New Model and Open Tools for Real Testing of QoE in Mobile Broadband Services and the Transport Protocol Impact: The Operator's Approach

Real life data from three Mobile Operators has been used to successfully test a New Model of Quality of Experience (QoE) in Broadband Services. The Platform utilized is based on Open Source Tools and it generates Key Quality Indicators (KQI) simulating the final user's perception of the service. The detailed characterization of: a) the consolidated usage profile, b) the transport and application protocols and c) the final service, are the main components of the model that complement the typical network Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). This work also studies how different connection-oriented transport protocols affect the QoE. This provides the operator with an objective comparison of the impact the different protocols have on the QoE metric. The final results are representative KQIs that allow indirect measurements of real life services and service behavior prediction under simulated scenarios. The set of KQIs varies depending upon the market segments and the specific services that each Mobile Operator offers to its customers. From the Regulator's standpoint, when considering several Operators with the same service, this methodology allows the benchmark of QoE.