Telecom operators’ deployment of self-organizing network (SON) has increased significantly in 2013, said Infonetics Research.
Infonetics Research said 87 percent of operators participating in its survey have deployed SON in their networks, up 27 percent from a year ago.
“Mobile operators know they need to keep network operating expenses under control, and they’re placing a big bet on SON while acknowledging the complexity of and their unease with automation that minimizes human intervention and maximizes computerization,” said Stephane Teral, principal analyst for mobile infrastructure and carrier economics at Infonetics Research.
SON is building momentum in 3.5G network optimization as a few large incumbents have already deployed SON as the key optimization tool for their 3.5G networks, and this trend appears unstoppable.
A large majority of operator respondents view overall implementation as the #1 technical challenge when implementing SON.
Two-thirds of respondents are evaluating centralized SON (C-SON) vendors Celcite and InfoVista to manage their distributed SON (D SON) LTE networks.
By 2015, 100 percent of those surveyed plan to use network- and handset/subscriber-based tools for mobile network optimization, reflecting the growing influence of SON on network self-learning.
