Mobile number portability

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Mobile Number Portability (MNP) enables mobile telephone users to retain their mobile telephone numbers when changing from one mobile network operator to another.

MNP is implemented in different flavours across the globe. The international and European best practice is for a customer wishing to port his/her number to contact the new provider (Recipient) who will then arrange necessary process with the old provider (Donor). This is also known as 'Recipient-Led' porting. The only country to not implement a Recipient-Led porting is the UK where a customer wishing to port his/her number is required to contact the Donor to obtain a Port Authorisation Code (PAC) which he/she then has to give to the Recipient. Once having received the PAC the Recipient continues the port process by contacting the Donor. This form of porting is also known as 'Donor-Led' and has been criticised by some industry analysts as being inefficient. It has also been observed that it may act as a customer deterrent as well as allowing the Donor an opportunity of 'winning-back' the customer. This might lead to distortion of competition, especially in the markets with new entrants that are yet to achieve scalability of operation.

A significant technical aspect of MNP is related to the routing of calls or mobile messages (SMS, MMS) to a number once it has been ported. There are various flavours of call routing implementation across the globe but the international and European best practice is via the use of a central database (CDB) of ported numbers. Network operators generally hold local copies of CDB and query it to find out which network to send a call to. This is also known as All Call Query (ACQ) and is highly efficient and scalable. Majority of the established and upcoming MNP systems across the world are based on this ACQ/CDB method of call routing. One of the very few countries to not use ACQ/CDB is the UK where calls to a number once it has been ported are still routed via the Donor network. This is also known as 'Indirect Routing' and is highly inefficient as it is wasteful of transmission and switching capacity. Because of its Donor dependent nature, Indirect Routing also means that if the Donor network develops a fault or goes out of business, the customers who have ported out of that network will lose incoming calls to their numbers. The UK telecoms regulator Ofcom completed its extended review of the UK MNP process on 29 November 2007 and mandated that ACQ/CDB be implemented for mobile to mobile ported calls by no later than 1 September 2009, and for all other (fixed and mobile) ported calls by no later than 31 December 2012.

Service providers and carriers which route messages and voice calls to countries where MNP is in place might use third parties to find out the correct network of a mobile phone number. The UK-based TynTec Ltdprovides the MNP service on a to various telcos, service providers and data organisations. The service queries the SS7 network to find out the correct network of a mobile phone number. The real-time MNP query guarantees that the result is the most accurate possible. In contrast, a service provider can query a MNP database, but this can be outdated and therefore provide inaccurate results. Other such providers include NQuire, End2End, and NumberPortabilityLookup.com. For Australia, the market leader in the provision of this lookup capability is Paradigm.One.

In regard to providers who deliver MNP solutions into the operators network, some examples are Ericsson, Huawei and European Computer Telecoms (ECT) [1]. ECT delivered for example a pan-European Number Portability solution to Tele2. This solution, a geographically redundant Service Delivery Platform, takes care of the MNP for Tele2 in approx. 10 European countries.

It takes a minimum of 5 working days to port a number in the UK compared to 2 hours only in USA, as low as 20 minutes in the Republic of Ireland and even a remarkable 3 minutes in Australia. On 17 July 2007, Ofcom released its conclusions from the review of UK MNP and mandated reduction of porting time to 2 working days with effect from 1 April 2008. On 29 November 2007, Ofcom completed its consultation on further reduction to porting time to 2 hours along with recipient led porting and mandated that near-instant (no more than 2 hours) recipient led porting be implemented by no later than 1 September 2009.

Contents 1 Mobile Number Portability in the Internet Telephony / VOIP Environment 2 Portability by country 2.1 Americas 2.1.1 Ecuador 2.1.2 México 2.2 Asia Pacific 2.2.1 Australia 2.2.2 Hong Kong 2.2.3 India 2.2.4 Singapore 2.3 Europe 2.3.1 Belgium 2.3.2 Cyprus 2.3.3 Italy 2.3.4 Luxembourg 2.3.5 Norway 2.3.6 Portugal 2.3.7 Romania 2.3.8 Sweden 2.4 Middle East and Africa 2.4.1 Egypt 2.4.2 Israel 2.4.3 Nigeria 2.4.4 Pakistan 2.4.5 Saudi Arabia 2.4.6 South Africa 3 References

[edit] Mobile Number Portability in the Internet Telephony / VOIP Environment

Mobile Number Portability also impacts the internet telephony, or VOIP (Voice over IP) business. A voice call originated in the VOIP environment which is routed to a mobile phone number of a traditional mobile carrier also face challenges to reach its destination in case the mobile phone number is ported.

