ServicesAssessments
 
Assessments

Assessments offered by aim to complete the picture of ongoing operation or forthcoming projects. The following non-exhaustive list provides a general overview of the assessments offered

  • Product Assessment
    If no product decision has been taken or too little is known about one or more components, these study may complete the picture by critically reviewing
    • Availability
    • Cost
    • Reliability
    • Performance
    • Functionality
    • Usability (by mapping existing requirements to products, a usability matrix may be derived)

The result may be either presented in a report or incorporated into specification documents or a technical proposal.

  • Rentability & Feasibility Study
    Either standalone or in relation to product assessments, the rentability & feasibility study places a stronger focus on financial and organizational aspects. Optionally, an investment protection plan may be worked out.
  • Capacity Planning
    By deploying latest queueing theory algorithms and simulation techniques, capacities in terms of trunks, agents, CPU load and other resources are determined. By rating each item with cost, an optimal capacity allocation plan may be derived.
  • Reliability Planning
    Utilizing common reliability theory and latest Markov modeling approaches, reliability interactions in single systems or networks are examined. Various scenarios may be tested for reliability requirements. The results are either presented in a separate reliability report or combined with capacity planning.
  • Voice over IP Assessment
    As VoIP technology is highly dependent on network infrastructure, an assessment is highly recommended. The existing network topology is reviewed in terms of performance and reliability. By deploying latest algorithms in bandwidth and jitter estimation, a set of suggestions and recommendations will be derived. In cooperation with our partner and / or customer, we are then able to derive an optimal solution with balanced price / performance ratio. The following list provides a non-exhaustive overview of the items to be examined
    • review of the existing topology (e.g. cabling)
    • selection of the appropriate codec preference set and their impact on the network
    • impact of signaling traffic (e.g. RTP, RTCP) on the network
    • impact of the network topology (e.g. network segments, firewalls) on VoIP traffic
    • configuration of switches and routers
    • review of measurements (if available)
    • configuration of DHCP, DNS, TFTP and other IP services (some vendors rely on existing network infrastructure to run their systems)
    • review of quality of service mechanisms (DiffServ, RSVP, MPLS)
    • WAN coverage (if required)
    • PSTN interfaces (e.g. ISDN, SS7)

We strongly recommend a detailed definition of the targets to be met and the tasks to be performed during a VoIP assessment to prevent from time and cost explosion. As an option customer engineers may be trained for Voice over IP within their environment.

For assessments to be effective, we highly recommend a heterogeneous team with domain experts involved allowing for incorporation of inhouse knowledge. As an option, various assessments may be combined with customer oriented trainings. In our experience, such a combination has proven successfully, as it allows for a significant gain in understanding.

@2007 .Telecomm