| The eye-catching 2001 Shanghai APEC Summit has
successfully fulfilled its historic mission. As a major telecom
guarantee unit, Shanghai Telecom assumed extremely onerous communications
guarantee task, which posed unprecedented requirements no matter
in terms of scale, technology, security or service. Through over
one year of hard efforts, under the guidance of China Telecom Group,
APEC Preparatory Office, Shanghai Municipal Informatization Office
and Telecommunications Administration Bureau and supported by all
concerned parties, Shanghai Telecom ultimately smoothly wrapped
up the task and got high remarks from leaders at all levels, APEC
Organizing Committee, participating delegations and all concerned
parties of the public.
As praised by Municipal Party Secretary Huang Ju and Mayor Xu
Kuangdi, Shanghai Telecom contributed effectively to the success
of APEC Summit through its guaranteed excellent telecom service.
Minister of Information Industry Wu Jichuan showed his satisfaction
with Shanghai Telecom's telecom guarantee work and network operating
performance during the APEC Summit, saying, "you have opened
an express line for the APEC meeting".
President of China Telecom Group Zhou Deqiang fully acknowledged
the solidarity, diligence and fast response exhibited by the staff
of Shanghai Telecom during the event, and expressed his ardent wish
for them to extend the spirit into their future work.
APEC Organizing Committee complimented that Shanghai Telecom
"provided timely service for both Chinese and overseas media".
Mr. Fan Xiping, Director of Shanghai Municipal Informatization
Office, said that Shanghai Telecom demonstrated its irreplaceable
role through its guarantee of telecom services for the APEC Summit,
and "now we have a deeper understanding of Shanghai Telecom."
The media also spoke highly: Shanghai Telecom showed the utmost
fortitude in guaranteeing the sound operation of telecom network
during the APEC event. Not only has it provided unprecedented quality
image transmission system for 28 home and overseas TV media, but
also managed a secure and stable network in the whole meeting period,
notwithstanding the immense traffic flow that ran across the network.
This is what Shanghai should take pride in.
Compliments from leaders and social sectors are the best prize
Shanghai Telecom received for its effort in serving the APEC Summit.
At the same time, the glory also urged us to look back on the whole
process and sum up lessons for an in-depth analysis and for further
successes.
1. All-dimensional service provision reflected the flagship
status of China Telecom in the industry.
Faced with such a hefty communications guarantee job, executives
of the company realized that besides a significant political task,
it also serves as a favorable opportunity for us to demonstrate
the power and service philosophy of China Telecom to home and overseas
friends. To that end, Shanghai Telecom established the guideline
of "striking a tight coordination, ensuring a sound implementation
of measures, emphasizing security and working in collaboration to
create a commendable image". The priority was given to the
provision of extensive services so as to highlight the status and
role of China Telecom in the industry.
The APEC communications guarantee task of Shanghai Telecom underwent
three stages: planning, project construction and guarantee/implementation.
Voice, data, video and monitoring were determined as four framework
categories (including 12 projects) calling for communications guarantee.
Specifically, services offered to delegations, correspondent and
meeting organizers included local/DDD/IDD calls, TV image transmission,
82001 call center, CDPD wireless data transmission, APEC official
website mirror, IDC server hosting, hotel broadband multimedia applications,
ATM high-speed WAN, ADSL high-speed access and wireless LAN access,
video conferencing, APEC centralized monitoring system, graphic
data transmission, etc. Meanwhile, as the operating unit of the
basic network, the company also provided part of the transmission
channels for other operators, thus forging a sound guarantee for
high-quality communications services.
TV transmission is a key point of the communications guarantee
task. We provided transmission service to China's CCTV, Japan's
NTV, TBS, TV ASAHI, FUJI, TV TOKOY, Hong Kong's CABLE TV and Reuters.
Our satellite broadcast service has set multiple records since the
satellite earth station was established: the longest signal sending
time (7031 minutes), the greatest number of TV channels (286 channels),
the longest duration of TV transmission (eight days and nights consecutively),
the maximal number of users in simultaneous transmission (18 channels)
and the shortest emergency response time (commissioning and provisioning
in 5 minutes).
An attraction point of our service in the summit is "82001",
an APEC special service number dubbed as "APEC Hotline".
