Regional ITU Consultation on
Conformance Assessment and
Interoperability
(Sydney, Australia, 16-17 September 2010)
Highlights from the
consultation events For the
Americas and the African regions
Paolo Rosa
Head, Workshops and Promotion Division
Telecommunication
Standardization
Bureau
Outline
1. Summary of Presentations: The
Problems, the Concerns on ITU
Programme
2. Contributions to the events
3. ITU Conformance Database
considerations and the parallel stepby-step approach
4. Conclusions
National Communications Authority
Ghana
Egypt - Network Integrator A
Equip.
Category (1)
Description of
the problem (2)
Wireless
Access
(WiMax
802.16d)
5
QoS: low
Quality of
Service – BER
related issues
Reasons (3)
Effects/Impact on (4)
3
4
poor
Loss of business / market
interoperability opportunities / image with
equipment
respect to competitors
different vendors
CDMA
F
3
Backhauling
Frame
poor
Via VSAT structures / key interoperability
bytes
equipment
different vendors
2
Additional costs for
maintenance/operation/
restoring
4
Egypt - Network Integrator B
Equip.
Category (1)
Description of the problem (2)
Main Reasons (3)
Effects/Impact on (4)
Feature not supported
and not mentioned on
Data Sheet although it
is basic requirements
for operation.
Another devise
should be used.
Analog Voice
Gateway
Can’t forward dialed digits to next devise.
Voice interface
Card
Caller ID feature is not working on
certain mode of operation although it is
globally mentioned on Spec. Sheet that
it is supported.
New hardware
interface card should
be used.
The customer was
unsatisfied and
switched to another
vendor.
Data Switch
Per Packet load sharing on multi-trunk
lines is not working although it is
mentioned in the Spec. Sheet
Function not available
in current software
release.
Additional devices need
to be used to support
the required function.
Wimax
Basestation
Antenna diversity should be supported... The diversity is actually not
It is available on the configuration menu working when it was
enabled on the software
but not working.
support Team stated
that the diversity is not
working in the current
software and may be
active in next version
5
Egypt- Mobile operator
Equip. Category
(1)
OMC
Announcement
Machine for
subscribers
Description of
the problem (2)
Signaling
Signaling
Reasons (3)
Effects/Impact on (4)
no conformity to
standards
Negative impact on customers/new
markets
no conformity to
standards
Cost increase due to the need to
replace some/all old existing
equipment or to buy additional
equipment to solve problems (e.g.
interfaces)
Partial/Total non
conformity for
no conformity to
IN
expected
standards
functionalities
poor interoperability
NGN
Software
equipment different
(RNC/MGW)
vendors
poor interoperability
Mobile Switching
Signaling
equipment different
Center
vendors
Negative impact on customers/new
markets
Negative impact on customers/new
markets
Loss of business / market
opportunities / image with respect
to competitors
6
TELCOR-NICARAGUA
Problems:
•Partial non conformity for expected functionalities
• Out of service
• Signaling, Overhead configuration
• Safety requirements
Effects on:
•
•
•
•
•
Cost increase to the need to replace some existing equipment or to buy
additional equipment to solve problems
Negative impacts on customers and negative image with respect to competitors
Limited or no access to required services
Delay in restoring network & services
Impact on effectiveness of services for civil society and emergency (for example
public phones could not handle a three-digit numbering, wich are the emergency
numbers
Conclusion:
Support to ITU C&I programme and Res. 76 implementation to reduce
problems
•
•
Compliance testing and interoperability and Conformity database are
indespensable tools to achieve C&I objectives
SUPERTEL Ecuador
• The costs of the technology should be
evaluated not only in view of the initial
investment but also in view of the lifetime of
products and their performance
• Meeting conformance to standards and
interoperability requirements should be a
need for all the industry
• We must be aware the more technology does
not
meet
certified
conformity
and
interoperability requirements the more is the
probability it be converted in waste in a
shorter time
SUPERTEL Ecuador
• Inconvenients due to no compatibility
between Platforms and Terminals for
SMS (INFORME TÉCNICO No. IT.DST.2009. 27/11/09)
