Background & Motivation
Understanding, measuring and managing quality in communication networks has become a vibrant area of applied research. The key reason is that improving service quality directly supports carriers in winning and keeping customers and reduce churn.However, since customers are also the ultimate judges of service quality, it is vital for the industry to move beyond traditional QoS and adopt a more holistic understanding of quality as perceived by end-users. Such a shift towards Quality of Experience (QoE) raises fundamental questions relating to which QoS parameters are truly relevant to users of a given service class, how these parameters can be measured and which quality levels actually define a satisfying user experience.
The Projects: ACE 1-3
The ACE project series aimed to realize this paradigm shift by investigating the link between technical network parameters and the customer’s Quality of Experience (QoE) in the context of mobile and fixed broadband. The ACE projects consist of user-centric as well as network measurement centric activities which together constitute an integrated approach towards QoE assessment and measurement for convergent networks and services.
In particular, the last project ACE 3 focused on the following aspects of broadband QoE: high-speed/LTE scenarios, impact of user terminals (smart devices), convergence, QoE for Web and Cloud services, VoiP and video (adaptive streaming, IPTV) quality. Its predecessor, ACE 2.0 addressed the following aspects of mobile broadband QoE: impact of user terminals (smart devices), different demographics, convergence, QoE for data services (Web 2.0, file downloads, progressive downloads) as well as the relationship between Customer Experience and QoE.
Methodologically, the ACE projects perform a strictly user-centric cross-layer approach towards QoE by taking into account relevant influence factors on network, application and user-level (see graphic below). The careful design and implementation of subjective QoE user studies based on innovative lab, field and crowd-sourcing methods using the facilities of FTW’s i:Lab lied at the very heart of our research process.
ACE 3 Key Facts
| Funded by | COMET, FFG | |
| Project manager | DI Dr. Raimund Schatz MBA, MSc. | |
| Partners | Telekom Austria AG A1 Telekom Austria AG Vodafone Group Services Limited Vodafone D2 |
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| Period | October 2012 – October 2015 | |
| Volume | ca. 140 PM |
ACE 2 Key Facts
| Funded by | COMET, FFG | |
| Project Manager | DI Dr. Raimund Schatz MBA, Msc. |
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| Partners | Telekom Austria AG A1 Telekom Austria AG Kapsch CarrierCom Vodafone Group Services Limited Vodafone D2 |
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| Period: | November 2010 – December 2012 | |
| Volume: | ca. 90 PM |