It incorporated features like meeting schedule query, telecom service
query, complaint handling, daily service guide and secretary service.
100 duty seats were set up, which were capable of answering questions
in both Chinese and English. During the summit, more than 30,000
calls were received, with the peak time topping 7,000 calls and
each serviceperson answering 245 calls on average per day. As a
new value-added telecom service, "82001" with its originality,
functionality and personality has got wide attention from the public
and was broadly applauded. As Secretary Huang Ju stated, "the
"820001" service hotline offered by Shanghai Telecom is
pretty good, you should enhance your publicity efforts." Mayor
Xu Kuangdi also said with delight that "this very service is
very good and you should keep it. I recommend this Guo Li Mansion
be renamed APEC Mansion to commemorate this APEC Summit." China
Telecom President Zhou Deqiang after inspection also showed his
appreciation: 82001 Call Center is an innovation of information
service. Meanwhile, the public media gave full concern to the service
model of "82001". 26 news bodies and more than 50 dotcoms,
including CCTV and People's Daily, covered the 82001 story.
In this special task, Shanghai Telecom provided in total 2,540
telephone lines, more than 50 private lines for government and media
use, 72 fiber cores, 982 ADSL ports and 107 ISDN ports. 13 sets
of satellite antennas were employed (including 5 emergency sets
and 10 leased satellites), TV signal transmission amounted to 355
times with an overall transmission length of 8,716 minutes. All
the 150 news booths were provided with 8 information points (4 Internet
jackets and 4 phone jackets). 400 terminals were installed in the
1000-squaremeter media office hall.
Such a quality service was broadly cheered by meeting organizers,
delegates and correspondents. An executive from CCTV commended that
the support delivered by Shanghai Telecom was of high efficiency
and high quality. He added that CCTV enjoyed top-notch telecom services
this time and expected to cooperate with Shanghai Telecom next time.
Admitted Mr. Tian Huiming, Deputy Chief Editor of China News Service,
"I attended eight APEC meetings in Seattle, Osaka, Kuala Lumpur,
Auckland, Brunei and so on. I must say this APEC meeting is the
best, especially the guaranteed telecom service. You may never expect
a Press Center of such state-of-the-art facilities and technical
services".
2. Advanced telecom service guarantee reflected China Telecom's
technical level.
In this APEC Summit, leading-edge communications technologies
like ATM, IP, ADSL, FTTB/LAN, Wireless LAN, Call Center, fiber communications
and large-capacity mobile integrated service satellite were all
employed for transmission of voice, data or video signals. All this
is an epitome of China Telecom's technical strength.
Voice Part. We installed standalone exchanges in the Press Center
that were equipped with PSTN/ISDN interfaces to provide such services
as international switching, toll switching, local hubbing and local
switching. The international switching capacity reached 30,000 circuit
ports, and the toll switching capacity amounted to 126,000 circuit
ports.
Data Part. Six projects were implemented, including ATM WANs
between meeting venues, ADSL high-speed access, CDPD Wireless Data
Communications Network, APEC mirror site, Internet Data Center (IDC)
service and broadband information service. The ATM WAN offers multiple
service interfaces for ATM access, FR access, circuit emulation
access, LAN access, totaling 8 broadband core nodes and 97 edge
nodes throughout the network. DSL featured voice, DVB, VOD, high-speed
Internet access and IP applications, with the capacity totaling
150,000 lines. 60 lines of ADSL access capability were provided
to the 27 APEC designated hotels. CDPD Wireless Data Communications
Network was able to provide GPS service to the public and SMS service
to APEC meetings. The APEC mirror website was able to post contents
in synchronization with APEC official website. IDC could provide
service features like private line access, complete PC rent and
virtual host. Apart from rich broadband contents offered to hotels,
Shanghai Telecom also opened up a special space on the Shanghai
Hotline website to provide APEC related meeting information, electronic
Shanghai map, folk life in Shanghai, current affairs, movie/TV entertainment
and MVs.
Video Part. Services included C-band satellite TV transmission,
international satellite earth station TV transmission and video
conferencing. In addition to the capability of simultaneous transmission
of six and two channels of two-way TV signals by the existing international
and national satellite earth stations, nine more channels have been
added for international satellite transmission to provide more than
14 channels of simultaneous analog and digital two-way TV information
delivery to 12 home and overseas satellites and send video signals
all over the world. At the same time, a broadband video conferencing
system was set up at the main Press Center and other relevant venues.
