Conformance testing milestone announced

The MCS-TaaSting (Mission Critical Services-Testing as a Service) project has announced that 60 per cent of MCPTT conformance test cases have been formally verified.

According to a statement, this number is the trigger required by certification organisations to activate their MCX conformance certification programmes, meeting procurement requirements from mission critical operators and users.

Speaking of the importance of the development, a spokesperson said: “A comprehensive certification programme helps to establish a stable market for mission critical services deployment, and is essential to ensure that critical broadband devices and services conform to the 3GPP standards.

“Conformance testing is required to verify the correct operation of key interfaces between devices, and between the device and the mobile network. Field trials are used to complement laboratory testing and witness the device’s and services’ behaviour in live multi-vendor commercial networks.”

Test case verification is achieved using 3GPP’s RAN5 working group’s-defined MCX IPCAN model, which is the only accepted standards-based process for full verification of MCX test cases.

MCS-TaaSting project co-ordinator, Dr Fidel Liberal, said: “MCX certification tools and programmes are becoming a reality. We can today provide end users and industry with flexible, ‘pay as you test’ conformance tools following exactly the standards certification process.

“It is time for end users to start including conformance certification requirements into their tenders and product acceptance processes, and for industry to integrate conformance testing into their development and delivery processes.”

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