The MSF (MultiService Forum) has announced completion of the global Evolved Packet Core (EPC) interoperability event. Participants in this event included Alcatel-Lucent, Bridgewater Systems, Cisco/Starent, Codenomicon, Huawei, JDSU, NEC and ZTE.

The first global MSF (MultiService Forum) EPC/LTE interoperability event was completed on March 31, 2010, which was hosted by China Mobile Research Institute in Beijing and Vodafone’s Test and Innovation Centre in Dusseldorf, Germany. The joint test event started from March 15, 2010.

Both intra-lab and inter-lab tests were involved in this comprehensive events. At Beijing site, two-thirds of the test cases for basic interworking between 42 vendor combinations were 

performed and all of them passed, while the other onethird were cancelled because of time constraint. For roaming test between Beijing site and Dusseldorf site, 9 roaming scenarios  were carried out with 3 passed completely, 4  partially completed and another 2 scenarios were cancelled for the sake of time limit.

Elements tested during this event included eNodeB (base station), Mobility Management Entity (MME), Serving Gateway (SGW), Packet Data Network Gateway (PGW), Home Subscriber Server (HSS), Policy and Charging Rule Function (PCRF), Proxy Call Session Control Function (P-CSCF), and other elements of the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) Core.

David Hutton, Vodafone Senior Standards Strategist and MSF Vice President, emphasized the importance of the MSF testing for the telecommunications industry. “Not only did the LTE/EPC test event confirm interoperability of different vendors’ EPC core elements, but it also served as a crucial verification of the associated 3GPP specifications."

Naseem Khan, Verizon Principal Member of the Technical Staff and an MSF Board director, commented on the value of the MSF testing for Verizon. “The MSF provides a testing environment that facilitates next generation network deployment. With carriers and suppliers working together to validate interoperable solutions, the time frame required to progress from standards development to product deployment is dramatically shortened. The MSF provides a unique environment for this.”