Effective administration of mobile number portability databases and systems – experiences from South Africa

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Number Portability Company (Pty) Ltd
Registration No.: 2005/040348/07 VAT Registration No.: 4830231124

Number Portability Company South Africa
Effective administration of mobile number portability
databases and systems – experiences from South
Africa
By Clive Fagan
General Manager Number Portability Company
http://www.number-portability.co.za


Key factors driving the adoption of third party
central number portability system·
•In 2004/5 only BT and Sigapore had a decentralised
call forwarding system which was already in trouble
•Most modern systems at that time had central
databases either reference or reference and routing
•Requirement for SA was mainly direct routing but
supporting indirect routing because of Incumbent fixed
line operator and to ultimately support both structures

Registration No.: 2005/040348/07 VAT Registrat ion No.: 4830231124

Understanding the value of centralising number
portability database and order handling
•One single source of ported numbers
•Consistent approach
•One source of the truth
•Allowing operators to control their own routing
•No risk of fragmentation or routing failures if operators went out
of business·
•Flexibility to add or subtract operators
• Neutral party to ensure porting processes are adhered to
•Sla and systems management in one place


Competitive issues addressed with the
Benefits of an independent NPC
•Neutral party
•Jointly owned by MNO’s and Two major GNP operators – no conflict
unanimous decisions needed
•Participants treated equally
–Agreements
–Costs
–Terms of use
•No domination by largest Party
•Running of NPC by any individual Operator not an issue
•Interests of Operators and Regulatory body not necessarily the same –
however NPC enforces regulations without setting the regulations


Understanding the support structures required for
efficient and effective system administration·
Background
–A company originally formed jointly by MTN, Vodacom and Cell C as a result
of 2001 Amendments to the Telecommunications Act which mandated ICASA
to: “prescribe measures to ensure that number portability shall be introduced in
2005”
–On 30 September 2005 Regulations were promulgated which mandated
mobile Implementation within 9 months i.e. 1 July 2006
–In the event Number Portability was introduced on 10 November 2006
–With effect From Monday April 26 Geographic Number Portability (GNP) was
Introduced. Bringing Telkom and Neotel into the NPC fold
–NPC is now jointly owned by Cell C, MTN, Neotel, Telkom and Vodacom with
effect from April 20 2010.


•Composition of NPC
•10 Directors (2 from each of the MNO’s and 2 each from GNP operators)
•General Manager, PA and Accountant
•SGT act as agents for Telcordia who provided the CRDB solution
•SGT provides help desk and software spport services to NPC
•Equipment is owned by Npc and hosted at T-Systems who also provide
networking services for internet and VPN services


•Charging Model
•Each Party, including the new entrants, funded NPC with an equal share of the
total capital, development and start-up costs
•A revised shareholder agreement was drawn up to include Telkom and Neotel
on an equal basis
•*Ports are charged at R50 per port giving a revenue based on ports, say
around R650,000 per month. Each donor operator in turn charges an Admin fee
directly to the recipient which is administered outside of the NPC
•The company is a profit making entity with large capital write-off
•NPC makes a small profit from charging a service fee in addition to the porting
cost. The service fee is an aggregate of all costs incurred including capital
write-off together with a small profit margin as agreed by the Board of Directors
•After the first 5 years of operation the NPC is pretty much a self-funding entity
and this is still true despite the introduction of GNP
* Note figures are purely illustrative

Reg. No. 2005/040348/07 Vat Ref. No. 4830231124

Porting Fee Structure

Recipient Donor
Service Service
Provider Provider

R20

CRDB

Recipient Donor
Network R15 Network
Operator Operator


NPC Services
•Hosting all porting services using CRDB and the OSS process
–Charges MNO’s and GNP operators
–Owns the relationship with the outsource providers
–Manage the outsource Agreement (SLA) which is back-to-back with our SLA
agreements with SGT/Telcordia
–Provides a SFTP service of daily updated ported numbers to contracted parties at a fee.
Currently 60 plus customers generating a healthy per month revenue. Monthly download
fee includes daily deltas of ported numbers. For an additional fee a full download is
available on request

The Porting Process based on the agreed OSS
–Technically sound and robust (For Mobile initially, modified for GNP)
–Many operationsin the world are using South Africa as a model “best of breed”
–Average port success rate around 84%
–To date nearly 1,300,000 mobile numbers and some 250,000 GNP successfully ported
–NPC ports around 18,500 numbers per month

Reg. No. 2005/040348/07 Vat Ref. No. 4830231124

- I’d like to sign up with Recipient
The operators
internal replica
and bring my existing number…
of the CRDB Basic
Other
Porting Company Validation
MNO

Subscriber data Internal
Your MSISDN
Credit Vetting Validation
is now activated!
CRDB
Yes / No
Recipient Donor
Yes / No Yes / No
Point of Sale We order the port! Point of Sale
Can we port tell when port
But don’t Can we
Administrative MSISDN now activecustomer?
your customer?your on our net Administrative
we will activate
Activation Database Database Activation

Customer Care Customer Care

Operational Operational
At Porting Time
Billing Database Database Billing

Network Mgmt Network Mgmt
Activate Deactivate
Switches Switches
System… System…


Bearing in mind Our Mission statement
Which is:
To allow users of all Cellular and
"
geographic services, to retain existing
telephone numbers without impairment of
quality, reliability, or convenience when
switching from one Cellular or Geographic
carrier to another”
Our flexibility was put to the test with the
advent of GNP!