• Lack of Interconnection
Signaling (INFORME STC-2008-00271)
due
to
• Limits
in
CDMA
interoperability
(ESTUDIO DE MOVILIDAD PARA ETAPA 2002)
• Cases where conformance was not
sufficient to achieve interoperability
ATIS
Conformance Database Is Ineffective
and Risky - 1
• A conformance database is not
likely to improve interoperability.
– Conformance is not necessarily related to
interoperability. For example, whether a product
conforms with product safety requirements does not impact
its ability to interoperate with other devices.
– Most products conform to many standards, not just
ITU Recommendations. Hence, conformance with only
ITU Recommendations will not ensure interoperability.
– The majority of standards include many options. If a
standard has two options, for example, products in
conformance with Option A will not necessarily interoperate
with products in conformance with Option B.
ATIS
Conformance Database Is Ineffective
and Risky - 2
• The database could negatively
impact countries and consumers.
– Countries may be deprived of new, state-of-the art
products and services if companies are inhibited from
entering a market when its products are not listed in the
database.
– Time-to-market will likely be slowed by new conformance
testing.
– Marketplace confusion could result from false, misleading
or otherwise erroneous database entries.
• Consumers may face higher costs
from additional conformance
and/or interoperability testing and
from reduced competition in the
market.
ATIS supporting CITEL
step-by-step approach proposal to PP-10
“The Telecommunication Standardization Bureau (TSB) Director,
prior to the implementation of any conformance or
interoperability database, should:
• Identify the nature of the interoperability and conformity
problems in the CITEL region;
• Study the effects databases may have on sector members
and stakeholders (e.g., other SDOs);
– Proposed studies should also address relevance of the proposed searchable
databases in “bridging the standardization gap” in the Americas Region;
• Present the results of a robust consultative process with
respect to the databases to future Council meetings;
• Develop a detailed “business case” for the searchable
database prior to its implementation; and
• Address potential liability issues related to the use of the
databases by the TSB Director before implementation.”
ATIS Summary
• More work remains to be done in order to move
toward a useful implementation of Resolution 76 that
addresses the needs and priorities of member States,
the structure of the ICT industry, and the expectations
of end users around the world.
• Any follow up action to Resolution 76 of WTSA-08 put
forward by the TSB Director to Council and the
Plenipotentiary Conference 2010 (PP-10) should be
consistent with the CITEL Inter-American Proposal
(IAP) to the Plenipotentiary Conference 2010.
• A business plan that identifies costs and potential
liabilities must be completed prior to launching of the
proposed ITU-T database (see JCA-CIT).
Outline
1. Summary of Presentations: The
Problems, the Concerns on ITU
Programme
2. Contributions to the events
3. ITU Conformance Database
considerations and the parallel stepby-step approach
4. Conclusions
Germany – Federal Ministry of
Economics and Technology
Project: Measuring interoperability – from
theory to practice
“successful interaction of various data- and
document-formats, processes and services as
well as software (-versions) and applications
often fails due to a lack of interoperability, which
is a prerequisite condition as soon as two or more
systems need to interact. “
Germany: The Project
•
Seeking to develop measures to enhance interoperability in
ICT stating that Conformity is not Interoperability
•
Addressed to
– public procurers have no acknowledged criteria to describe requirements
concerning interoperability
– suppliers – especially SMEs – do not have an acknowledged possibility to
proof if their product meets infrastructures requirements
•
To develop typical scenarios aiming at analyzing, testing,
verifying and demonstrating interoperability of selected
systems in specific areas of application in a lab testingenvironment
•
To produce scenario-specific profiles to be channelled to the
relevant standards bodies as appropriate
MRAs Issues
Present situation
Exporting country
Manufacture
Importing country
 Export 
Testing

