World’s First Vehicular Small Cell at Mobile World Congress 2015

The world’s first Vehicular Small Cell ‪#‎VSC‬ providing premium in-car connectivity at Mobile World Congress 2015 in Barcelona ‪#‎MWC15‬; visit us at Hall 6 Booth M26!

You drive a premium car and own a smartphone. Do you have premium connectivity? You are a Mobile Operator and manage many premium customers. Are you convinced that they always get premium connectivity?

The car body attenuates the mobile signal dramatically. Consequently, your phone inside the car suffers from call drops, slow internet, etc. The Vehicular Small Cell (VSC) solves this problem. The VSC acts like a small cellular base station inside your car and provides you with best connectivity for voice and data. Cell phone radiation and battery drainage is minimized.

As an operator you serve satisfied premium customers. Network benefits of the VSC are an optimized usage of network resources and reduced network congestion. This leads to increased customer satisfaction and reduced churn.

The Vehicular Small Cess is a joint research project in cooperation with BMW Group, peiker acustic GmbH & Co. KG, and Nash Technologies GmbH.

Die Digitale Transformation – Triebkräfte und Konsequenzen

Die digitale Transformation ist in vollem Gange. Jede Branche ist davon betroffen. Bernd Stahl spricht mit Stephan Grabmeier, dem Gründer und Geschäftsführer der Innovation Evangelists GmbH über die treibenden Kräfte hinter dieser Entwicklung und die Konsequenzen, die sich daraus für Führungskräfte und IT-Spezialisten ergeben.

BS: Herr Grabmeier, wir befinden inmitten einer umfassenden digitalen Transformation. Was genau hat man darunter zu verstehen?

SG: die digitale Transformation ist aus meiner Erfahrung heraus nicht nur die Technologie, obwohl diese natürlich eine große Rolle spielt. Ich sehe vier Bereiche: neben der Technologie sind es der Druck durch die ökonomischen Veränderungen, einhergehend mit einem sozialen und kulturellen Wandel.

BS: Welche Branchen sind momentan besonders betroffen?

SG: Ich weiß gar nicht, ob es eine Branche gibt, die nicht davon betroffen ist. Jede Branche ist in unterschiedlichen Reifegraden davon betroffen. Die Branchen, die eine hohe Wissensintensität haben sind sicherlich stärker betroffen: allen voran die Verlage und die ICT, aber auch das produzierende Gewerbe im Kontext von Industrie 4.0, das Gesundheitswesen und die Energiewirtschaft.

BS: Wer oder was treibt das Ganze?

Zum vollständigen Interview geht es hier.

Convincing Verification Possibilities: AndroidTM Device Control and Intelligent Voice Recognition

Nash-ITE allows you to do more with less: complex interop-test scenarios involving a multitude of technologies from traditional voice to advanced VoIP features on smartphones for a very competitive price. Bernd Stahl talks to Martina Dietschmann who explains the benefits of two new features: Android^TM Device Control and Intelligent Voice Recognition (IVR).

BS: You have introduced two exiting new features within Nash-ITE. What are they?

MD: Amongst others, the two major features introduced recently are: Control of Android^TM Devices and Intelligent Voice Recognition (IVR). These two new features are as different as our motivation to set it to our development roadmap.

The introduction of end-user device control for Android^TM came up during an innovation discussion. The simple idea was: if we want to verify next generation mobile and fixed networks as well as IMS, then our Intelligent Testing Environment (Nash-ITE) shall support fixed and mobile end-user devices. With the prototype show case we got encouraging response from our customers. Finally the device control for Android^TM became a new feature of Nash-ITE.

Intelligent Voice Recognition, the second new feature, is a direct response to different customer queries. The trend to have an increasing part of voice control in communication networks simply requires from a testing environment to react on voice and not only on protocol messages. That is what we now offer.

BS: What functions of Android^TM devices can you control? In the press release you mentioned matrix testing: what exactly do you mean be that?

Let me answer the second question in before the first one. When checking the behaviour of a communication network it has to be shown that the connected end-user devices can communicate which each other correctly. The matrix of test cases for such a scenario is determined by the combination of all involved end-user devices. For example, we want to verify the interworking of 2 analogue, 2 IDSN and 2 SIP users. This setup results in a testing matrix with 9 individual test cases, when assuming that the originating and the terminating side are relevant.

