7.10 Subscription Management

32.1013GPPPrinciples and high level requirementsRelease 17Telecommunication managementTS

Subscription Management (SuM) is a feature that permits Service Providers, Value Added Service Providers and Mobile Operators to provision services for a specific subscriber. The feature is necessary to allow Service Providers and Operators to provision, control, monitor and bill the configuration of services that they offer to their subscribers. SuM focuses on the OAM processes to manage subscription information. These correspond to the ‘Fulfilment’ Process areas of the TeleManagement Forum Telecom Operations Map [100].

SuM is an area of service operation management that sets a complex challenge for Service Providers and Operators in their support of new or existing subscribers during their every day network operation.

In GSM solutions the main repository of the subscription information is in the Home Locations Register (HLR). However the management and administration interfaces for controlling this information is proprietary to each vendor. The use of proprietary interfaces is inconvenient for those Operators using multiple vendors’ equipment since their provisioning systems have to accommodate multiple proprietary interfaces, which perform essentially identical functions. Moreover, it makes it more difficult to generate customer self care applications that allow subscribers to provision, and amend subscription data.

The 3GPP environment requires more complex service delivery mechanisms than in GSM and SuM is no longer simply an internal matter for a single operator but a capability that is achieved by linking together features across multiple Service Providers and Operators Operations Support Systems (OSS). Historically, the services provided by Operators have been defined within standards groups such as ETSI or 3GPP. With the advent of Open Services Access (OSA) being adopted by 3GPP the User Service Definitions will be replaced by Service Capabilities traded amongst Service Providers and Network Operators. This will allow Operators and Service Providers to define customized service environments that roam with users as they move amongst networks – this is the Virtual Home Environment (VHE) 3GPP TR 22.121 [56]. This customized service environment means that subscription information is held in a number of locations including the Home Network, the Visited Network, the User Equipment, Application VASP Equipment (e.g. servers accessed by the subscriber for content and information based services) and the Operations Systems of the Service Providers, and Operators supporting the subscriber’s service subscription.

Service delivery and support across multiple vendors’ solutions and organizations is a feature of other industries, and the solutions adopted are secure supply chain solutions based upon mainstream e-commerce principles, methods and technologies.

There is a relationship between this feature and the PS Domain, CS Domain, IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), Authentication Center (AuC), Open Services Access (OSA) and Generic User Profile (GUP) documented in other 3GPP specifications.

The conceptual model for SuM is illustrated in figure 10.

Figure 10: High level view of Subscription Management (SuM)

SuM is concerned with provisioning the subscription profile throughout all the systems and trading partners needed to realize the customer service, SuM provides specifications that define the interfaces and the procedures that interconnect the three points of the SuM triangle: Customer Care Center, the User and the network (s) where the Subscription profile resides (such as HSS, USIM, etc.).

The SuM requirements are described in more detail in 3GPP TS 32.140 [57], The SUM Architecture is described in 3GPP TS 32.141 [58].