SAM, ATDI Unique Solution for 2D and 3D Mapping of Radiocommunications Networks

As competition rages in the telecommunications market, especially as deregulation hits the local loop in France, the relevance of the geomarketing data needed by operators as the basis on which to deploy their networks is becoming a high priority strategic issue.

Paris, January 29, 2001

ATDI, the French leader in radiocommunication network planning and management software, is releasing the first global high-definition mapping solution specially designed for telecom operators. A truly comprehensive tool for modeling and managing telecommunications services, SAM (Subscriber Access Management) offers a highly reliable and appropriate solution with which operators can detail their business plans, limit the need for exploratory visits in the field and minimize the cost of signing up and connecting subscribers to their networks.

As virtually the sole supplier of network planning software to local loop operators in France, ATDI has doted SAM with all its technological expertise in mapping and designing radio networks. Designed to meet each of the specific requirements that are particularly critical during the network deployment phase, SAM is built around three components: SAM/3D, SAM/View and SAM/Address.

SAM/3D is a high-resolution 3D mapping tool. Based on the use of high-precision aerial photography, SAM/3D provides information on terrain topology (altitude, lay of the land, etc.) as well as on the various buildings in a town or city, providing their location and height with a precision in the order of two meters. This information, essential when designing a radio network, can be used, among other applications, to identify any obstacles whose presence may interfere with the propagation of electromagnetic waves and therefore impact the level of coverage provided by a network in a given area.

SAM/View proposes aerial photographs transformed using sophisticated algorithms to cancel out the effects of perspective and distortion caused by the camera's optical properties. These photographs are then "set" in the SAM/3D module to ensure a perfect correlation between the three-dimensional shape of the terrain and the picture itself. SAM/View thus provides an excellent visualization of a town or city and lets you analyze - beforehand - any difficulties likely to arise when deploying the network by visually identifying the main obstacles, the age and type of buildings, the condition of terraces on buildings, the configuration of streets, etc. All of this information is essential when it comes to installing radio antennae or when laying out the route of a fiber optic network. The views provided by SAM/View offer one-meter definition and are rectified in terms of building façades, unlike many competing solutions on the market.

SAM/Address is a module that provides precise geomarketing data obtained from land survey maps; it loads databases that set up the link between postal addresses and geographic locations. The purpose of SAM/Address is to generate a list of potential customers located on a digital geographic map and to analyze and adjust network coverage in relation to these customers, as well as to better target those points actually covered. All of this will be achieved with a level of precision never before reached by the databases used normally, such as those that equip road navigation assistance systems.

"Specifically developed for telecommunications, SAM provides all the tools required for managing access to a subscriber while guaranteeing the best quality localization and environment modeling" stresses David Missud, ATDI's Managing Director. "A complete solution, SAM has natural applications in technologies as varied as the local radio loop, digital TV, cable networks and of course the forthcoming UMTS third generation mobile telephone networks."