Certification

Marketing
Mutual Recognition of Test Reports
Exporting country
Manufacture

Testing
Importing country

Export
 Certification

Marketing
Mutual Recognition of Certification
Exporting country
Manufacture 
Testing

Certification
Importing country

Export

Marketing
1
7
MRAs: Benefits
 Products may be shipped directly to foreign countries
without any further requirements for testing and/or
certification, thereby reducing costs and time to
market
 Facilitates trade by promoting market access
 Reduces and minimizes non-tariff trade barriers
 Promotes market access and competition
 Shortens the time for manufacturers to introduce
their products into the importing countries
Impact of the Mutual Recognition
Agreement in the Americas
Lack of certified laboratories and of policies for
their accreditation doesn’t allow, especially in
the countries of latin america and of the
caribean islands, the achievement of the
objectives of MRAs, and it generated a disparity
in the access to the market in the american
region.
Italy
Example in SDH homologation (Gov. labs):
•
•
•
•
6 Manufacturers – STM 16 Optical Systems
Physical Interfaces
Software & Hardware
107 tests failed: no-conformance and no-interoperability, e.g.:
–
–
–
–
–
–
BER performance, data exchange and thresholds settings
Protection switching
Alarm monitoring not correctly implemented (threshold etc.) especially for
regenerators and for STM-1, STM-4 and STM-16 levels
AIS (signal loss alarm) actions not implemented
receiver sensitivity versus a BER=10-10 for the ADM16/1 aggregate optical
interface results not compliant with ITU-T G.957 Recommendation;
No conformity to standards for
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Jitter transfer function on PDH tributaries at 140 M bit/s out of Recs.
EOW auxiliary (service)
1+1 protection switching,
absence of error performance monitoring (ITU-T G.821 and/or G.826)
Frame alignment pointer not in common positions (Bytes, Bits)
synchronization/clock problems
….
Italy
“Reply to concerns from some members about the
ITU-T Conformity and Interoperability program as
agreed by the Council-09”
– Why to implement the ITU Conformity Procedure and its
Database
– Benefits coming from the ITU Conformity Database for
manufacturers, operating companies, services providers,
end-users
– Why the conformance assessment is the first step in
achieving interoperability
– Real costs and time to market for the manufacturers
– ITU Conformity and Interoperability programme as the best
solution for the needs of developing counbtries.
Telecom Italia 1
• ITU-T's ADSL transceiver standard allowing
discretionary implementation choices aimed unfairly
impair any-to-any interoperability (chipset issue)
• Poor basic interoperability and sub-optimal
performances between cross-vendor implementations.
• Problems progressively overcome thanks to:
– ITU-T's transceiver standard for new generations of DSL
technologies (e.g. ADSL2/2+ and VDSL2)
– less chipset vendors which made the interop playground narrower,
hence less complicated
– Operators strong demand for interoperability limited, to a certain
extent, unfair implementation practices
– Development of interoperability Test Plans by the Broadband
Forum, in a sense completing the ITU-T standard. These Test
Plans not only deal with functional interoperability but also at the
level of optimal any-to-any performances.
Telecom Italia 2
• GPON interoperability tests : lack of
interoperabilty in a multivendor
environment due to:
– Misinterpretation of the Standard,
• E.g. Most Significant Bit of a certain field inverted
with Least Significant Bit
– Too many options allowed by the Standard:
example GPON OMCI (G.984.4), which led to
the production of the "G.984.4 Implementers
Guide” defining a sub-set of mandatory
implementations of the OMCI stack
Vietnam
• Partial missing of vendor’s committed implemented
functionalities affects general quality of services
–
–
In mobile wireless network, it was not possible to implement vendor A’s EMR function
In transmission network, vendor B’s SDH equipment Metro 100 lacks of LCAS (Link Capacity
Adjustment Scheme) functions….
• Partial lack of interoperability between equipment of same
or different manufacturers results in the impossibility to
access to services
–
–
when exchanging codecs between 2 softswitches, the first priority of supplier F’ MSS equipment is AMR
12.2 while AMR 12.2 is the secondary choice of supplier E’s MSS, thus, the supplier E’s MSS only
replies with the G.711 message.
A interface of supplier E‘s BSC support only ATM while the MSS equipment of supplier F support only
TDM
• Need to apply unexpected procedures to obtain that
functionalities work
• Low quality of service
–
–
many service providers/operators could not figure out the specifications that are related to the QoS of
each service, thus their compatibility or incompatibility to ITU recommendations such as ITU-T G.1010,
ITU-T E.860… still can not be verified.
QoS has not been realized in details, therefore it is not easy to apply ITU-T’s recommendations.
Outline
1. Summary of Presentations: The
Problems, the Concerns on ITU
Programme
2. Contributions to the events
3. ITU Conformance Database
considerations and the parellel stepby-step approach
4. Conclusions
The step-by-step approach
•
How long will each step be [time] and how many steps are
foreseen?
•
Are the industry, the operating companies, regulators and endusers willing to wait for the results of the proposed multi-year
step-by-step approach before deciding how to make investments
and how to deploy new risk-free technologies?
•
To gain time we can benefit of the step-by-step approaches
followed by others SDOs, Especially those that found reasonable
and frutful the creation of a conformity database.
•
