Essentials of a mobile office architecture

Mobility in today’s business parlance is virtually carrying one’s office along, while on the move. Therefore, a corporate network is only useful if it is convenient and accessible to authorised users, wherever they are working. Sunil Bhatt tackles some basic issues that crop up in a truly wireless environment

The nature of today’s global business environment has given the word ‘mobility’ a new dimension. It has extended beyond the concept of top executives travelling across the world to finalise important business deals. The fact is that information has become an important corporate asset, and access to it anytime and anywhere has become all the more important. Therefore, mobility in today’s business parlance is virtually carrying one’s office along, while touring the globe. A corporate network is only useful if it is convenient and accessible to authorised users, wherever they are working. The network should help enterprises enable secure, Ethernet-speed connections to the Internet at hotspots, or popular locations frequented by business travellers, including airports, hotels, convention centres, and other public places. This would help employees stay productive while on the move.

This would mean implementation of a solution that would enable enterprises to build a unified communications infrastructure to connect to the Internet. The solution should include fast and easy access to wireless connections at mobile hotspots, convenient billing and settlement services. With this kind of a network infrastructure, mobile executives should be able to establish connections wherever and whenever they need. All they would need to do is carry a wireless LAN adapter for fast access to broadband Internet.

Such a solution’s architecture will consist of switches in wireless environments that communicate with the service provider’s broadband services management gateway. This gateway would in turn act as a ‘tollgate’ that provides network access to end-users. Besides, this gateway should be able to deliver customised wireless access and management services to mobile professionals on the move, from a standard Web browser. Apart from connecting hotspot users to the Internet via a router that provides high-density, dedicated access to the public network, the gateway should also be able to handle call accounting, authorisation, reporting, policy and management functions and deliver localised content to multi-user locations.

Need for flexible billing options

One of the major grouses of such mobile office applications is billing for connectivity, as it becomes difficult for enterprises to consolidate and disburse payments for different service providers. Mobile office solutions should provide enterprises with the flexibility to use a third-party settlement service that consolidates access charges from multiple networks into a single bill, providing seamless roaming facilities to mobile executives. In order to bring this into practice, enterprises must establish agreements with third-party settlement aggregators to perform consolidated billing for their wireless hotspots. Enterprises will be able to use these third-party settlement services to increase the access footprint for their subscribers and to consolidate access charges from multiple public access networks into a single bill for their enterprise customers. By aggregating services from ISPs who administer hotspots, third-party settlement services can deliver roaming services and centralised billing that provide convenience for mobile professionals and cost savings for the companies they work for. These third-party settlement systems authenticate each user for network access and generate one integrated bill per company. They can enable organisations to negotiate corporate relationships and pricing agreements that cover access for their mobile employees. They can establish flexible billing options, such as prepaid and post-paid arrangements, calling cards or credit cards. With these services, companies need only deal with one service provider of their choice while getting the benefits of roaming between access locations, if needed, while travelling.

The role of broadband service gateways

The use of such broadband service gateways will enable service providers to efficiently provision and bill for wireless access by acting as toll-gates. Ideally in such a situation, the broadband service management gateway has to issue an IP address to mobile users when they attempt to connect to the Internet. It should then authorise users or connect them directly to the Internet or ask them to authenticate. With this kind of a broadband service gateway, service providers can also configure the gateway with a set of IP addresses that are open for anybody to use at a particular hotspot thereby enabling free Internet access to users.

The broadband service gateway should also be able to track access time by gathering information from a Radius server and should be able to collect, consolidate, and report billing information. This type of a broadband service gateway can then be used as a front-end billing mechanism at hotspots for Internet access. In hotels, for example, the gateway would function as a front-end billing mechanism, enabling the hotel to bill a mobile professional for their Internet access, if desired. Along with LAN switches this kind of a broadband services gateway manager would offer another step in ensuring consistent performance throughout a network hotspot. The gateways’ network management tools would have to provide additional troubleshooting features and support, as well as performance tuning features like bandwidth throttling, which limits users to a maximum bandwidth based on parameters set in the service provider’s Radius server.

This type of broadband service gateways should also have to function as customised information portals in airports, hotels, convention centres, or other public places. For example, in an airport hotspot, service providers can use localised portal capabilities of this kind of a broadband services gateway manager to deliver information about rental cars, shuttles or local attractions at no charge to users as part of a walled garden. This walled garden would grant network users access to limited information prior to authentication. If they choose, users can agree to pay for more extensive broadband services. In a hotel, the gateway could also act as an electronic concierge, providing information about local weather, restaurants, or special events.

Just as organisations are thriving to find out ways and means to capitalise on the huge amounts of information they are continuously amassing, this kind of an infrastructure will be able to provide true mobility to executives travelling across the globe. By facilitating ease of access to information by providing Internet connectivity at mobile hotspots, this kind of service architecture allows travelling executives to effectively harness the power of Internet to access proprietary information as well as value-added content from various service providers.