There are many satellites that orbit the Earth, beaming information this way and that way around the globe. Many of them use equipment from ViaSat (News - Alert), which provides innovative satellite, digital communication and ground station equipment. Recently, under contract from Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems, it developed a new management system for the next generation of LTE (News - Alert) satellites, with help from WebNMS.

Boeing needed new technology for its commercial satellites and its Ground-Based Beam-Forming (GBBF) system. The GBBF system, provided by ViaSat, is comprised of the Control and Management System (CMS), Uplink Beacon Station (UBS) and Gateway (News - Alert) used by Boeing’s mobile satellite communications. This sends the signals to ground stations, which collect the events and send the data to a CMS, which management can view. It must monitor and control ground station equipment while handling analog-to-digital conversion, signal processing and positioning with the satellite beam.

In order to make all this work, ViaSat uses WebNMS. WebNMS requires less hardware and software than similar products, and is built with flexible architecture, made to integrate standard and custom protocols with ease. It’s also built with a FCAPS framework (fault, configuration, accounting/asset inventory, performance and security), ensuring security and high performance.

With WebNMS, ViaSat built two management systems: a Gateway CMS for the four ground systems, and a Central CMS for a unified view of the network. WebNMS was customized to use a SOAP protocol to communicate between the two CMS’s, while its functional modules, such as security, performance, topology, and inventory, were also used in the ViaSat system.

As a result, ViaSat managed to launch its signal processing system quickly, while saving time and money. With the high level of customization provided by WebNMS, ViaSat wasn’t tied to a single vendor, allowing it to outsource each system to its preferred ones. It met all of ViaSat’s requirements for fault, performance, and so on, all while requiring less hardware and software.

“We were amazed that one complete framework like WebNMS could deliver on its promises and provide an out-of-the-box framework to help us develop a massively complete satellite NMS system in 10-12 development months, says Ravi Khanna, a technology architect at ViaSat. “The cost and resource savings are only matched by the incredibly abbreviated time to market. We wouldn’t consider building in-house again, now knowing the efficiencies of using WebNMS.”

This is an impressive feat, made possible by WebNMS. Satellite systems are of incredible importance, but ViaSat managed to make it with less time, money, software and hardware than they would with other options. Its customizability made it fit every one of ViaSat’s needs, and now, Boeing (News - Alert), ViaSat, and all those whose lives are made easier by its satellites are benefiting from it.

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