With Android^TM Device Control we can add a further dimension to the test matrix for networks where fixed and mobile services converge. This was our main motivation: to support the voice and SMS feature on an Android devices within the new release of Nash-ITE. It is now possible to set up test cases where Nash-ITE requests from a mobile device the setup of a call to any other device in the test configuration or to release this call accordingly. The correct sending of an SMS is also part of this new feature.

The control of other Android^TM functions will follow, some prototyping is in preparation.

BS: What can you do with Intelligent Voice Recognition?

This new feature allows you to easily integrate tests requiring IVR: from simple announcements to complex voice guidance. For example, it is possible to design tests which verify the proper functioning of specific announcements in a PSTN or IMS network. In particular, this is applicable for End-to-End tests where Nash ITE is being used as an endpoint emulation of various possible network user endpoints, such as classic analogue, ISDN, SIP or Mobile Phones.

The voice guidance itself is not a new topic in communication networks. Already in the past you got announcements like ‘This number is unknown’ when dialing a wrong number. Today we count hundreds of announcements within a network, simple and old ones as well as complex voice guidance samples.

The test procedure follows always the same patterns. When an announcement occurs during a specific test scenario, the Nash-ITE records the voice sample and sends it together with a reference to the integrated IVR. Depending on the used reference, either an exact or a partial match can be tested. Checking the result of the IVR, the Nash-ITE can then decide if a test has been passed successfully or not. This fits for simple announcement testing. When checking complex scenarios flexible, test cases can be created where it is possible to step into another testing branch depending on the tone or announcement received. The IVR can be nested or repeated with different voice samples during testing.

BS: Why is all this important? Which problems of the customers do you address?

You can find some answers already above. With these new features, Nash-ITE extends its capability to verify services in converging communication networks. It can be used for classical PSTN tests as well as for next generation fixed / mobile or IMS networks. From an operator perspective, the flexibility of Nash-ITE reduces CAPEX & OPEX as a huge range of tests can be handled on a single platform. Additionally, these operators own multi-vendor network equipment. Hence, they need complex interoperability and end-to-end testing. The control of Android^TM devices in Nash-ITE is another important function to solve this problem.

BS: How do customers respond to these new features? What do they like in particular?

The feedback to the new features is very good. As already explained, the IVR is a direct response to customer queries. The resulting implementation has matched their expectations. For operators, who use Nash-ITE already for a long time, it was very important that their existing and sometimes very complex test configurations could be extended by an IVR. Porting or duplicating these configurations only for IVR testing to other platforms was judged as ineffective and expensive.

With the presentation of the prototype for the end-user device control for Android^TM we were able to really surprise our customers. The combination of fixed and mobile for the simulation and emulation of endpoints was something they were eagerly looking for.

BS: Thank you very much, Martina, for explaining us the value of these two new Nash-ITE features.

Wettbewerb um Talente: wie findet man sie?

Wer Idealprofilen hinterherjagt, hat Schwierigkeiten, geeignete Mitarbeiter zu finden. Die Lösung: Kandidaten eine Chance geben, die nicht vollständig passen und diese anschließend in der eigenen Firma entwickeln. Bernd Stahl spricht mit Maximilian Nobis, Sales Manager IT Recruitment bei Harvey Nash Deutschland, über den Wettbewerb um Talente und wie man sie findet. Hier ist die Zusammenfassung.

BS: Es scheint heute so zu sein, dass Talente immer knapper werden, besonders im IT-Sektor. D.h. der Wettbewerb um die fähigen Köpfe hat sich verschärft. Max, was sind denn Deine Beobachtungen zu diesem Thema?

MN: Zunächst einmal ist es so, dass sich die Unternehmen durch ihre Suchkriterien sehr stark diesem Wettbewerb aussetzen. Es wird häufig nach einem konkreten Mitarbeiterprofil gesucht, auf welches man sich sehr versteift hat. Man erwartet dabei, dass nicht nur die fachlichen sondern auch die persönlichen Qualitäten zu 90% erfüllt sein müssen, um die Stelle zu bekommen. Z.B. Deutsch als Muttersprache, Herkunft aus der Region des Unternehmens, geradliniger Lebenslauf, vollständig abgeschlossenes Studium und ein Kandidat, der zwei bis drei Stationen vorweisen kann, auf denen er mindestens zwei Jahre verweilt und gezeigt hat, dass er nun perfekt in das neue Unternehmen passt. Er sollte starkes Interesse an der neuen Position haben und am besten in einer vorigen Position gezeigt haben, dass er die Anforderungen für die neue vollständig erfüllt. Wenn man diesem Idealprofil hinterherjagt, hat man natürlich Schwierigkeiten, geeignete Mitarbeiter zu finden.

