Success Stories
Automated Testing Framework
Lawful interception (LI) is a legal requirement of CSPs (communications service providers) under national laws and regulation. In the past, LI was limited to wire-tapping phones. Today’s criminals have a wide variety of communication channels through different types of technology and encryption methods.
CSPs must be able to provide data for SMS text, call detail records, fax, downloaded and transferred files. It’s essential for CSPs to maintain consistent LI capabilities to respond quickly to warrants from law enforcement agencies with complete and relevant data from various sources and network technologies.
Automated testing eases the load on your test lab for every transition, migration, and update to your network. A series of test scripts can run in a matter of hours. Ongoing monitoring and reporting tools enable your staff to focus on proactively fixing problems.
LI can also be a valuable revenue stream in some countries where local authorities pay specific fees to the CSP for every observation.
LI compliance is essential to avoid hefty penalties and protect licensing. Timely cooperation with law enforcement agencies safeguards your bottom line.
SEGRON’s Automated Testing Framework (ATF) can help CSPs validate LI compliance. With each transition, migration, and update, CSPs can run a series of test scripts to generate the reference data interfacing to law enforcements LI management system. Continuous monitoring detects and alerts appropriate personnel of issues in LI capabilities. Reporting and analysis tools enable quick troubleshooting and problem resolution.
Testing all interfaces of the PCRF (policy and charging rules function) from an end-to-end perspective to verify policy decisions was a challenging task for a European Tier-1 MNO.
More than 3000 dynamic test cases were required for this process and needed to be performed at least once per month. Additional systems under test (SUT) are OCS, PCRF and EDA.
Due to the massive amount of tests required, manual testing was not a viable option.
Even though there were only 50 test cases, the environment preparation and manual post-testing analysis was a big pain point for the customer.
After deployment of the ATF, the automated execution of these 50 test cases, including the precise analysis, have been completed within less than 3 hours.
SEGRON installed one ATF instance in the MNO laboratory environment, equipped with a powerful PCRF simulation on Gx, Gy interface and intelligent automated test case design based on dynamic input parameters (policy decision).
ATF PCRF simulator communicates with elements such as PCRF (Gx), OCS (Gy), EDA (HTTP/SOAP), OCS Provisioning (REST) and SIS (REST) 3000 highly complex test cases have been automated. The execution time is less than 9 hours.
A Tier-1 mobile operator needed to ensure the correct functionality of very complex radio interworking tests with a variety of different smartphones, including Layer3 analysis, inter-, intra system handover, SRVCC, 5G dual connectivity verification in a laboratory environment. The manual execution of 50 complex test cases took several days to execute as precise analysis was necessary.
Even though there were only 50 test cases, the environment preparation and manual post-testing analysis was a big pain point for the customer.
After deployment of the ATF, the automated execution of these 50 test cases, including the precise analysis, have been completed within less than 3 hours.
Efficient, automated active testing solutions using real devices in an early stage of the product lifecycle (laboratories) is important to ensure optimal customer experience in production networks.
SEGRON installed an on-premises ATF instance with a custom RAN verification suite including automated attenuator control, shielded boxes, and Layer3 radio protocol analysis. An automated environment Health Check Suite was deployed to monitor the RAN availability and environment status including automated notification in case of problem detection.
A Tier-1 mobile operator needed to ensure the availability and correct functionality of all circuit switched services after parameter or software changes in the network.
A set of 400 complex test cases needed to be executed on a regular basis covering services such as 2G/3G or VoLTE calls, call forwarding, SMS, eCall and multiparty, including the verification of the audio quality and automated signalling analysis on several Core and RAN interfaces.
Prior to the deployment of SEGRON’s ATF, several weeks of testing efforts were needed to manually execute the 400 test cases, including all necessary verification steps (audio and trace analysis). After deployment of the ATF, the fully automated execution of these 400 test cases, including automated result analysis and documentation, took less than 15 hours and could run overnight.
Customer Quality of Service and Experience has improved because problems are identified early in the service acceptance phase and are not impacting customers.
The remote testing capability of the ATF added further benefits, especially during COVID restrictions.
The SEGRON ATF provides the ability to perform testing using real end user devices and can also integrate and analyse the interfaces needed to ensure the correct testing result.
Specifically, we delivered an on-premises installation including real mobile devices and an audio quality analysis solution. The ATF Host also accessed the existing trace solution to perform detailed signalling analysis.
intelligent Device Automation
Keeping pace with device and firmware evolution had become a challenge for the device testing team of a European Tier-1 mobile network operator.
More than 60 devices and 200 firmware versions per year needed to be tested and this amount was expected to grow further.
