ATIS Releases Major Communications Network Reliability Report

October 27, 2008, Washington – The ATIS Network Reliability Steering Committee (NRSC) announces the release of its 2006–2007 Biennial Report. The report reviews observed network reliability trends and associated industry actions regarding the nation’s communications networks. It covers outage frequency, outage impact, and actionable countermeasures industry can take to effectively address areas of concern. It is enhanced from previous editions with reporting entities that now include wireless and cable operators in addition to wireline communications service providers.

“We’re especially encouraged to see active participation from other sectors, namely a strong showing from the wireless sector,” said Karl Rauscher, vice chair of the NRSC. “The NRSC believes this expanded participation has strengthened the efforts we have had in place on an ongoing basis since 1992.”

Report highlights include the following:

• In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, many organizations joined together in an NRSC team to develop a checklist of proactive steps communications service providers can take to prepare for a hurricane. These range from monitoring the storm path five days in advance to physical planning for vehicles, equipment, power and fuel supplies. The checklist is available at http://www.atis.org/nrsc/docs.asp.

• The NRSC also is responsible for publishing a Standard Outage Classification document to provide a common list and methodology for classifying communications outages. This offers a new and consistent approach to understanding both the direct and root causes of an outage.

• To complement the Classification document, the NRSC published the Categorization of Equipment Deployed within Communications Networks for Use in Outage Classification and Analysis Technical Report to provide a naming and classification system for equipment used in communications networks. The goal is to allow companies to classify equipment types in reliability discussions with universal terms to reduce the confusion often found by using multiple naming systems.

“These accomplishments, as well as the many others highlighted in the report demonstrate the progress the NRSC is making to advance reliability in a market based on ever-changing regulatory demands, environmental concerns, technology and consumer preferences,” said Archie McCain, chairman of the NRSC.

The full text of the NRSC 2006–2007 Biennial Report can be found online at http://www.atis.org/nrsc/annualrpt.asp.

About the NRSC
The ATIS NRSC is a team of experts dedicated to improving the reliability of communications networks by providing timely consensus-based technical and operational expert guidance to all segments of the public communications industry. The Committee establishes industry guidelines and processes to be used in collecting network reliability data, documents methods for the industry to use in analyzing outage data, works with the FCC to identify and analyze emerging outage trends, and makes recommendations to improve communications network reliability. It advises the communications industry chiefly through developing and issuing standards, technical requirements, technical reports, bulletins, best practices, and annual reports.

About ATIS
ATIS is a technical planning and standards development organization that is committed to rapidly developing and promoting technical and operations standards for the communications and related information technologies industry worldwide using a pragmatic, flexible and open approach. Participants from more than 300 communications companies are active in ATIS’ 22 industry committees and Incubator Solutions Program. www.atis.org