Narus polices prepaid wireless nets
 
|
|||
 | |||
|
PALO ALTO - Billing and mediation software developer Narus last week announced its next-generation offering, which enforces service provisioning policies based on collected usage data.
The software, which Narus has not yet named, is designed to let service providers profitably deliver next-generation services while controlling the associated risk through policy enforcement.
For example, if a prepaid mobile service subscriber has a zero credit balance, the Narus software can downgrade or eliminate service in real time based on policies predefined and programmed by a network operator.
Indeed, the first application for the new software platform is called the Narus Solution for Prepaid Wireless Mobile Internet Services. The software collects and analyzes usage data and then denies or permits services in any combination, including e-mail, browsing, voice over IP and streaming media, based on specific policies pertaining to usage or billing.
Related links: more news on billing software
Although the initial application for the new Narus platform is in prepaid mobile, it can also work with other service provisioning applications, Narus says.
The software platform includes two key components: Policy Manager and Interactive Semantic Traffic Analyzer (ISTA).
Policy Manager passes balance and other information back and forth from the billing and customer care application, decrementing the subscriber's balance and generating action by third-party notification and messaging applications. ISTA collects data and receives policy-based action requests from Policy Manager and enforces those policies using Narus' patent-pending IP Signaling technology, which sends appropriate disconnect or other commands to client and server.
Analysts believe software like Narus' could become the norm in service/billing mediation. "Mediation is going to become a much more flexible and powerful tool," says Mike Allen, an analyst at Aberdeen Group.
"Up to this point, it's been a standard product with few bells and whistles - it had to be tweaked by the IT staff or the vendor," he adds.
"We're now in the stage where mediation vendors are starting to take all of this network usage information and develop their own applications to sit on top of it, and do new and cool things," says Jason Briggs, an analyst at The Yankee Group.
Challenges for Narus include the slow sales cycle into incumbent local exchange carriers, and the infancy and unpredictability of the prepaid IP wireless market.
The new Narus software will be available in the fourth quarter. Pricing is customer/network-specific.
RELATED LINKS
Narus: www.narus.com
More news on provisioned services:
Dorado Software manages multivendor networks
Redcell software can enable customer-provisioned services from a variety of routing, switching devices.
The Edge, 04/23/01.
SuperComm to highlight carrier-customer edge
New carrier switches mean new way to provision services.
The Edge, 06/05/00.
Provisioning services automatically
Provisioning of frame relay services should be a lot easier in the not-too-distant future, thanks to the Frame Relay Forum's FRF.1.2 implementation agreement, which was quietly approved last July.
Network World Frame Relay Newsletter, 01/31/01.
BONDING your way to more bandwidth
Imagine a world where you can double your bandwidth with the click of a mouse at guaranteed quality of service and all within seconds.
Network World Fusion, 06/25/01.
Narus polices prepaid wireless nets
Billing and mediation software developer Narus this week announced its next-generation offering, which enforces service-provisioning policies based on collected usage data.
The Edge, 09/18/01.
Back-office software developer Narus today unveiled a product that collects, aggregates and filters Cisco NetFlow packet accounting data from Cisco routers.
The Edge, 06/26/01
 |
 |
 |
|||||
|
 |
|
|
|
|||