A step-by-step approach that benefits of the experience of others
SDOs should be developed in parallel to the implementation of the
Res. 76, 46 and to the action lines endorsed by Council-09.
Considering the activities of other SDOs well consolidated, the
“ITU parallel step-by-step” approach will allow:
–
–
–
–
To satisfy needs of vendors and customers
To fine-tuning the activities of ITU on res. 76 and 47
To give advice to ITU Study Groups to consider for new studies for test
suites as needed
A better coordination with other SDOs in the field of C&I
26
The parallel TSB step-by-step approach
Res. 76 (WTSA-08)
Conformity and interop
tools
S-by-S STND
Standardization needs
S-by-S FIN
Financial issues
Res.47 WTDC-10
Capacity building / test
centres
Conformity Data Base
available to the public
immediately
SDoC completeness & liability
advices, database layout,
criteria to reduce costs
Comparison and evaluation
of certified vs non-certified
testing costs (%)
Analysis of the results of the
ITU-D Questionnaire on C&I
labs in the regions
Promote conformity / interop
testing and the ITU-T
database(s)
Inputs from any vendor and
free access by end users
Continue monitoring of main
C&I requirements from
developing countries linked to
applications and technology,
neutrality
Comparison of financial
impact of certification testing
on final manufacturing costs
of products and final cost to
the end users (%).
Creating a conformity testing
and interoperability culture in
the regions: workshops &
Capacity Building
opportunities
Create a C&I portal managed
by ITU to provide a general
overview on C&I and links to
activities of other
SDOs/Industry/regulators/
Governments and to Labs
Comparison of test methods,
creation of ITU reference test
methods and alternative test
methods (ITU SGs/SDOs).
Overlapping/duplication issues
Stimulate MRAs in the regions
Analysis of the status of
MRAs worldwide.
Benefits of MRAs in terms of
time to access markets and
savings on unnecessary
repeated testing worldwide.
Status of the existing labs in
regions. Type of testing labs
Development of criteria to
establish test centres in the
regions
Coordination with ILAC, IAF,
BIPM, UNIDO, Financial
Institutions and other SDOs /
Forums
Study new / adapt existing
test suites where needed and
still not available SGs, JACCIT
Evaluate costs incurred by
end users and vendors due
to the lack of C&I. Services,
image, market, competition
Establishment of costs for the
establishment / enhancement
of labs in the regions and
creation of regional networks
Review the conformity data
base and procedures
according to vendors / users
needs. SDO/Forums Labs
Review the existing market
surveillance tools
Evaluation of possible
financial contributions by non
members to input data in the
ITU Conformity Database
Establishing capacity building
programs in the regions
creation of labs networks
Review interop capabilities /
technologies and C&I portal
Create synergy
users/vendors/regulators/SDO
to improve the C&I program
Preparation of the long-term
Business Plan based on the
dynamics of the C&I process
Create criteria and
procedures to prepare RFPs
for private and public entities
(e.g. the Germany Project)
Periodical review of whole
implementation of Res.76 din
function of the S-by-S
parallel approach
Study new tools to parallel the
database and to give feedback
to ITU-T SGs for standards
review and studies.
A proposal:
The Global Conformity and
Interoperability Portal
• Links to Conformity Databases from all the SDOs
adehering reciprocally to this initiative
• Links to ICT testing labs and accreditation
organizations worldwide
• Repository of global MRAs for C&I
• Information on ITU and other SDOs Interop
events
• Contributions on best practices for testiing
• Contributions from consumers/civil society
Outline
1. The Problems, where are they?
2. Contributions to the events
3. ITU Conformance Database
considerations and the Step-by-step
approach
4. Conclusions
Conclusions-1
•Request from Dev Countries for the immediate
implementation of the Conformity DB and the creation of
Interoperability DB to be linked to other similar
databases
• ITU-T SGs to look for other available Databases
• Demonstrated how other Databases from SDOs / Forums have
been implemented on the same basis of the ITU one
•Concerns from vendors on the design of the DB and
encourage them to improve the design before to make it
public as one of the tools of the C&I program
•Regions and regional organzations invited to individuate
locations for test centres in the regions / sub regions (Res. 47)
Conclusions-2
• Need of active participation of Regions in the ITU-T SGs
to improve Recommendations. Fellowship & remote
participation available.
• Need of Operators from regions to participate in the work
of ITU-T to learn more about standards and how to
implement them
•PP-10 will analise a proposal for participation at reduced
fee for members from Dev Countries
•The step by step approach should not slow down
the implementation of action lines of council-09 and
a proposal for a parallel approach has been
presented by TSB
•Importance of the participation of association of
consumers
•Capacity Building: Tutorial in Rwanda on Optical fibers
Addressing interoperability is one of the very reasons for
founding ITU and for which Experts in ITU-T Study
Groups are engaged in developing
Recommendations and test suites.
There is no point in developing test suites if ITU
does not give some recognition to manufactures
having their equipment tested to ITU-T
Recommendations
TSB is committed to consulting and collaborating with all
the ITU-T membership to ensure the successful
implementation of Resolution 76 and the TSB
recommendations endorsed by the ITU Council
“It is a long and winding road but
there is no turn back”
32
Thank you