VOIP is clearly identified as a Least Cost Routing (LCR) voice routing system, which is based on checking the destination of each telephone call as it is made, and then sending the call via the network that will cost the customer the least. With GSM number portability now in place, LCR providers can no longer rely on using the network root prefix to determine how to route a call. Instead, they now need to know the actual current network of every number before routing the call.

Therefore, VOIP solutions also need to handle MNP when routing a voice call. In countries without a central database like UK it might be necessary to query the GSM network about the home network a mobile phone number belongs to. As VOIP starts to take off in the enterprise markets because of least cost routing options, it needs to provide a certain level of reliability when handling calls.

MNP checks are important to assure that this quality of service is met; by handling MNP lookups before routing a call and assuring that the voice call will actually work, VOIP companies give businesses the necessary reliability they look for in an internet telephony provider. UK-based messaging operator Tyntec provides a Voice Network Query service, which helps not only traditional voice carriers but also VOIP providers to query the GSM network to find out the home network of a ported number.

In countries such as Singapore, the most recent Mobile Number Portability solution is expected to open the doors to new business opportunities for non-traditional telecommunication service providers like wireless broadband providers and voice over IP (VOIP) providers.

Last but not least, in November 2008 the North American FCC (Federal Communications Commission) released an order extending number portability obligations to interconnected VOIP providers and carriers that support VOIP providers.

[edit] Portability by country

[edit] Americas

[edit] Ecuador

Ecuador MNP is going to be implemented until Feb '09. It's not known which type will be used.

[edit] México

Mexico will be starting MNP on July 5, 2008. The handling of the service will be handled by Telcordia Technologies.^[1].

[edit] Asia Pacific

[edit] Australia

In Australia, mobile telephone numbers have been portable between carriers since 2001. Previously, prefixes 04x1, 04x2 and 04x3 referred to Optus customers, 04x4, 04x5 and 04x6 referred to Vodafone numbers, 043x, referred to 3 Australia numbers, and 04x7, 04x8 and 04x9 referred to Telstra. Portability has been a great asset in allowing freedom of choice of service provider. However many telecommunications companies had special or discount rates for calls between two customers of the same service provider, which although the special rates still existed, it was made difficult for customers to determine which provider the person they were calling was with. Land line phone numbers are tied to a particular physical telephone exchange - as of 2004 there are no plans or demand to change this.

[edit] Hong Kong

Mobile number portability is available since March 1, 1999^[2].

[edit] India

The Indian government also said yes to start number portability in the country.

Due to unpreparedness of the two public telecos BSNL and MTNL in respest of technology, the scheme will be put into effect from June, 2009 instead of October , 2008...

[edit] Singapore

To be introduced at January, 13th 2008. Vendor chosen for database installation is allegedly Syniverse, USA.

[edit] Europe

[edit] Belgium

Belgium mobile operators started Mobile Number Portability in October 2002. The central solution CRDC has been re-implemented several times. First integrator was Telcordia of the US. After number of years a new contract for CRDB was awarded to Cap Gemini. Presently CRDB contract is with local company Porthus.

[edit] Cyprus

Cyprus also began to offer this service when another telecommunication other than the main began offering mobile telephony.

[edit] Italy

MNP was introduced in Italy in 200x. Despite the huge success of MNP (Mobile Number Portability) so far, Italian mobile users still ask for more freedom of choice. The MNP process is still far from perfect and backlogs and delays are still far too commom. Often operators offer special packages and bonuses to customers who want to move to their network and sometimes contact their own 'leaving' customers to check their reason for moving and make special offers to avoid their loss.

