Infovista and PCTEL, global leaders in network lifecycle automation (NLA) and wireless connectivity, announced a strategic collaboration to co-develop joint 5G network testing use cases for mobile operators and industry regulators.
The joint use cases will bring together PCTEL’s 5G scanning receivers, including its flagship Gflex® and Infovista’s market-leading TEMS software to create differentiated and simplified solutions that address specific customer needs and requirements. The initial set of use cases covers 5G C-Band interference monitoring, autonomous testing, beamforming configuration validation, automatic site location detection and automated interference detection.
Faiq Khan, President of Global Networks of Infovista said, “Mobile operators and regulators are facing new and specific challenges as 5G spectrum is licensed and networks rolled out. Their complexity requires new approaches to network testing, using the latest in AI, automation and cloud-native technologies to reduce the time and cost of network testing and monitoring while also being more accurate and valuable to the business.”
One of the first joint solutions sees Infovista and PCTEL combining to deliver automated interference source detection and location. Leveraging Infovista’s NLA cloud platform for automated cross-domain troubleshooting, the solution uses network and service performance data from Infovista Ativa™ and its AI/ML analytics engine to rapidly identify and geo-locate cells affected by interference. With the approximate area of the interference identified, Infovista’s precision drive testing algorithms determine an optimal drive route and diagnostics workflow. After which, a tester is dispatched with a PCTEL scanner and guided workflow to quickly find the source of the interference.
Arnt Arvik, Vice President and Chief Sales Officer of PCTEL said, “Today, effective network testing and monitoring requires purpose-built scanning receivers to measure hundreds of channels across a broad spectrum including 5GNR and mmWave. Testing needs to be fast and accurate, conducted in multiple environments, and it needs to be capable of simultaneously testing multiple technologies and operator networks.”
Together, Infovista and PCTEL will bring the power of two customer-focused teams to co-develop joint 5G testing use cases and solve tangible challenges their customers face, both today and in the future.