The all-dimensional communications guarantee system coupled
with cutting-edge technologies have flied its colors in this APEC
Summit. Mexico is the host country for next year's APEC Summit.
At closing the Mexican delegation asked us to keep the broadband
LAN of the Press Center for one more month to allow them time to
arrange an inspection tour for their technical staff so as to make
a neat preparation for the next APEC Summit.
3. Reliable security represented China Telecom's sense of political
responsibility.
Given the importance of the APEC Summit, we placed our highest
concern on the network security aspect by setting up a multi-approach,
multi-alternative-route and multi-tiered guarantee system, thus
greatly improving the security level of information flow and ensuring
a perfectly safe communications process.
First, a Communications Guarantee Steering Center headed by
General Manager Cheng Xiyuan was established in line with the A-level
guarantee system as contained in the network management theory.
Seven teams were formed to respond to different guarantee targets,
which were Head of State Communications Guarantee, Press Communications
Guarantee, Venue Communications Guarantee, Emergency Communications
Guarantee, Hotel Communications Guarantee, Integrated Service Guarantee
and Logistics Support Guarantee. Responsibilities were identified
and implemented down to the grassroot. During the guarantee period,
General Manager Cheng Xiyuan and Deputy General Managers Zhang Weihua
and Tong Ling themselves filled the monitoring position in the steering
center. All departments charged with guarantee jobs signed a writ
to show their commitments to serving the APEC Summit with their
No. 1 heads assuming full responsibilities for the jobs they were
respectively assigned.
Second, network security was guaranteed in different forms at
different levels. For example, cable backup was adopted as alternative
for cable and wireless facilities. Different networks were configured
to support each other. Dual Node redundant equipment was installed
at key venues. Two-way voice channel reception was put into use.
Regarding submarine fiber communications, several alternative solutions
were prepared in case of need.
In particular, we are much concerned about those crucial components
of the APEC meeting. For example, the Certification Center served
as the pivotal security guarantee site, the normal operation of
which directly hinged on the safety and order of the summit. Bearing
this in mind, we provided as many as four alternative transmission
schemes and closely collaborated with the local public security
bureau to ensure the seamless and error-free operation of the Certification
Center. Down the transmission route, a total of 4,578 people times
were allocated to closely watch and safeguard each and every wired
well.
Third, a tight emergency plan was drawn up. Emergency handling
plans were put made for all possible conditions, such as APEC Hotline,
International Internet outlets, high-speed Internet access at the
Press Center and the MIS system at the APEC Preparatory Office.
All the plans were maneuvered three times prior to the implementation
of real guarantee work, with altogether eleven items rehearsed.
The Municipal Informatization Office and Telecom Administration
Bureau also designed special simulated situations to check the feasibility
of the emergency plan. It was proved that the rehearsal did play
its role in getting people acquainted with possible accidents. For
example, during the summit, the APEC mirror site recorded 330,000
visits in total and suffered 295,000 malicious attacks. Thanks to
the appropriate safeguarding efforts, hacker invasions were resisted
effectively.
Fourth, a joint guarantee system was put into shape. Submarine
cables were seen as the weak points in the guarantee work. The APEC
Summit coincided with the high autumn fishing season. To ensure
safe communications and under the coordination of the municipal
government, we cooperated with marine regulatory and fishery administrative
departments in Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai to wage a cable protection
combat that involved 36 boats and round-the-clock watch keeping.
Fighting furious waves on the unbounded sea in resolute will, our
staff expelled 1,457 fishing rule-violating boats and contributed
in a tacit way to the safe communications of the APEC Summit.
Fifth, a monitoring center for guarantee of APEC communications
was set up to undertake round-the-clock real-time supervision, which
included supervision of traffic flowing in exchanges that were installed
in all meeting venues and key hotels; supervision on TV signals;
supervision on the running of 82001 equipment; supervision on the
traffic of the Shanghai Internet node; supervision on the traffic
of the APEC mirror site on Shanghai Hotline; supervision on the
status of the CDPD equipment; supervision on the status of the ADSL
equipment and supervision on the status of the ATM equipment. In
that way a monitoring platform was in shape to exert an overall
control of the guarantee system. Once unusual conditions emerged,
the monitoring center could report to competent bodies while keeping
an eye on the handling of the problem.