Zum vollständigen Interview geht es hier.

Der Zertifizierungs-Dschungel

„Überraschungen sind ein Teil vom Geschäft. Man muss aber beweisen können, dass ungeplante Vorgänge unter Kontrolle sind.“ Bernd Stahl spricht mit Chris Holt, Projektmanagementberater und Gründer von CHIM (Chris Holt Implementation Management), und Mark Hayes, Sales Director bei Harvey Nash Deutschland in München, über den Zertifizierungs-Dschungel. Hier ist die Zusammenfassung.

BS: Chris, Du hast vor einigen Wochen einen Vortrag über ITIL^® PRINCE^® gehalten. Der Untertitel war damals „Eine kleine Tour durch den Zertifizierungs-Dschungel“. Chris, verrate uns doch Dein Geheimnis: wie hast Du den Weg durch diesen Dschungel gefunden?

CH: Zuerst muss man die Auswahl der benötigten Zertifikate begrenzen können. Es ist genauso, wie bei einem Projekt. Man muss sich zwei Fragen stellen: „Wo bin ich jetzt?“ und „Wo will ich hin?“ Die Frage „Wo bin ich jetzt?“ bedeutet, dass ich mir Klarheit darüber verschaffen muss, ob ich die Voraussetzungen für eine Zertifizierung mitbringe. Z.B. wenn ich Englisch nicht genügend beherrsche, fallen schon mal alle Zertifikate weg, für die es keine deutsche Prüfung gibt. Oder, beim Zertifikat „Project Management Professional“ benötigt man als Voraussetzung Erfahrung im Project Management.

Zum vollständigen Interview geht es hier.

Women in Technology: 16. VDI Kongress der Frauen im Ingenieurberuf

Bernd Stahl spricht mit Priscilla Rodrigues, Projektleiterin WiT (Women in Technology) bei Harvey Nash Deutschland über den 16. VDI-Kongress der Frauen im Ingenieurberuf, der am 18.-19 Juli 2014 in Nürnberg stattfindet. Das Interview wurde in Englisch durchgeführt. Hier ist die Zusammenfassung in Deutsch.

BS: Priscilla, um was geht es beim 16. VDI-Kongress der Frauen im Ingenieurberuf?

PR: Der 16. VDI-Kongress der Frauen im Ingenieurberuf findet am 18. Und 19. Juli in Nürnberg statt. Wir führen ihn in Zusammenarbeit mit dem VDI durch. Das diesjährige Motto ist „Energie“. Dabei geht es um mehrere Aspekte: Energie versus Technology, das Zusammenspiel von Energie, Umwelt und Mensch, etc. In den letzten Monaten wurde viel über Energie gesprochen: Energie-Ressourcen wie Treibstoff und Elektrizität, die Verwendung von Energie-Ressourcen, Erneuerbare Energien, oder ganz einfach die Frage, wie positive oder negative Energie von Menschen ausgehen kann. Energie kann in vielen unterschiedlichen Formen verwendet werden. Unser Team bietet auf dem Kongress einen Workshop an. Er konzentriert sich auf, wie wir positive Energie auf intelligente Weise in unseren Bewerbungsgesprächen einsetzten können.

Lesen Sie das ganze Interview hier.

Deutsches Smart Metering Konzept – Europäische Union gibt den Weg frei

Das deutsche Konzept für intelligente Zähler – die Smart Meter – hat das EU-Notifizierungsverfahren passiert. Eine kurze Pressemeldung, wie viele, die täglich durch die Agenturen tickern. Doch sie gibt den Startschuss für ein sicheres Smart Metering in Deutschland.

