Managing service level agreements in Premium IP networks: a business-oriented approach

Abstract

This paper presents a market-enabling framework where users, content providers and network operators can interact in the seamless, transparent sale and delivery of a wide range of services. The framework allows for dynamic creation, configuration and delivery of services with quality assurance, via automated management of Service Level Agreements (SLAs). We propose an approach relying on a systemic treatment of business, service and network layer issues, which translates into a layered architecture where components belonging to different levels interact on the basis of a mediation paradigm. We use mediation as a generic term for a combination of negotiation, brokerage and state notification, jointly concurring to the realization of the entire life-cycle of a service.

Introduction

The motivation to deploy new services as quick as possible is based upon a provider’s intention to secure its revenues. Providers are already operating on very thin margins [1], therefore it is hard to underestimate the importance of dynamic service provisioning and configuration in the current world of telecommunications. With the ongoing convergence in the next generation IP networks of voice and data, control and management [2], the task of dynamic service creation is an extraordinary challenge.

A generic architecture of service creation in Premium IP (PIP) networks is herein defined as a framework of communication between entities enabling dynamic configuration and provisioning of SLA-conforming services. Business aspects, service aspects and network aspects influenced by service creation are identified. Major requirements from network provider side are analyzed and a transition towards service creation aware networks is outlined. The solution envisaged relies on a systemic treatment of business, service and network layer issues, thus bringing to the introduction of three different models:

• Business Model: who is selling what to whom;

• Service Model: what and how gets delivered in service phases;

• Network Resource Model: what and how is committed in the network at the time the service is provisioned.

Interaction between business, service and network layer entities is based upon a novel communication paradigm exploiting the concept of mediation. We use mediation as a generic term for a combination of negotiation, brokerage and state notification, jointly coordinating and configuring service components. A framework that exploits this concept is to be comprised of two different architectures: (i) open service architecture, facilitating rapid design of a new service provisioned by a federation of providers; and (ii) open network architecture, facilitating dynamic service creation at network level.

The paper is organized in nine sections. The main concepts and terms that will be used throughout the paper are introduced in Section 2. A novel architecture for the effective provisioning of Premium IP services is introduced in Section 3. Section 4 discusses the main issues related to the translation from the high-level description of a service to the associated technical specification. SLA management is addressed in Section 5. The important issue of SLA Monitoring is dealt in Section 6. An actual example of the application of the mediation architecture is shown in Section 7, where we present the deployment and management of a Virtual Private Network service. Section 8 analyzes related work in the field of SLA management and service creation. Finally, Section 9 provides some concluding remarks, together with directions of future work.