Patent ID: 8050671

Claim:
A method for determining network growth information for a radio access network (RAN), comprising the steps of: obtaining, for existing components of the RAN, RAN configuration information comprising RAN component configuration information and RAN component connectivity information; obtaining traffic information comprising actual traffic information indicative of actual traffic supported by the RAN and forecast traffic information indicative of forecast traffic forecasted to be supported by the RAN; determining network growth requirements using cross-element capacity analysis wherein changes to capacity requirements of a specific network element are adapted to determine changes to capacity requirements of one or more network elements associated with the specific network element; determining, using the RAN configuration information and the actual traffic information, RAN utilization information comprising information indicative of utilization of existing components of the RAN; and determining, using the RAN utilization information and the traffic information, RAN growth information indicating whether at least one additional RAN component is necessary to support the actual and forecast traffic.