Seit mehreren Jahren wird um die Sicherheit in Energieinformationsnetzen gerungen. Für den Bereich Smart Metering wurden im Auftrag des Bundesministeriums für Wirtschaft und Technologie (BMWi) Schutzprofile und Technische Richtlinien entwickelt. Diese fanden letztendlich Eingang im Entwurf der Messsystemverordnung. Recht kontroverse Diskussionen gingen dieser voraus. Was teilweise als Bremse für das Smart Metering angesehen wurde, zeigt letztendlich  aber die geforderte Nachhaltigkeit und gesamtsystemische Betrachtung. Sichere Systeme erhöhen das Vertrauen in die Technologie und die Akzeptanz der Nutzer. Diese schaffen die Grundlagen für langfristige Geschäftsmodelle.

Stefan Kapferer, Staatssekretär im BMWi, erklärt: “…der Entwurf schafft die technische und organisatorische Basis für den Einsatz von intelligenten Messsystemen für Strom und Gas…“

Der Abschluss des europäischen Notifizierungsverfahrens zu diesem Entwurf ist damit auch gleichzeitig die Basis diesen in nationales Recht umzusetzen. Auf dieser Basis öffnet sich der Weg hin zu technologischen Umwälzungen. Der Einsatz intelligenter Messsysteme bringt eine neue Stufe in der Verwendung aktueller IKT im Messwesen zum Ausdruck.  Die IKT wird als Bindeglied für die effiziente Nutzung energietechnischer Systeme gestärkt. Sie wird damit integraler Bestandteil der Informationsverarbeitung in Energienetzen.

Der Startschuss ist gefallen. Die Entwicklung intelligenter Energieinformationsnetze hat eine wichtige Hürde genommen. Smart Metering und Smart Grids werden uns in Zukunft selbstverständlich werden. Dabei ist die technologische Herausforderung für Hersteller und Betreiber ebenso interessant wie die sichere und komfortable Nutzung im Alltag.

Autor: Martina Dietschmann

The Rapid Growth of Carrier-grade Small Cells

Mobile experts predict that carrier-grade small cells will outnumber femtocells in 2016. This trend was the reason for Node-H and Nash Technologies to create a partnership. Nash Technologies’ 3G software now integrates well with the Iuh stack of Node-H and supports as well the concept of self-organizing networks (SON). In this short interview, Mike Cronin, CEO of Node-H and Dirk Zetzsche, Business Development Director of Nash Technologies GmbH discuss the benefits and opportunities of this partnership.

MWC 2013: Fiesta, Siesta or Vista?

The Mobile World Congress 2013 has closed its doors. 1700 exhibitors (+200). 72000 visitors (+7000). But what remains? Fiesta, Siesta or Vista? Was it a party, a nap, or a vision? It depends on the beholder. Some were bored, some excited, and some inspired. We could see the Internet of Things leaving the horizon, cloud computing permeating the mobile network, and a few surprises with user devices.

The Internet of Things, this will be the 50 Billion mobile devices by 2020 as predicted by Ericsson, connected to the Internet, realizing services hosted on cloud computing centers scattered all over the globe. Most of these devices will not be smartphones or tablets, but rather sensors, smart objects and commodities, smart tags, robots, vehicles and the like. It will be machines talking to machines (M2M), and sometimes also to humans. Most of these interaction will be wireless. The result will be Big Data, a gigantic amount of data, constantly growing at incredible speed. Tremendous growth is expected and the ecosystems are starting to evolve. They mainly cluster around the concept of Smart Cities, one of our current big challenges.

New business models start to appear. They are built around the Big Data being collected. Imagine a smart car generating lots of usage data. Insurance companies can generate special tariffs, depending on the type of usage. Some end user will like it, because of the money they can save. A similar principle applies to car maintenance contracts. Even car sharing models such as zipcar become manageable. Your fridge will never be empty, but always contain your favorite food, delivered just in time. You don’t even have to go shopping for it, if you don’t want to. You will always be guided to an empty parking place. You will never miss a train or wait for a long time at the station for a friend to pick you up. Intelligent traffic management systems calculate the optimal route for your car to be there on time. Municipalities will save money while being able to offer better and sustainable service.

