Telecommunications carriers can now step away from time-consuming manual testing and benefit from an automated lab landscape for their networks, thanks to the new advanced lab automation solution from HUBER+SUHNER featuring optical circuit switching and RF-over-fiber (RFoF).
Replacing traditional coaxial interconnected and manually controlled labs, the solution integrates fiber connectivity and optical circuit switching technologies to provide an automated, transparent and user-configurable fiber layer.
For transport and core network labs, an optical circuit switch allows for flexible connection and measurement of optical network components in a test environment. The POLATIS® optical circuit switch, featuring patented DirectLight™ beam-steering technology, enables continuous testing of multiple devices remotely, eliminating the need for physical presence and manual re-patching. This not only reduces labour costs but also frees up time.
For RAN labs, RFoF modules can be deployed to convert signals from RAN radios into fiber optic signals which enables much greater transmission distances with significantly lower losses from device under test to test equipment. The optical circuit switching can then be utilised in the same way as with transport and core network labs. The high performance opto-electrical conversion ensures minimal impact on measurement results and provides bidirectionality for both the optical and the RF domains.
As a result, an automated fiber optic network layer for device testing can be configured or reconfigured in seconds rather than hours or days, allowing customers to meet challenging test cycle turnaround times.
“Carriers are under intense pressure to rapidly test and deliver enhanced network services, while validating new equipment,” said Claudia Bartholdi, market manager, HUBER+SUHNER. “The longer it takes to certify new equipment and services through manual operations, the further a business gets from increasing revenue and competitiveness. Through our end-to-end solution, we can ensure high reproducibility, traceability and increased efficiency, alongside a faster time to market.”
Regression, feature and interoperability testing are all key procedures for carriers. Regression testing ensures software releases do not impact the existing functionality of a network but may require thousands of individual tests that must be run in cascaded sequences. Carriers must also look to enhance network performance and user experience, which requires new features like network slicing, while ensuring any new equipment, elements or interfaces within a network function according to predefined standards and can coexist in a network.
The lab automation solution for carriers enhances these procedures. For regression testing, it drastically reduces the time for test set-up and operation to introduce new software releases quickly and efficiently. It can also be implemented to allow agile feature testing, helping to verify that the new functionalities will work on an end-to-end basis before they are introduced into the live network.
For interoperability testing, the solution simplifies the testing of virtual RANs, as well as open standard software and hardware, to ensure all network elements work together effectively.
“By automating test processes, labs can also share expensive equipment and reconfigure tests remotely and immediately,” continued Bartholdi. “Using readily available tools, resources can now be securely shared between labs dedicated to different elements of the network without conflict, quickening the testing process.”
The lab automation solution from HUBER+SUHNER will be on display at the OFC exhibition in San Francisco, Calif., on April 1–3, at booth #3032.