Continuous transformation Situational awareness Boosting service availability Voice optimisation IP data distribution

ATM-grade networks

Leading the way towards the digital sky

ATM relies on available, secure, and timely communications to ensure safe and efficient operations. However, standard enterprise networks are designed for general-purpose connectivity and lack the performance guarantees, resilience, and safety-critical prioritisation required for ATM applications. While IP-based architectures are replacing traditional TDM-based networks, commercial IP networking technologies alone cannot meet ICAO’s strict availability, latency, and security requirements. The challenge for ANSPs is to integrate modern networking technologies without compromising safety, reliability, or service continuity.

To address these challenges, an ATM-grade network layer is required—an intelligent abstraction that enables seamless integration of voice, data, and surveillance applications across diverse network infrastructures. This approach ensures that ATM applications remain independent of transport technology, allowing for gradual migration from TDM to IPv4, IPv6, and beyond. At the same time, it provides resilience against network degradation, intelligent traffic routing, and real-time performance monitoring, ensuring that safety-critical communications meet the highest operational standards.

Frequentis provides a comprehensive suite of ATM-grade network solutions, such as NetBroker, VCX-IP, SDDS-NG, and A-NMS, enabling continuous transformation, real-time situational awareness, and optimised service availability. By implementing proactive performance monitoring, dynamic network adaptation, and intelligent redundancy mechanisms, Frequentis ensures that voice, surveillance, and data communications remain uninterrupted, secure, and future-ready. With these capabilities, ANSPs can confidently modernise their networks while maintaining the high reliability and operational predictability required for ATM services.

Key features

ATM-grade networks provide multiple enhancements for network performance and reliability. Learn more about the typical use cases.

Continuous transformation

The Frequentis approach significantly reduces risk, cost, and potential disruption for ANSPs and airports by removing dependencies between physical and network technologies. It enables elements of the infrastructure to be transitioned to IP technology without impacting the rest of the network. This simplifies the phase-out of legacy technologies and the introduction of new technologies, giving ANSPs complete control over the pace of transformation from legacy to IP.

Situational awareness

ATM networks require real-time visibility and control to ensure uninterrupted voice, data, and surveillance communications. However, fragmented monitoring tools and siloed infrastructures make it difficult to detect, correlate, and resolve issues proactively. Standard network management lacks end-to-end situational awareness, leading to delays in fault resolution and increased operational risks. Frequentis A-NMS provides a centralised umbrella monitoring system, integrating real-time performance tracking, automated fault correlation, and application-aware service monitoring. This ensures full visibility, proactive incident management, and seamless network control across ATM-grade infrastructures.

Boosting service availability

ATM requires 99.999% availability to meet ICAO standards, but commercial networks lack the reliability and performance guarantees needed for safety-critical communications. To bridge this gap, an ATM-grade networking layer ensures deterministic routing, real-time performance monitoring, and seamless failover. Frequentis NetBroker dynamically selects the best available path, while NetBroker Duplicator enables loss-free, delay-free handover, ensuring uninterrupted ATM communications, even in degraded network conditions.

Voice optimisation

ATM voice communications must meet strict latency, reliability, and clarity requirements to ensure seamless coordination between controllers and pilots. However, network delays, jitter, and packet loss can degrade voice quality, especially in hybrid IP and VSAT environments. Standard ED-137 supports up to 255 ms one-way delay compensation, but high-latency links require extended handling. Frequentis VCX-IP enhances ED-137 with delay compensation up to 500 ms, best signal selection, and real-time voice optimisation, ensuring clear, uninterrupted, and echo-free communications across all network conditions.

IP data distribution

The number of voice channels required by an ATM centre can increase, putting pressure on the available bandwidth and radio channels. Through compression and intelligent aggregation of Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP) streams, the Frequentis solution can significantly reduce overall bandwidth consumption. Providing a unified gateway for voice and IP communications, the solution also provides a stepwise migration path from legacy infrastructure.

Manage cookies