Sixth, a failure removal effort was initiated across the network.
As early as half a year ago, the whole network underwent a scrutiny
and separate parts of the system were given a joint adjustment.
From October 12 through 22, the whole network was locked, with all
the work in relation to civil construction, local data revision
or exchange software upgrading being halted. Machine rooms were
open only to a limited number of staff, and the communications building
was put under strict guarding. According to statistics of the NM
center, the failure occurrence rate of the whole network dropped
to a new low during the APEC Summit.
4. The corporate spirit was carried forward, exhibiting to the
public the creditable corporate image of China Telecom.
"Wholeheartedly respect customer concerns" is the
service philosophy of China Telecom, which has been fully reflected
in this APEC communications guarantee task. The staff of Shanghai
Telecom delivered a perfect interpretation of this philosophy through
their sincere innovative spirit, synergic teamwork ethos, altruistic
dedication and perseverance.
a. Sincere innovative spirit
It is proved that the APEC communications guarantee plan was
successful. It resulted from the sincere, scientific and innovative
spirit of Shanghai Telecom and the intelligent work of its staff.
This April, we invited the expert team from renowned AT&T as
special consultant to evaluate the plan, which used to take on communications
guarantee work for such events as Sydney Olympics and G7 Summit.
They left the following remarks: Shanghai Telecom's communications
infrastructure is capable of satisfying the requirements of events
of such scale and prestige. The diversified products and services
it offered are rich enough for use by international customers.
b. Synergic teamwork ethos
The efficiency and quality of the APEC guarantee work arose
from the power of teamwork. During the meeting period, all relevant
departments vied for hard work and took initiatives to fill in blanks.
With fast response from all parties, the communications guarantee
work went fairly smooth, forming a favorable "resultant force".
For example, while providing unilateral injection for CCTV, we found
that they were asking for 20 rather than the planned 5 pairs. Although
the nearest node lay 1 km away, still our staff tried every best
to satisfy CCTV's requirements in the shortest time.
The overall synergy was also reflected between local telcos.
We proactively provided quality infrastructure for other telcos.
For example, in spite of limited resource, time and manpower, we
managed to deploy a large number of circuits for Shanghai Mobile
to improve its coverage. Also we backed Shanghai Netcom in providing
emergency fiber cables for its wireless Internet service. The aggregation
of leading local telcos rendered unprecedented convenience for APEC
guests to communicate with each other.
c. Altruistic dedication
After Shanghai Telecom was transformed into a corporation, economic
benefit should become its first priority. However, faced with a
communications guarantee task like the APEC case, the national and
social interests must override all. During the summit, we complied
with requirements of the municipal government to provide free high-speed
Internet access, wireless Internet, 82001 hotline and ADSL broadband
access services. The over 3,000 correspondents at the Press Center
largely relied on our high-speed Internet service, which facilitated
the transmission of massive news releases and graphics. As a side
effect, our fax revenue was downsized for lack of bandwidth. But
we were equally happy: just think about what convenience we brought
about for our hardworking correspondents!
d. Diligence and perseverance
During the summit, more than 1,500 Shanghai Telecom staff strove
at the forefront. Some had to stay on shift from day to night, only
with two or three hours for a nap. So our people were fighting not
only the challenging work but also sleepiness and fatigue. For example,
the Garden Hotel where the Japanese delegation stayed required us
to provide 138 telephone lines before 10:00 a.m. October 16. However,
the ballroom there was occupied by a wedding banquet and thus not
available until 12:00 p.m. October 15. The staff of the Special
Use Office worked late into night and up through 5:00 next morning.
By then there was only three hours away from their next task, so
the fellows spent the time in sofas and soon rushed to the next
venue with full enthusiasm. While referring to this episode, Secretary
General of the municipal government commended that "you are
like a dagger, able to fix problems wherever you are stuck in".
APEC Summit drew to a close, but the impact it generated is far-reaching.
Success not only left us joy but also thoughts toward future.