This was not as simple as it all seemed.
•Originally we only had one fixed line operator
•Subsequently a second operator, initially called SNO, subsequently named
Neotel was licensed
•Our planning always allowed for two GNP operators albeit with some
modified functionality
–We had to cater for traditional copper-based telephones plus NGN radio/ fibre model
(not simply an electronic switch)
–Managed (Prioject based) / non managed porting
–PRI ‘s of different sizes (eg 10,000 blocks)
–Change of address notifications
•We had a live functional Mobile porting system that could not be disturbed


But…
•300 plus ECN licenses were granted by ICASA to speed up de-regulation
–Mixture of NGN , IP and various technologies
–Originally mostly ISP’s with technologies in place such as VOIP
–Mostly small operators
–Different interconnect models (including transit)
–Almost all had direct routing in place
•Potentially all of these operators could port
–Provided that had a fixed line number allocation
–They had routing codes
–They had interconnect agreements with Telkom and or Neotel


Challenges

•How to bring new entrants into the CRDB
•What Commercial negotiation and Agreements were needed for new
licensees) wishing to be connected to the CRDB
•What mechanisms would apply for utilising the CRDB
•What about Testing, Training and implementation issues
•Manage SLAs with parties connected to the CRDB
•Ensuring that we met the regulators requirements for new porting entrants
•Development of GNP system was well advanced
–OSS was developed
–Process flow was developed
–Inter operator testing was about to begin
–The two GNP were focused on ensuring that they could successfully test and implement
GNP by The ICASA regulated date
–NPC was well aware that ICASA would require ECNS licensees to be able to port


Lessons Learned
•Market: past, present, & future:
–Review those changes in the market share, leadership, players,
market shifts, costs, pricing, or competition which may change the
charging model or affect costing structures and/or recoveries
–In other markets, number portability has encroached into the Fixed
Line arena. Therefore ensure that IP belongs to the Number Portability
Company (NPC) and that the CRBD system is positioned to become
THE Portability Solution for all telephone numbers (Fixed Line and
Cellular)
–Bear in mind the abovementioned scenario in any strategic planning
initiatives


Meeting the challenges by carrying on business as usual
•The management and enforcement of the CRDB outsource SLA
•Commercial negotiation and completion of Agreements with other parties
(including new licensees) wishing to be connected to the CRDB
•Ensure all financial and regulatory reporting requirements are met
•Meet with Operators and Service Providers on porting issues
•Manage SLAs with parties connected to the CRDB
•Liaise and meet with the Regulator on any porting related issues

Also not forgetting…


Financial Plan
•Review the High-level financial plan that
defined financial model, pricing and recovery
assumptions, and ensure that these were valid
going forward.
• Prepare forecasts of expected costs and
recoveries
And…


Resource Requirements
Define resource requirements in terms of:
•Technology requirements
–Method of access
–Define user types
–Define brioadcast or download requirements
•Personnel requirements
•External requirements
–Products/services/technology required to be purchased
outside company
Not forgetting to…


Review Risks & Rewards
•State risks to NPC
–Competition act
–Requirement of other ECNS regarding shareholding and participation
•State risks to Service Providers e.g.:
–Competitive issues could place strain on infrastructure
–High low end churn could prove to be costly
–Legal issues regulatory and common law could pose risks


The Black Swan?

•ICASA issues new Mobile License To Telkom!
•Implications?
–Would existing plan for introducing new GNP entrants work for Mobile?
–Could we have the same agreements and charging rules applying
–Testing?
•Answer
–Yes!

•Ripost What about mobiles wanting GNP?
•Answer
–No problem!
–Same rules apply
–Everome treated equally


The Future?
•VOIP
•IP Telephony
•Enum


The Answer
•Business as usual
•Robust flexible solution
•Reference Database - not a routing system
•Good market understanding
•Forward planning
•Neutrality of NPC


So often Operators, Regulators and Cell/GNP
users see portability as a “network”

BUT


The Network is the tip of the Iceberg

Network

Strategy

Supply Chain
CRM
Sales

Testing Systems
Billing
Administration Customer Service
Procurement
Business processes Interconnect Marketing


•Questions?


•Define why port?
•What is a number

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