To exploit these data and to interconnect services and businesses Service Delivery Platforms are necessary which comply with standards and are able to integrate legacy M2M solutions. The cloud offers M2M-as-a-Service. However, equally important will be the bandwidth available to the users. To be more precise: bandwidth without frustrating quality of service. This type of bandwidth is a scarce resource. Both, the mobile cells and the outer parts of the backhaul often operate at their capacity limits. One of the solutions here are small cells, miniature, short-range base stations. Millions of them. Small cells come as complete packages including multi-mode and management. The end users will neither realize that they are there, nor that they are suddenly connected to one. But they will experience them as the quality of service increases, and the life of their batteries stretches. Infonetics predicts a bright future for these small invisible helpers.

We also saw a paradigm shift for the end user devices. Firefox OS – similar to Google’s Chrome OS – executes HTML5 code without a browser. At the same time this HTML5 app is portable: an app developed for Firefox OS runs as well in a standard mobile browser of other platforms such as Android, iOS or Windows. This is a key differentiator: apps just need to be developed once and execute everywhere, with little or no effort. Even the portation of an existing web app to the new platform is cheap. Firefox OS will start as a cost-effective solution for threshold countries, replacing feature phones by low-cost smartphones. An additional side-effect is that this new OS allows network operators to gain access to the application layer again. They can now create their own app market and can compete with the established OTT ones from Android and iOS.

Need a new phone? Why not considering YotaPhone? One phone, two displays. Half smartphone, half e-reader. A high-resolution liquid crystal display on one side and an electronic paper display (EDP) on the other. If you use it intelligently, you can save a lot of battery.

What is your opinion? Was this year’s Mobile World Congress a Fiesta, a Siesta, or was it Vista? You can discuss it here, or life at Cambridge Wireless.

Autor: Bernd Stahl

MWC 2013: The New Mobile Horizon Comes In Like a Slow Train – It’s Time to Reposition

If we’re coming to the Mobile World Congress this year thinking we’ve got all the answers – or at least some of them – then maybe I need to disappoint us. What we really need are questions. Lots of them. Why?

It is because we are living in the age of disruptions. It is not that they occur every once in a while. They characterize this era. There frequency even increases. They shake everything and everyone, one after the other. There seems to be no end. Many answers belong already to the past, before they have enjoyed a life in the present. Our museums are full of brilliant answers, the dreams and aspirations of even older generations of engineers. But what prevails in this shakeout?

The unshakable. I.e. the resilient, the flexible, the ones anticipating the next move. The ones that have implemented ambitious dreams into their designs, at a time when the majority was laughing at them. The ones having more questions than answers. There are times when questions are more important than answers. Yes, these are our days. Whereas answers sooner or later find their “eternal home” in the museum, questions always have their future in front of them. And, it must be the right questions. It is like George Bernard Shaw once said: “You look at the world and ask ‘Why?’. I dream and ask ‘Why not?’”.

So let’s have a look at the disruptions that our industry created in the past 100 years, say, and see what we could learn for what is ahead of us. When Wireline Telephony was invented and introduced, the delivery boys became obsolete. The required basic technology was circuit interconnectivity. Visionaries like Heinrich von Stephan, who built world’s most advanced telephone system in Germany were laughed at and found themselves in the “Book of Idiots”, which later became the public telephone book. What was the true nature of this disruption and why was its impact so profound? This question is difficult to answer and would fill at least another blog post. So we keep this question to help us guide into the future.

Mobile Telephony extended Wireline Telephony, requiring mobile circuit connectivity. No one further became obsolete this time. Things changed, when Data Communication appeared. Packet communication had quite a few advantages over circuit connectivity. However, the opposite of this statement has also some relevance: for instance the Carrier Grade versions of Ethernet emulate some of the circuit connectivity features. Packet communication gave us the Internet. And the Internet gave us an abundance of information. We suddenly had abundance to such an extent that it required search to be useful. Search was free, of course, and refinanced via advertising. This abundance of information and the corresponding shift in advertising started to make printed products obsolete. What was the true nature of these disruptions and why was their impact so profound?

Then Voice over IP (VoIP) arrived with improved packet communication. Skype and Co. were just cheaper and offered attractive new services in combination with voice. Circuit Wireline Telephony became obsolete. Did voice communication become obsolete? No! International voice traffic has a constant annual growth of 13%, thus compensating price declines at the same rate. This is a stable trend for decades. And it is still true up until 2012, being 490 Billion minutes. However, since 2011 this growth came significantly from OTT voice solutions combined with smart messaging services, increasing the pressure on carrier voice solutions. What was the true nature of this disruption and why was its impact so profound?

