What is Intent-Driven Fulfillment and Why is It Key to Customer Experience?

Service providers are continually seeking to offer differentiated services to address a variety of subscriber demands, from augmented reality (AR) or virtual reality (VR) gaming to telemedicine to Connected Cars to the Internet of Things (IoT). The end goal is to empower subscribers to easily order revenue-generating services (e.g., “Gamer Enhanced Internet”) on demand, and have the service delivered immediately and efficiently.

But despite ongoing efforts by standards bodies to evolve broadband and mobile network architecture specifications and standardize multi-domain service deployment, it is often the case that custom services are neither easy for most service providers to design and deliver, nor easy for subscribers to order.

Network orchestration requirements

To ensure that subscribers can easily order and quickly receive the next-generation services they want, service providers need a network orchestration system that is:

• Intent-based, to allow subscribers to describe their service desires without having to provide technical details
• Operator self-serve, so service and DevOps teams can design end-to-end services in a low-code fashion with minimal reliance on custom development or vendors’ professional services
• Fully automated from Operations Support System (OSS) to resource, to enable near-instant service delivery with no human intervention required

To deliver these orchestration capabilities to our customers, DZS developed the DZS Xtreme intent engine, the industry’s first intent-driven service fulfillment engine. Our intent engine makes possible zero-touch, end-to-end fulfilment of services by decoupling the service requirements from how the service is built. Subscribers can express their service requests in human-friendly terms like “Vehicle Infotainment” or “Broadband Internet Service Plan,” and the system can automatically resolve these attributes into appropriate actions.

How the DZS Xtreme intent engine works?

The DZS Xtreme intent engine operates through a set of operator-designed policies across different domains (access, transport, cloud etc.), which drive the resource selection process. Fields in standards-compliant templates, such as a TM Forum Service Order or the GSMA NEST template, are used to determine the best-fit resources to fulfill a particular service.

For example, if the subscriber requests an ultra-high-bandwidth link for at-home gaming, the system will select components with the right form and fit from the service provider’s fixed access and transport assets (Optical Line Terminals, Optical Network Terminals, Optical Transport, etc.) just like one would put together Lego blocks and automatically provision resources for the subscriber. This allows service providers to rapidly assemble services without having to white-glove tailor every service, which costs time and money and is a significant barrier to creating new services. Similarly, if the subscriber requires a mobile low-latency link for Augmented Reality, DZS Xtreme can resolve the service into an Ultra-Reliable Low Latency Connection (URLLC) 5G slice.

The intent policies are free-form and support the use of low-code plug-ins, which give service providers unparalleled flexibility over what services to create, how to deploy them, and how to differentiate them from competitors’ offerings. The intent process also enables service providers to interface with third-party systems used in the order fulfilment process, such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM), IP Address Management (IPAM), inventory, or other databases. This helps to eliminate “swivel-chair” copy and paste processes across systems, reducing errors and shortening the time from order to delivery.

As with other DZS Xtreme capabilities, customers can design their intent fulfilment process using the DZS Xtreme wizard-driven service designer User Interface (UI), and can customize and enhance each step of the fulfilment process via low-code plugins. DZS provides training for all steps of service design, to ensure customers self-sufficiency, independence and ownership of their value-added services.

More about DZS Xtreme

DZS Xtreme is a fully standards-compliant orchestration system for high-speed broadband and mobile wireless services. By simplifying creation, deployment and management of end-to-end connectivity services including access, transport and 5G slices across multi-vendor network elements, network functions, and cloud infrastructure, DZS Xtreme enables operators to transform their business models from simple consumer high-speed connectivity to Service Level Agreement (SLA) guaranteed, high-revenue services targeting power users, small businesses and large enterprises.

To discover more about how DZS Xtreme orchestration services and other DZS Cloud solutions can help your business deliver differentiating subscriber experiences, contact DZS.

I also encourage you to attend our upcoming “Accelerating Optical Edge Deployments with Unprecedented Economics” webinar on October 12, at 10 am Eastern/ 9 am Central to learn more about how you and your organization can leverage DZS Xtreme for a Software-Defined Network EDGE.