A Comprehensive Guide For Broadband Network Management

Most individuals nowadays connect to the Internet via a high-speed or broadband connection. A broadband connection allows the transfer of information by everyone, be it ordinary customers or corporations. According to Cisco, over two-thirds of the worldwide population will have Internet access by 2023, and machine-to-machine (M2M) connectivity will increase by 34% to 14.7 billion.

In today’s digital age, a robust and reliable broadband network is the backbone of communication and connectivity. Whether for personal use or business operations, the demand for high-speed internet continues to grow. With this surge in demand comes the necessity for efficient broadband network management and that’s where broadband management solutions come into the picture. This comprehensive guide aims to explore the key aspects of broadband network management, providing insights into its importance, challenges, and more.

What Is a Broadband Network?

A broadband system consists of a network of interconnected hardware and software to fulfil the rising communication needs of every organization, brand, and person on the planet. Broadband networks rely on high-capacity transmission technology to send data, audio, and video over vast distances at rapid speeds. It is named “broadband” as it sends data across a large frequency band, typically concurrently, allowing more information to be delivered. 

What exactly is Broadband Network Management (BNM)?

Today’s communication infrastructure consists of networks within networks. There’s the Local Area Network (LAN), the Wireless LAN (WLAN), the Wide Area Network (WAN), the Storage Area Network (SAN), the Virtual Private Network (VPN), and more. Most manage data traffic for a certain purpose or geographic area covered by the network, such as storage devices, servers, computers, routers, and more. 

LANs, for example, often manage traffic for computers and low-voltage devices over a short distance, such as a single office site. A WLAN does the same function but does not require physical network connections. IoT devices may be part of a local WLAN and are linked to their home base via a WAN through the Internet. To manage such a huge network, network managers often broadband management solutions available in the market. 

How Broadband Network Management Can Assist

A broadband network management system (BNMS) can provide an organization with technical, business, and productivity benefits together with network administration efficiencies. Many BNMS products include standard and customized reporting to assist IT workers in developing a network strategy. These reports are used to forecast growth, track device performance and lifespan, and various other things. The real-time monitoring and alerting functions assist in identifying flaws in the broadband network before they become a problem. 

Here are some more reasons why BNMS is beneficial for large networks:

• Management of bandwidth

A BNMS’s automatic bandwidth management features can assist in shaping network traffic to benefit from consumption trends and device availability. Automation will be one of the few ways broadband network managements can be done at the speed and volume these devices demand, as the number of machine-to-machine connections is forecasted to make up at least half of all globally connected devices online in 2023. 

• Tracking Assets

Since many of the devices in a broadband network are out of the IT team’s reach, 

keeping track of all the assets in a broadband network could be challenging. A BNMS makes it simple to track and monitor devices so that IT staff members are well aware of them. Depending on usage, organization size, and budget, it can be scaled up or down, because staff employees have a thorough knowledge of the network, its capacity, utilization, and other aspects. 

Drawbacks

Sometimes, broadband products used for monitoring and management of the network can also prove to be counter-productive. For instance, BNMS can result in bandwidth throttling and negatively impact network performance. 

IT staff should monitor automated security or behavioral analytics tools closely to ensure they’re not blocking legitimate traffic or usage. 

Last but not least, the rise in the use of P2P applications like content delivery networks and cloud computing can prove to be challenging when it comes to managing broadband networks. If not managed properly, they can negatively impact the broadband network. 

Conclusion

Broadband networks must develop to keep up with the rapid growth in number of Internet-connected devices. One example of a new technology that may soon change the landscape is 5G, in addition to edge computing and satellite connection. Maintaining the internet’s connectivity in a broadband environment that is constantly changing will fall to network engineers and IT specialists. Broadband management solutions will be crucial and may even be the only option to do that effectively, trust the experts to navigate you through the evolving broadband connectivity.