Interconnect Manager maintains full records for each partner agreement. It also provides near real-time monitoring of the current financial position with each partner. This makes it easy to spot re-filing and other issues, giving the opportunity for a proactive approach to managing interconnect agreements.
Interconnect Manager
Maximise your wholesale margins with smarter Interconnect Billing
Cerillion Interconnect Manager is a complete interconnect billing and settlement solution for fixed, mobile, cable and multi-play Communications Services Providers.
Amid the continuing de-regulation of global telecom markets, interconnect can form as much as 30% of the total ongoing costs of operation for many CSPs today. This means that interconnect management is now more important than ever. The growth in data and content services means that margin management is vital, and leading CSPs are now deploying Next Generation Networks in a bid to provide fully convergent services to an increasingly demanding customer base. With the arrival of many new entrants and the growing threat from over-the-top (OTT) digital service providers, proactive management of interconnect partners has become critical to sustaining a competitive advantage.
Cerillion Interconnect Manager is a complete interconnect billing system that allows you to manage interconnect agreements and improve overall profitability. From rapid production of interconnect bills for inbound traffic, to efficient reconciliation of bills for outbound traffic, it provides all the tools needed to negotiate high-value interconnect agreements. Interconnect Manager also enables improved cash flow through accurate billing and prompt settlement, and helps to maximise the Return on Investment (RoI) for existing network assets.
Key Benefits of Cerillion Interconnect Manager
Maximise your margins
Proactively manage your partners and negotiate improved interconnect agreements based on near real-time data.
Improved cash flow
Speed up the time to interconnect settlement with a near real-time management view of the status of all your agreements.
Multi-tenancy
Supports multiple legal entities in one system, allowing interconnect billing across affiliates to be monitored from a central place.
Optimal cost routing
Re-rate an entire month’s traffic within minutes, allowing almost instant analysis of the impact of alternate routes or newly negotiated agreements.
Operational efficiency
Set-up and launch new interconnect routes and agreements using automated rate loading.
Revenue assurance
Early identification of suspense files enables rapid re-processing prior to the end of the billing period, maximising the amount of billable interconnect traffic and minimising revenue leakage.
Key Features of Cerillion Interconnect Manager
Interconnect partner management
Traffic monitoring and reporting
Interconnect Manager monitors network traffic in real time, allowing you to compare expected vs. actual routing to optimise configuration and maximise RoI. Our interconnect billing system is also equipped with a set of Business Insights reports and dashboards, enabling users to easily explore, visualise and query their interconnect data.
Carrier-grade rating
Interconnect places entirely different demands on the rating engine compared with retail billing. Interconnect billing systems need to manage a much smaller number of billable accounts (interconnect partners), but with many times more CDRs to be processed per account. The analysis of these CDRs, whether for generating reports, performing least cost routing, or conducting “what if?” scenarios, requires repeated re-rating.
Interconnect Manager uses a unique system of CDR aggregation. This approach sorts incoming CDRs by a series of criteria such as partner name, destination, product type, size of call, time of day or date, point of interconnect and switch. The resulting aggregates can be manipulated quickly and easily, allowing for the highest possible performance in rating and making re-rating practical at any time. It also means that less hardware is needed to operate a high performance system.
Automated rate loading
Interconnect agreements have come a long way from their origins as long term agreements which were only reviewed and changed annually. In de-regulated markets, interconnect agreements are frequently re-negotiated as new entrants offer cheaper routes, forcing incumbents to compete and manage these new agreements.
Our interconnect billing system meets this challenge by providing a universal formatter for uploading partner tariff tables. This allows for bulk entry of new / amended tariffs in multiple formats, automatically loading them into Interconnect Manager. This dramatically reduces the time needed to maintain configuration data and ultimately offers the ability to drive down costs and improve margins.
Least cost routing
Interconnect Manager incorporates a comprehensive suite of Least Cost Routing (LCR) and optimal routing tools. These allow for comparison of rate offerings from a range of current (and potential) interconnect partners to determine the best value route for each destination. These are prioritised according to the route quality and level of savings available, enabling easy identification of quick wins or providing substance to negotiate improved rates with existing partners.
It can also test offers against the current network topology compared with the impact of proposed network extensions. This enables you to carry out smart financial decision-making based on real data.
Revenue assurance
Interconnect Manager provides a management dashboard detailing the status of all interconnect agreements at any time. End-to-end traceability enables drill down to the individual call level, and reject records can be viewed and re-processed in near real-time. Rejects are organised by class making it easy to correct the root cause of each problem; they are also organised by value, focusing attention on the issues that really make a difference.
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Cerillion Interconnect Manager FAQs
What is telecom interconnect billing?
Telecom interconnect billing is the process of calculating charges between communications service providers (CSPs) for traffic carried across or terminated on each other’s networks.
When a call, message or other service passes from one operator’s network to another, the operators must determine what is payable or receivable according to their interconnect agreement. This requires large volumes of usage records to be rated using the relevant routes, destinations, service types and partner tariffs.
Cerillion Interconnect Manager provides interconnect billing and settlement for fixed, mobile, cable and multi-play CSPs.
How is interconnect billing different from retail telecom billing?
Retail telecom billing calculates charges owed by individual consumers or business customers for the services they use. Interconnect billing calculates wholesale charges between network operators and other communications partners for exchanging or carrying traffic.
Interconnect billing normally involves fewer billable accounts but significantly greater volumes of usage records for each account. It must also support complex partner agreements, frequent tariff changes, traffic reconciliation and repeated re-rating for routing and commercial analysis.
Cerillion Interconnect Manager is designed specifically for these wholesale inter-operator relationships, while Cerillion Revenue Manager manages retail and enterprise customer billing.
What is interconnect settlement in telecoms?
Interconnect settlement is the process through which telecom operators reconcile the traffic exchanged between their networks and settle the resulting financial amounts.
Each operator calculates the charges it expects to pay or receive based on usage records and the rates defined in its interconnect agreements. These calculations are compared with invoices and traffic data supplied by the partner so that discrepancies can be investigated before payment.
Cerillion Interconnect Manager supports the production of bills for inbound traffic, the reconciliation of bills for outbound traffic and the tracking of each agreement through to settlement.
How do mediation and interconnect billing work together?
Mediation collects usage records from network systems, validates and standardises them, and directs them to the appropriate downstream applications. The interconnect billing system then identifies the relevant partner, route and agreement before rating the traffic and calculating the amount payable or receivable.
Accurate mediation is important because missing, duplicated or invalid records can cause billing disputes or revenue leakage. Rejected records must therefore be identified, corrected and reprocessed promptly.
Cerillion Mediator Plus processes online and offline network usage, while Cerillion Interconnect Manager rates interconnect traffic and manages partner billing and settlement.
What is least cost routing in telecoms?
Least cost routing is the process of selecting the most cost-effective available network route for traffic to a particular destination.
It involves comparing the rates offered by different interconnect partners while also considering factors such as route availability and service quality. Operators can use traffic and rating data to model alternative routes, assess proposed rate changes and strengthen their position when negotiating partner agreements.
Cerillion Interconnect Manager provides least cost and optimal routing analysis, including the ability to re-rate historical traffic to compare different routing and commercial scenarios.