Pipeline Profile: Lou Leporace

SCTE member since 2005 Title: Chief Technology Officer, Auspice Corp. Broadband Background: Most recently, Leporace was with Shark Mountain, a broadband consulting firm, but he began his career with NASA. This is appropriate given that Auspice’s technology was designed with the International Space Station in mind. How does Auspice’s solution fit in with a VoIP deployment? VoIP deployments, like any consumer or business service, require a great deal of diligence on the part of the service provider in order to maintain a high level of customer satisfaction. The Auspice solution is what enables the service provider to deploy with confidence. Auspice provides the technology that monitors the VoIP network, pulls in data from a number of sources, and correlates that information in real time to head off problems before they occur, as well as automate the troubleshooting aspects of the deployment. What intrigued you about Auspice’s technology as you made your decision to work there? The technology has its roots in managing the operations of the International Space Station for NASA, which is where I started my career. What intrigued me is the manner in which the technology is applied to MSO network operations. Auspice has a very talented team of engineers who have extended the core of the original technology and developed a set of mission-critical correlation tools for the communications industry. The flexibility, modularity, and extremely quick development time are the qualities that really caught my attention. How will your experience relate? My experience is perfect for this role. I have spent more than a decade in the IP networking industry, followed by a decade working on front-end and back-end services in the MSO/ISP space. I have designed and built services for video communication and other data and entertainment services. I have also spent part of my career in the OSS/BSS space and bring both an operations perspective and a product development point of view to my new position. All in all, my past experiences allow me to bridge the gap between service and development work. What are your near-term and long-term goals in your new role at Auspice? The great news is that Auspice has industry-leading customers such as Comcast and Cox Communications, and those relationships continue to evolve and grow. That kind of validation of our software and services resonates throughout the communications industry and certainly provides the necessary springboard for our future growth. The challenge for Auspice is maintaining the high level of innovation and resolve we’ve already established while moving forward. We need to continue to impress and "wow" our customers, prospects and industry experts with compelling, original solutions. Auspice must also continue to provide quick turn around and the highest level of quality and support of existing products for customers of this stature and size. My near term goals are to grow Auspice engineering so that we in turn can grow our solution set to meet or exceed the demands of this dynamically expanding industry. Longer term I want to lead the company into new geographic and business markets. How would you describe Auspice’s role in a cable network? Auspice helps deliver superior customer experiences through service assurance applications that automate operations support processes. By monitoring and correlating events and data across the entire infrastructure in real time, our software gives greater visibility to the operations team in order to head off issues before they impact the end customer. We’re really the confidence booster for the MSOs and cable service providers. How is the MetaScript language evolving? The primary goal of the TLX MetaScript is to capture business process in a human-readable format, without the need, or cost, of experienced software programmers. Ongoing enhancements to the MetaScript Language (MSL) will allow the MetaScripts to better satisfy this goal. We are further reducing the already short learning curve for MSL writers through additional built-in functionality. Functions such as string manipulation will increase the inherent flexibility of MSL. Macro-like concepts will reduce the complexity of using advanced constructs like command response verification. Organizational elements—i.e., bundles, sequences, and subsequences—are being augmented to allow the MetaScript writers to better leverage the parallel processing capability of TLX. Furthermore, the addition of specific language keywords for debugging will further reduce the MetaScript development costs. What is the place of IT in the cable industry? The IT team manifests itself in the operations end of the business. It’s really where the rubber meets the road. IT is responsible for providing solutions that keep the networks up and running, as well as providing world-class customer service and support. Who do you generally deal with at MSOs, IT people or engineers? Auspice primarily works with the operations teams at the MSOs. In this regard we are dealing with both IT people and engineers. We are tightly engaged with the IT folks responsible for the day-to-day operation of the network and network services. We spend a great deal of our time developing and providing information tools that will assist the operations team in heading off problems before they occur and helping them rapidly resolve issues when they do happen. We also spend time with engineering teams, architecting solutions for next generation services and new network platforms. Will you still have time for racing motorcycles? I will always make time for the passions in my life-and that includes racing. And while the rapid growth and challenges facing the communications industry and Auspice will certainly place a high demand on my time, I’m sure I will manage to make at least a few track dates. Where will you race next? I just returned from the MotoGP at Laguna Seca in California. I am always inspired by excellence in any field, and watching the best racers in the world run a record-setting pace has motivated me to return to this venue to do club racing this summer. I’m really looking forward to it.