[edit] Luxembourg

MNP was introduced in Luxembourg in June 2004. The Mobile Number Portability Central (MNPC) managed by the G.I.E Telcom E.I.G. operator group and developed, installed and operated by Systor Trondheim AS of Norway, was put into commercial operations from February 2005.

[edit] Norway

MNP was introduced in Norway in 2001, one year after the introduction of fixed number portability, and has been a tremendous success. More than 20% of the mobile subscribers are porting their number from one operator or service provider to another each year. The administrative solution for fixed and mobile number portability in Norway, the National Reference Database (NRDB), was put into service in 2000. The NRDB is owned and managed by the 8 largest network operators in Norway through the company NRDB AS. The reference database was developed, installed and is presently operated by Systor Trondheim AS.

[edit] Portugal

Portugal introduced MNP in January 2002. The administrative Reference Entity (Entidade de Referencia (ER)) interconnecting all network operators and service providers is operated by a local third party, Portabil S.A., a joint venture between the internationally well known companies Logica and Systor Trondheim AS.

[edit] Romania

MNP in Romania will be introduced in December 2008. All documents regulating this process are already developed. The service will be free of charge for all subscribers and all tariff plans.

[edit] Sweden

Sweden Mobile operators launched Mobile Number Portability in autumn 2001. The largest operators formed independent company, SNPAC AB, to procure central database (CRDB) solution. Implementation of CRDB was carried out by Cap Gemini & Oracle. Fixed line portability which had been implemented since 1999 was also incorporated into the CRDB. To this day (April 2008) more than 3,476.591 numbers (fixed and mobile) have been ported.

[edit] Middle East and Africa

[edit] Egypt

In Egypt, MNP was introduced in April 2008. The three mobile operators in Egypt (Mobinil, Vodafone, and Etisalat) are expected to compete to get the most out of MNP. Telcordia's NPC serves the centralized administrative and provisioning role of MNP, with its partner Giza Systems as the system integrator. Giza Systems has also implemented and will beoperating the intra-operator MNP part of the solution for Mobinil using Telcordia's NPG.

[edit] Israel

Israel implemented MNP on December 3, 2007.

[edit] Nigeria

The Nigerian Telecommication regulatory agency (Nigeria Communications Commission, NCC) announced plans to introduce mobile number portability before the end of 2007.

[edit] Pakistan

Pakistan introduced mobile number portability in March 2007 and was the first country in its region to do so. It was introduced on 23 March 2007 and was implemented from 26 March 2007.

[edit] Saudi Arabia

In Saudi Arabia, MNP has been implemented in the middle of 2006, helping to liberalize the market, raising the competition between ALJAWAL, and Mobily, the two Mobile Operators originally available in the country. MTC Zain, a third operator is being introduced (end of 2007) to the Saudi Market. The new operator will target to benefit the most from the availability of MNP in the country. All of this pours into the benefit of the market and the end customer, as more competition reflects into better service levels, better marketing packages, etc. The administrative approach for MNP in Saudi Arabia is managed by the Centralized Clearinghouse Approach, through the NPC (Number Portability Clearinghouse), a product of Telcordia, a worldwide leading company in NP solutions. The implementer and system integrator is Giza Arabia, a company owned by a leading system integrator in the Middle East, Giza Systems located in Cairo Egypt. Giza Arabia is also the implementer of the intra-operator MNP part of the solution for MTC Zain, the third mobile oprator in Saudi Arabia. The intra-operator is implemented using a Telcordia solution called NPG (Number Portability Gateway).

[edit] South Africa

South Africa MNP was implemented on November 10, 2006. The three operators, Vodacome SA, MTN SA, and Cell C, formed an independent company for the implementation and management of the central solution. The solution was after delays awarded to local company SAAB Grintek teamed up with Telcordia of the US. According to interviews with the MD of Port Co, a total of 12.000 numbers are being ported per month (Aug 2007).

[edit] References

Daniel AJ Sokolov, Problems with VOIP and Convergent Services [2]

VOIP News, US Number Portability Extends to VOIP Providers [3]

IDA Singapore, Singapore to Enjoy Full Mobile Number Portability from 13 June [4]