With new competition from over-the-top providers and new financial pressures in light of the challenging economy, many carriers are shifting gears to put more focus on services and applications, while at the same time trying to cut costs and optimize resources wherever possible.

 

That’s led to a movement by service providers either to seek greater control of their networks and the services that run over them as they embrace next-generation technologies, or to partner with others in an effort toward the same end. And that has sparked a movement by many suppliers to expand and/or better promote their network and service management offerings and professional service offerings.

 

ECI Telecom (News - Alert) today was the latest service provider supplier to do just that, as it introduced new software tools and services around network design, auditing, and analysis and optimization.

 

Here’s a rundown of what’s new:

 

·         Network Design – The Network Design service helps operators introduce new services and improve time-to-market while avoiding high-cost disruptive migrations. This service helps network operators assess and design an optimum network architecture that addresses operational as well as strategic growth requirements.

·         Network Audit – ECI’s Network Audit service enables service providers to continuously analyze and track changes in existing network elements, without compromising future plans for design and installation of new elements. The Network Audit service delivers a view of the provider’s network infrastructure and equipment to facilitate the decision-making process and greatly improve resource planning, utilization and allocation.

·         Traffic Analysis and Optimization – ECI’s Traffic Analysis and Optimization service brings ease of operation to the day-to-day monitoring of critical metrics relating to network stability, capacity and utilization. It provides in-depth traffic analysis and enables the necessary fine-tuning for optimal network performance and investment protection.

 

To support these services, ECI is leveraging the following tools:

·         Network Design Platform– ECI’s new, vendor-agnostic planning and design tool supports multiple technologies, such as fiber, WDM, TDM, Ethernet and MPLS. This tool is optimized for handling the migration to an all-IP network, reducing single points of failure and bottlenecks along the network, and optimizing network resources utilization.

·         LightPlan – Developed for WDM network planning, simulation and documentation, ECI’s LightPlan enables efficient and streamlined network planning workflows and uniform views of all network layers, technologies and platforms in use.

·         Site Planner – ECI’s Site Planner provides configuration and documentation for all the network elements in ECI’s product portfolio.

 

 

Oded Harniv, ECI Telecom’s associate vice president of software solutions, tells TMCnet that these services will be a main focal point for the company going forward and that the company plans to invest in the effort more in 2010. He adds that ECI Telecom is thinking of offering some aspects of these offerings on a Software-as-a-Service basis in the future.

 

“Our Network Design and Optimization offerings bring together ECI’s team of services experts and a comprehensive and highly flexible suite of tools for customers who need more capacity without over-extending existing resources to expand or develop their networks. As carriers increasingly look to outsource short and long-term projects, with ECI’s services and tools, they can save on OPEX (News - Alert), delay CAPEX, maximize usage of their existing network and prepare for an optimal migration to next-gen at their own pace, the ultimate definition of 1Net,” said Eran Talmon, head of the global services division of ECI Telecom.

 

In India, Vodafone (News - Alert) Essar Ltd. has selected ECI to perform in-depth network analysis and consultancy services. With the Network Design Platform, ECI identified key areas for optimization and laid out a plan for the company’s migration to a next-generation network.