Fast Engset computation

Abstract

The blocking probability of a finite-source bufferless queue is a fixed point of the Engset formula, for which we prove existence and uniqueness. Numerically, the literature suggests a fixed point iteration. We show that such an iteration can fail to converge and is dominated by a simple Newton's method, for which we prove a global convergence result. The analysis yields a new Turán-type inequality involving hypergeometric functions, which is of independent interest.