Start 

The first circle, Kerala, was launched in March 09 and the other 3 circles were launched 2 months later. More than 500 base stations were built in each circle. With the successful launch of these greenfield circles, the network coverage of Aircel dramatically broadened across India and Aircel became a major PAN India mobile service provider. 

It was a challenge for both Aircel and Huawei to prepare and run the operation in such a short period. The SWAT team from Huawei was quickly mobilized and defined the execution plan with Aircel. They recruited, built up, and trained the operations team, set up the necessary platforms and processes. A well-thought delivery strategy of centralized operation service resulted in an efficient operation team structure, flexible operations tools and eTOM, ITIL based processes. Since its first launch, the network has been running at world-class operation. 

Growing 

Affordable and good quality services for the subscribers have always been the major focus for Aircel. By providing and promoting valued services such as "One touch access for your service", "Search on the go with Pocket Internet", "Open up your world" etc., Aircel continues to attract varied subscribers. With heavy and complicated daily operation and management work, how could Aircel focus on its core services and expand? 

Through Huawei' s centralized operation, Huawei' s end-to-end Managed Services solution has ensured Aircel network's high availability, continuity, and security with its centralized NOC. 

Launched in 2009, the centralized NOC has capabilities of supporting 60,000 sites, which can be easily upgraded to 100,000 sites. Based on the centralized NOC and its intelligent operation support system (iNOC), Huawei integrates and manages the field maintenance team, with the good provision of service to Aircel. Besides, Huawei NOC delivers Managed Services to Aircel through 7 major eTOM and ITIL based processes. All these processes form the standardized operation of Aircel network, and guarantee operational efficiency. Synergized with different teams and different projects, remarkable OPEX reduction becomes a reality. 

Micro-wave transmission was the peculiarity of the Indian network. Aircel also made a lot of changes to network topology and planning, which caused difficulties for future maintenance. The team at NOC conducts operation performance reviews internally & externally (along with Aircel) to identify unreached areas and get them corrected. For better SLA management, iNOC has automated the processes such as fault management, performance management, etc.. All of these result in a well-organized and high quality network, and therefore bring in more and more subscribers with satisfaction. 

At the same time, managers from Aircel can easily access iNOC through the Internet, to extract or view reports and other information about the network with their accounts. Mallikarjun Rao, Chief Network & Engineering Operations, was happy to say, " I was accessing the Huawei NOC from my office today and I must compliment the efforts you have put in getting the information related to our 4 circle network on my Finger tips. It was one shot & I was able to get all the information I wanted. Thanks for the good work and please keep it up." 

Till today, Aircel has been involved in the business of 18 circles; and continues to launch new services to attract more subscribers, such as "1 paise per second", or,"unlimited data @ Rs 99 per month". With over 25 million happy customers in the country, Aircel is a full-fledged national operator.

With a population of over 1.1 billion, India has become one of the most dynamic and promising telecom markets in the world.

Aircel, a pioneer for mobile services in India, planned to enlarge its footprint with aggressive timelines. Compared with the bursting of India mobile market, Aircel only had its footprint in 10 out of 23 circles in 2008. In order to improve its market share and provide high quality service to the subscribers, Aircel was to make its presence in the greenfield circles.

Huawei, regarded as a responsive and professional partner, was chosen to provide the equipment and Managed Services of its GSM network in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, and also Maharashtra & Goa. Huawei offered to handle this project on turn key basis with more than 7,000 BTS sites and also 3-year Managed Services, using Huawei centralized Network Operation Center (NOC).