As you may know, in 2020, the U.S. Congress passed the Secure and Trusted Communications Network Act to safeguard its telecommunications networks from certain foreign ‘untrusted’ players. It allocated $1.9 billion under the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) ‘Rip & Replace’ program to address the growing concerns over cybersecurity and the increasing number of data breaches. The program aims at compensating carriers for costs incurred to remove, replace, and dispose of communications equipment and services in their networks that pose a national security risk. It requires them to ‘rip’ equipment from untrusted vendors from their networks and ‘replace’ it with trusted equipment. The FCC program is open to any “advanced communications service provider (CSP) with 10 million or fewer customers.”

Manage Network Security & Modernization without Disruption

As a CSP, you know security is paramount. Your most significant and foremost directive is to provide your customers with a secure, scalable, and reliable network that is agile and user-friendly to meet the ever-changing and evolving digital landscape. You have to ensure networks are resilient and profitable, providing the flexibility to work with a mix of vendors and creating cost savings in the long run. Additionally, you are concerned with how to dispense and replace any untrusted and unsecured equipment that could compromise the core attributes of your network.

Keeping up with the demands of digital transformation and staying on top of your game while ensuring employee safety and protecting your network from security threats are some of the tough challenges that organizations face today. Whether you are facing a network upgrade, either because of ‘untrusted’ equipment or other business and technology challenges, you require system integration partners to step in and help you sail smoothly through this transition.

Rip, Replace & Upgrade Without Compromising Network Performance or Customer Experience

Here are a few guiding principles to keep in mind when replacing or upgrading your network. These will give you a competitive edge and ensure all elements of your network infrastructure conform to industry and national regulatory standards.

• Make security your numero uno priority. Security threats like malware, viruses, trojan horses, phishing, worms, spyware, adware, Wi-Fi attacks, and so many more are the order of the day today. Take cognizance of these and do vulnerability assessments to identify threats and take proactive measures to address them. Leverage specialists help to improve your network’s level of protection.
• Future-proof your network with next-gen technologies like 5G to meet the ever-evolving needs of your customers. Don’t just focus on short-term requirements. Look at the bigger picture. Think and plan ahead. Be future-ready to match consumer expectations for secure and resilient communications to stay competitive and cost-effective.
• Monitor your KPIs. Do continual performance analytics to track and monitor your KPIs and stacks to ensure resilient, reliable service. These help in quick issue detection and faster mean time to resolution while also saving costs and time.
• Choose a vendor-agnostic system integration partner. Network architectures are evolving and rapidly demanding manufacturer-independent, standards-based, and interoperable network elements and systems. These bring in more players, resulting in more options and reduced costs for the CSPs. So, choose a SI partner with the experience and expertise to bring home all these advantages to you while also helping you meet your business objectives.

Finally

The challenges of implementing the FCC’s ‘Rip & Replace’ program also highlights the issues facing all CSPs today, whether to rip and replace or upgrade. And every challenge brings with it opportunities. Rip & Replace presents the perfect opportunity to bridge the technology skill gaps and build the foundation of a better, more secure, adaptable, and more sustainable telco system. It presents the CSPs with a unique opportunity to form a fruitful alliance with an experienced SI partner who can help them quickly, smoothly, and cost-effectively transition with the latest technology trends.

The Amantya Advantage

Amantya believes the effective transition of vulnerable or legacy network infrastructure requires a comprehensive and cost-effective solution with a trusted partner experienced in end-to-end network deployments. We understand the impact and challenges of such transitions, especially for small service operators, and how they can significantly benefit from a vendor that can help them overcome these challenges with innovative and futuristic solutions. We help carriers re-invest and replace their unsecured and legacy systems with modern solutions that are secure and future-ready with the ability to support 5G and beyond.

We offer trusted and secure 4G/5G solutions to help network operators address the FCC’s ‘Rip and Replace’ requirements quickly and effectively at a much lower cost to help carriers save significant upfront CAPEX. Our easy-to-deploy solutions help replace existing unsecured network equipment and services and upgrade legacy networks while ensuring efficient decommissioning & migration of network elements.

With prior experience working with leading global Tier 1 MNOs, we ensure a highly reliable, future-proof, and secure network transition without hampering the customer’s user experience.

Upgrading your existing network infrastructure in response to FCC’s Rip & Replace program? Or want to migrate from 2G/3G to next-gen 4G/5G? Our team collectively has decades of carrier experience and offers turnkey custom network upgrade solutions. Get in touch with us today