ctor for better business and improved customer satisfaction and loyalty. The configuration and performance data can give information on the element utilization. Configuration parameters directly give the time the element was out of service, maximum load the element can handle, and SO on and the per- formance data complements the configuration data in identifying utilization and performance matrix of the network element. This would help in resource planning for a network offering a service. Optimal configurations can be determined over time that would best suit the customer and meet the level of service assurance. Service assurance does not always mean a set of measures taken by the ser- vice provider to keep a customer happy. Assurance is to make sure that both EMS Functions customer and service provider meets the terms and conditions specified in the service level agreement. In cases where the customer is deviating from the SLA, the service provider notifies the customer and takes corrective actions. A typical example where EMS functionality comes into play is for implementing security. The actions performed by the customer can be collected as security logs or using an event engine that listens for occur- rence of a specific event and generates a report when an event occurs. When the customer performs an action that results in security violation, the cus- tomer service can be temporarily or permanently disconnected based on the SLA. To ensure a good quality of service that is essential for service assurance, there is a requirement to monitor network fault, performance, and utilization parameters to preempt any degradation in service quality. The role of fault, performance, and utilization parameters on service assurance has already been discussed earlier but a collective role of these functions is to ensure good QoS. There are multiple service assurance solutions available in the telecom market that mainly provides overall network monitoring, handling of trouble, and isolation of issues. Service assurance is clo