Market Expansion Toolkit

Market Expansion Toolkit introduces five enhancements to Pre-emption.

Of these five, the following are enabled automatically when the Market Expansion Toolkit
licence state is set to ON:

Subscriber class specific statistics

Fair call duration
Soft call drop support in BSC

Enabling the following two enchancements requires that the parameter is set to some other
value than to the default value. They can also be disabled by setting the parameter forced
release priority threshold to the default value ('1').

Forced release after an unsuccessful forced handover attempt

Pre-emption based subscriber classification

Forced release after an unsuccessful forced handover attempt

Forced release after an unsuccessful forced handover attempt ensures that a high priority
subscriber is allocated a TCH even if there is congestion in the cell and the neighbouring
cells. If the lower priority subscriber cannot be handed over to another cell, a forced release is
started for the lower priority subscriber. Figure Forced release after an unsuccessful forced
handover attempt illustrates the process in a congested network.

Figure 1:
Forced release after an unsuccessful forced handover attempt
Pre-emption based subscriber classification
The subscribers are divided into classes according to their priority levels and the value of the
parameter forced release priority threshold. The priority levels are defined in the MSC and
the parameter value in the BSC. The parameter range is 2 to 14. The value 1 is the default
value which disables the pre-emption base classification in all pre-emption attempts.
Table Example of subscriber classification gives an example of a situation where the three
priority levels have been specified in the MSC/HLR and the value of the forced release

priority threshold parameter in the BSC is 2. The Function column states what happens in a
congestion situation.
Class Priority PCI QA PVI Function
level
1

Forced release

Forced handover (primary option)

or forced release (secondary
option)

3-14

No pre-emption capability

Table 1:
Example of subscriber classification
Subscriber class specific statistics
The Market Expansion Toolkit related Traffic Measurement counters are updated according
to the class of the subscriber. There are two counters for each subscriber class.
For more information on counters related to Market Expansion Toolkit, see System impact of
Radio Resource Pre-emption and Queuing.
Fair call duration
In Fair call duration, the call durations are compared when a pre-emption candidate is
selected. The comparison is made between two or more equal pre-emption candidates. The
candidate with the longest call is then selected for pre-emption. If the call is transferred from
one TCH to another, the existing time stamp is also transferred to the new TCH. Figure Time
stamp comparison illustrates the selection process.

Figure 2:
Time stamp comparison
Soft call drop support in BSC
In a soft call drop, the MSC sends a warning tone to the pre-empted user and waits for a short
period before starting the release procedure. Support for soft call drop in the BSC is
implemented by extending the timer that controls pre-emption. This ensures that the BSC
waits long enough for the channel release procedure to be completed. Figure Soft call drop
illustrates how the soft call drop procedure works.

Figure 3:
1.

Soft call drop

The MSC sends an ASSIGNMENT REQUEST message to the BSC for MS 2.

The BSC starts the pre-emption procedure for a lower priority class subscriber (MS 1).
2.
The timer that controls pre-emption is set for 15 seconds.
3. The BSC sends a QUEUING INDICATION message to the MSC for MS 2.
If handover is not possible for MS 1 and forced release is allowed, the BSC sends a
4.
CLEAR REQUEST message to the MSC for MS 1.
The MSC send a warning tone or message to MS 1 and waits until the time set in the
5. timer has been exceeded.
The user is not disconnected immediately, but has time to finish the call properly.
6. The MSC releases the call (MS 1).
7. The MSC sends a CLEAR COMMAND message to the BSC for MS 1.
The BSC clears the call and gives the released TCH to MS 2.
8.
The BSC also resets the timer.
9. The BSC sends a CLEAR COMPLETE message to the MSC (MS 1).
10. The BSC sends a ASSIGNMENT COMPLETE message to the MSC (MS 2).