example, is typically a good candidate for migration.
Mining wisdom from data
The cloud can serve as the perfect companion for another increasingly vital operational practice – data analytics. The cloud is capable of modeling large amounts of data, and running models to process and analyze this data. It is possible to run thousands of simultaneous instances on the cloud and mine for business intelligence in the oceans of telecom data operators generate.
Today’s CSP maintains software systems generating all kinds of customer data, covering areas ranging from billing and order management to POS, VAS and provisioning. But perhaps the largest and richest vein of subscriber information is the call detail records database.
All this data is worthless, though, if it cannot be mined and analyzed. Formal data mining and data analytics tools can be used to identify patterns and trends that will allow operators to make strategic, knowledge-driven decisions.
Analytics involves many complex areas like predictive analytics, neural nets, decision trees and classification. Some of the approaches used in data analytics include prediction, deviation detection, degree of influence and classification.
With the intelligence that comes through analytics it is possible to determine customer buying patterns, identify causes for churn and develop strategies to promote loyalty. Call patterns based on demography or time of day will enable the CSPs to create innovative tariff schemes.
Determining the relations and buying patterns of users will provide opportunities for up-selling and cross-selling. The ability to identify marked deviation in customer behavior patterns help the CSP in deciding ahead of time whether this trend is a warning bell or an opportunity waiting to be tapped.
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