Calabasas, CA, February 09, 2012 – Ixia (NASDAQ: XXIA), the leading global provider of converged IP and wireless network test solutions, today announced that it will demonstrate a new industry-leading VoLTE test solution at Mobile World Congress 2012 from February 27 – March 1, in Barcelona. The live demonstration will take place in Ixia’s booth 1E47, Hall 1.

Voice and SMS services are the primary revenue sources for mobile operators, contributing close to 80% of the overall revenue. Over-the-top (OTT) voice and video service providers are a significant threat to steal market share from mobile operators. Operators may be reluctant to commit large amounts of capital to LTE deployments without having confidence that they will be able to provide customers with voice quality and reliability equivalent to that of existing 2G and 3G networks. Support of toll grade, operator supported voices services over LTE’s all IP infrastructure presents a substantial technological challenge.

Ixia has introduced a new test application to its IxLoad solution to measure voice quality end-to-end, from the cell tower through the core network. Operators can easily compare and contrast the voice quality of over-the-top (OTT) service to operator-provided voice services. Using best-in-class industry algorithms, operators can measure the mean opinion score (MOS) of voice quality before going live. Additionally, Ixia’s new application tests the functionality, scalability, and resiliency of LTE infrastructure components and new IMS networks that support VoLTE-based services.

Ixia’s IxLoad is a unified test solution for testing all aspects of wireless networks end-to-end, including LTE base stations, core network components, and the IMS subsystem. IxLoad supports a broad set of test applications measuring the scalability and capacity of data applications, the quality of rich media services, and the evaluation of security vulnerabilities.

Ixia’s VoLTE solution will be available for demonstration at MWC 2012 in booth 1E47, Hall 1.

Key Facts:

• IxLoad measures voice quality by a mean opinion score (MOS) using E-model and perceptual estimation of speech quality (PESQ) algorithms.
• IxLoad’s high RTP performance supports more than one million concurrent calls with media per chassis.
• IxLoad measures control plane and media latency which can be used to understand call setup latency.
• VoLTE features include:
• Support of the GSMA IR.92 specification
• Emulation of SIP endpoints to initiate and receive voice calls and SMS texts over eGTP
• Emulation of the IMS network (P-CSCF & MGW)
• AMR and AMR-WB codecs
• AKAv1 & AKAv2 authentication
• Default and dedicated bearers

“Mobile VoIP subscribers (Over the Top) growth is predicted to be 386M in 2015, led by Skype and GTalk Mobile, but generating little revenue. Now operators must compete to preserve their $500 billion per year in global business under attack,” said Stéphane Téral, principal analyst at Infonetics Research. “VoLTE is the solution that allows operators to offer a differentiated solution. This important demonstration shows that Ixia can test VoLTE implementations so operators can go to market with confidence.”

“The demand for high-definition voice and other media-rich features is growing with the number of mobile users and devices accessing the Internet. Operators must be sure that their new LTE networks can deliver high quality voice services,” said Joe Zeto, sr. manger, market development at Ixia. “Ixia’s new VoLTE test application allows operators to validate their networks under realistic conditions.”