Device manufacturers have begun “outsourcing” testing of new firmware and devices to the MNO.
Device testing and service verification using latest smartphones and firmware versions is key to optimal QoE and customer satisfaction. Legacy test automation tools fail to keep pace with device evolution or require time consuming maintenance.
The advanced capabilities of the ATF, in combination with iDA, enable day 1 availability of newest devices for test automation and decrease test duration time significantly.
Time-to-market is super critical when it come to launching new iOS and Android-based flagship devices.Accelerating this process by using the ATF and iDA without any compromises on QoS and QoE directly results in a competitive advantage for our client.
SEGRON installed the intelligent Device Automation (iDA) solution supporting the ATF device control. The iDA uses artificial intelligence technology to integrate new and pre-released devices, as well as firmware versions, within minutes into the ATF to enable seamless testing. Today, our customer simply connects the new devices to the ATF/iDA, and the device learning process is initiated automatically. In less than 15 minutes, existing test cases can be executed using new or even pre-released devices.
Global Service Enabler
A Tier-1 EU mobile operator approached us to verify correct functionality of existing and newly introduced roaming services for different network domains. The verification needed to be done on regular basis, including hosted mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) and services such as end-to-end IPX connectivity, data roaming, voice services (VoLTE), diameter and GTP roaming solutions. A strong focus has been put on VoLTE and 5G roaming testing.
Productivity was significantly improved. In the past, manual testing in combination with modem based legacy tools lead to delays and uncertain results. Smartphone based verification of services like VoLTE, 5G and OTT app QoE is the future proof way to have maximum confidence in customer satisfaction and optimal QoE in domestic and roaming scenarios.
Manual testing can be reduced to a minimum and new services are verified quickly and with latest smartphone technology in roaming scenarios. This results in accelerated time-to-market and significant resource and cost reduction.
SEGRON’s Global Service Enabler (GSE) uses real smartphones in multiple locations globally for automated verification of MNO/MVNO services in all network domains. SIM cards were provided by the customer and inserted into the central SIM arrays hosted by SEGRON. IREG test experts on the client and SEGRON side defined test campaign and locations and enabled automated service verification with regular reporting and immediate alarming in case of fault detection.
Automated Testing Framework
Challenge
Lawful interception (LI) is a legal requirement of CSPs (communications service providers) under national laws and regulation. In the past, LI was limited to wire-tapping phones. Today’s criminals have a wide variety of communication channels through different types of technology and encryption methods.
CSPs must be able to provide data for SMS text, call detail records, fax, downloaded and transferred files. It’s essential for CSPs to maintain consistent LI capabilities to respond quickly to warrants from law enforcement agencies with complete and relevant data from various sources and network technologies.
Solution
SEGRON’s Automated Testing Framework (ATF) can help CSPs validate LI compliance. With each transition, migration, and update, CSPs can run a series of test scripts to generate the reference data interfacing to law enforcements LI management system. Continuous monitoring detects and alerts appropriate personnel of issues in LI capabilities. Reporting and analysis tools enable quick troubleshooting and problem resolution.
Benefit
Optimize Productivity and Increase Revenue
Automated testing eases the load on your test lab for every transition, migration, and update to your network. A series of test scripts can run in a matter of hours. Ongoing monitoring and reporting tools enable your staff to focus on proactively fixing problems.
LI can also be a valuable revenue stream in some countries where local authorities pay specific fees to the CSP for every observation.
Avoid Costly Penalties
LI compliance is essential to avoid hefty penalties and protect licensing. Timely cooperation with law enforcement agencies safeguards your bottom line.
Challenge
The manual execution of 50 complex test cases took several days to execute as precise analysis was necessary.
Solution
An automated environment Health Check Suite was deployed to monitor the RAN availability and environment status including automated notification in case of problem detection.
Benefit
Increased productivity
Improved Efficiency & Accuracy
Pre-released devices, new device and firmware versions can now be released to the market much more quickly. The testing of firmware versions was normally taking weeks; now it can be completed within days, including the administrative tasks.
Challenge
Solution
Benefit
Increased productivity
Improved Efficiency & Accuracy
Challenge
Solution
An automated environment Health Check Suite was deployed to monitor the RAN availability and environment status including automated notification in case of problem detection.
Benefit
Revenue Assurance & Quality of Service
With 3000 test cases executed over night, our client can release high quality software to the production environment without risk of revenue loss.
intelligent Device Automation
Challenge
Solution
Benefit
Improved Detection of Phone Issues
Decreased Time-to-Market
Pre-released devices, new device and firmware versions can now be released to the market much more quickly. The testing of firmware versions was normally taking weeks; now it can be completed within days, including the administrative tasks.
Global Service Enabler