Thought 1: Well-preparedness doubles the chance of victory.
Obscure customer demand is a characteristic of big events. It
was also a crux of this communications guarantee task. To our pleasure,
despite the changing customer demand in the whole guarantee process,
all requirements got satisfied.
This was in part attributable to the early planning work for
communications services. Were it not for the tremendous informatization
effort propelled by high-tech, were it not for the promotion of
the Optical Shanghai strategy and the construction of a broadband
platform, and were it not for the establishment of Pu Dong Special
Use Office and the introduction of emergency satellite facilities,
it would have been extremely difficult to fulfill such an arduous
communications guarantee task.
This was also attributable to the early launch and implementation
of work. At the very beginning of this year, network security upgrading
was performed for 13 switching projects, 10 transmission projects,
10 line projects and 9 power supply projects, laying a solid foundation
for the safe operation of the backbone network during the summit
period. Another example is Pu Dong Telecom Office that is located
at the main meeting venue of APEC Summit. In early June, the office
already wrapped up the commissioning of 3,000 telephone exchanges,
500 ISDN lines and 648 ADSL racks installed at the Press Center,
and laid 2,400 copper wires at Jin Mao Mansion.
Thought 2: For protection of submarine cables, a new way must
be explored as soon as possible.
The security of submarine cables has always been a weak point
in communications guarantee work. During this APEC Summit, Shanghai
Telecom joined hands with competent departments in Zhejiang, Jiangsu
and Shanghai and sent out cruising boats in storming waters to protect
submarine cables. Really we were moved by the devotion of our "bay
watch" staff, but what is more thought-provoking is the rationality
of this primitive cable protection model. The "People Fighting
Sea" scenario could only serve as a stopgap means, and combined
cross-department cooperation may only work in case of important
political task and under proactive coordination of competent government
bodies. So this could not attack for good the problem of daily maintenance.
We suggest that telcos get support from regulatory administrations
and come to a consensus in terms of responsibilities and obligations.
In this context, advanced submarine cable protection techniques
(e.g., deep-burial) may be utilized to explore a whole new way in
this respect. Only by doing so can this headache be ultimately cured.
Thought 3: The APEC guarantee task pointed to the right direction
for integrated communications services.
The success of APEC communications guarantee also opened up
a new market horizon for Shanghai Telecom to develop integrated
communications services.
Going through the tests of the Eighth National Games and the
APEC summit, Shanghai Telecom has accumulated rich experiences in
providing guaranteed communications services for big events. As
far as the current network capacity and service capability are concerned,
China Telecom compared to its rivals possesses an irreplaceable
advantage in offering communications guarantee for big events. With
China's further open-up and Shanghai's accelerated pace into an
international metropolis, more and more international events or
conferences will be held in China and in Shanghai. This implies
a scare business opportunity for the China Telecom, which has been
just put into fully commercial operation. Also huge potential abounds
in this market. With the improvement of technical command and the
further standardization of the market, we will study the business
model of providing communications guarantee for big events, and
push it to the public as a flagship communications product of Shanghai
Telecom.
Thought 4: The work enthusiasm gushed in the APEC communications
guarantee task will become a new driving force for Shanghai Telecom.
The curtain of APEC Summit was drawn, but the spirit oozing
out of the entire guarantee process will become our common wealth.
The spirit represents solidarity, perseverance, harmony, innovation,
synergy and win-win. We must solidify the spirit and carry it forward
to our future work. This is an important mission left by APEC Summit,
and also a great opportunity for the company to leap forward. We
will further study how to inherit and bring forward the spirit and
combine it with the building of the corporate culture to make it
a new driving force for Shanghai Telecom to march ahead.
The APEC communications guarantee task was successfully fulfilled.
Looking back on the one-year preparation and implementation of the
guarantee efforts, we should say that all the achievements were
attributable to the hard work of Shanghai Telecom staff, to the
warm concerns and guidance of senior leaders and to the concerted
help from our sister telcos, CCTV, the public security bureau and
meeting venues. We will earnestly carry forward the philosophy of
" Wholeheartedly respect customer concerns", and regard
the success of APEC guarantee as a spur and incentive for us to
be united and proactive in striving to provide better telecom services
for Shanghai's informatization drive and for the Shanghai people.
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