In the early 2000’s, Social Communication entered the arena. It required Cloud Computing as the enabling and driving technology. Traditional communication services and techniques became much less important. What was the true nature of this disruption and why was its impact so profound?

The iPhone brought us the breakthrough in Mobile Data Communication. It required even more advanced packet technology. App stores were established, an app economy appeared, and exploded. More traditional communication services became much less relevant. In 2007, UMTS packet data was exploding over UMTS voice. And in 2009, the volume of total mobile packet data was greater than all mobile voice. In February 18, 2013, Booz & Co. predicts a decrease of mobile voice turnover of 5% per year until 2016 to then $ 628 Billion, while the one of data will grow by 9% per year. The annual data volume even grows by 29%. This growth is generated by mobile digitalization, and the bulk of this growth goes to the OTTs. Infonetics reported recently, that the Carrier VoIP/IMS market sees first positive year since 2008. LTE network operators use IMS to implement their voice solutions. But will this ever pay off, as mobile voice has a sustained decline of revenue? And what about Small Cells? They hit the application layer and implement a mobile PABX. Ubiquisys and Quortus demonstrate a small cell based mobile PABX for small and mid-sized enterprises (SMEs). This solution eliminates the need for desk phones, hence making our lives easier. What IS the true nature of these disruptions and why IS their impact so profound?

The marginalization of voice traffic was predicted from the late 1990’s onwards. This seemed to be obvious and inevitable, but the reality was still different. Voice remained a cash cow. Corrective action did not seem to be necessary. But what happened since then? The Telecommunications Operators lost the Application Layer. For 100 years, the Application Layer consisted of voice, fax, telex and the like. Then suddenly the Application Layer became extremely rich and abundant. This abundance was driven by completely new players. Abundance is game-changing. It is so desirable and attractive to the user, that it cannot be hold back. Plus: the disruption of the traditional telephone system by the Internet was also about philosophies “regulated networks” versus a “multistakeholder model”, and of institutions ITU vs. IETF.

Is there a remedy for the Incumbent Telecommunications Service Providers? Will they have a new approach, or just more of the same old same old? Can they reinvent themselves? What will be their new message? Is this message strong enough to drive their change? I really wish there would be one. But honestly, I don’t believe that it is QoS (Quality of Service). It is not the quality of the service that matters; it is the service itself, the application. QoS can only be a stop-gap-solution. The marketing position and the immediate user visibility of the real service is always much better than the just the one of its quality.

And what do we see now at the Mobile Horizon? The nature of a horizon is that it is far away and things cannot be discerned clearly. They seem to be so small. And there appears to be so much time until they arrive here. But what we can already recognize is indeed clear enough. It could be subsumed in the formula M2M & IoT, Machine-to-Machine Communication realizing the Internet of Things. Everything connected, if you like, a new Human-Machine-Society. Do you feel the paradigm shift, again? Our life and work will change, and so will the value chains. Every Next Big Thing starts small. What WILL BE the true nature of these disruptions and why WILL their impact BE so profound? The answers will come. Who will carry them? And, whom will these answers carry? What will constitute the new teams? It is already clear: a new abundance is on the way. Again, it will be game-changing. Again, it cannot be stopped, because it is so desirable.

Business models are currently figured out. This trend is backed up by former Juniper M2M strategist Godfrey Chua joining Infonetics Research. A new nano-scale Chip Design enables the Future ‚Internet of Things‘. This prototype uses solar power and consumes so little energy that its battery does not need to be replaced. Thin and flexible credit-card-size tags can now be developed, which can be attached to common object like books, clothes, furniture, etc., thus connecting those objects to the Internet of Things. M2M protocols such as the MQTT (Message Queue Telemetry Transport) support short intermittent messages which are ideal for IoT applications: connection-less, and sleep & wake communication schemes save battery. This list could easily be extended. Emerging new technologies will transform vertical markets, and they will be mobile: health, transport (cars, trains, ships, planes, space vehicles), energy, learning, payment, homes, cities, etc.

What WILL BE the true nature of these disruptions and why WILL their impact BE so profound? Why not … ?

 

See you in Barcelona. Hall 5 G40.

Autor: Bernd Stahl