China Unicom Henan and ZTE: Simulating signal storms and setting flow controls

Challenge: For telecoms operators, the significant risks associated with some major operations, such as disaster-recovery switchovers, prevent them from predicting outcomes, making them hesitant to proceed. Similarly, major faults often trigger signalling storms that affect the entire network, and it has been difficult to predict the impact in advance and mitigate interference proactively.

Solution: China Unicom Henan and ZTE have leveraged digital twin technology to tackle the challenge of signalling storms. They are using automatic simulation evaluation and intelligent flow control parameter optimisation to eliminate switchover risks and guarantee disaster-recovery switchovers. The system collects signalling-related data, evaluates signalling storm peak values and recommends flow control parameters using AI algorithms. The AI can simulate network function characteristics, predict storm generation trends and verify the accuracy of flow control parameters.

Impact: This collaborative effort significantly enhances the reliability and efficiency of network operations, safeguarding against potential disruptions. As well as enabling the network management system to predict the signalling storm peak value of all 5G core and IMS (IP multimedia subsystem) network elements, the digital twin technologies can precisely recommend the flow control parameters. The peak value can be evaluated more than 15 minutes in advance of actual disaster activity, while the accuracy of the recommended flow control parameters is almost 90%.

Location: Asia Pacific

Topic: Operations and maintenance

Cost: The cost of this solution is low. The major cost relates to the deployment of a digital twin system based on virtual machines. The solution requires the deployment of virtual machines equivalent to 10% of the computing resources of the existing network.

MNOs and supporting organisations: China Unicom and ZTE