no 1/2012 [14] The Magazine of Comarch Telecommunications Business Unit
www.comarch.com
In this issue: In focus: Customer experience From the core of the network to the customer Infrastructure sharing – ServCo vs. NetCo – the competition shift
Beyond BSS/OSS OSS/BSS integration – the building block of the era of “big data” Challenges and opportunities of multi-market transformations Enhancement of roaming call back user experience
6
Hot In focus: topic:customer Aiming for experience Perfect Customer Experience
From the core of the network to the customer HOW OSS ENSURES A SEAMLESS CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
recent Stratecast survey of more than 120 Communication Service Provider (CSP) executives, worldwide, reveals that 91% believe their “business must be fundamentally or substantially transformed to remain competitive in the future.”
A
Fulfillment, from product definition to delivery Assurance, from the customer to the core of the network End-to-end network upgrade
Nancee Ruzicka
Stratecast (a Division of Frost & Sullivan)
Director OSS/BSS Strategy
The need for customer focus is resonating with CSPs as they reinvent themselves as retailers, rather than capacity plumbers. Customers want a one-stop shop; they want reliable products that are delivered quickly and easily. By defining processes as the customer sees them rather than what is convenient for the business or what has been used in the past, CSPs can retain their status as trusted providers and take advantage of the brand recognition they have worked so hard to establish. The transformation underway in the communications industry means that CSPs will compete to deliver products and quality, not connectivity. Networks have always been deployed based on customer demand, and as the volume and variety of infrastructure increases, the factors driving CSPs to invest have not changed. What has changed is the need for CSPs to differentiate themselves based on the quality of the multitude of products and services being delivered, while at the same time becoming competitive retailers that are relentless about customer satisfaction. The challenges are many and this report will focus on four key OSS functions that, when focused on the customer, deliver CSP differentiation while controlling costs:
Dynamic capacity management using self-organizing networks (SON)
While CSPs rotate their businesses to focus on customers, they must also horizontally align OSS/BSS to work consistently across the business and support multiple products, services, customers and partners.
GOAL #1: EXCELLENT CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE CSPs are trying hard to focus on the customer experience. That requires a radical shift in thinking about the way that products are defined, created, delivered, billed for and supported. The connections, the devices, the features and applications, as well as billing and customer support functions must be simple, straightforward and of the highest possible quality. In order to monetize existing investments in infrastructure and OSS/BSS, operations must be responsive and reliable, while access to OSS/BSS by partners and customers must be seamless and automated.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
In focus: customer experience
7
Figure 1. Customer experience requirements. Source: Stratecast
Customers will buy based on device and application choice rather than network loyalty, and they will be driven away by inadequate offerings, inflexible product and pricing plans, inaccurate activation, poor performance and incompetent support. CSPs will differentiate themselves by understanding customer needs and accurately translating those needs into OSS and network infrastructure that can deliver. Maintaining a positive customer experience requires that CSPs deliver unique, high-quality products and implement customer-focused processes and OSS/BSS as shown in Figure 1. If the network is assumed and products are commoditized then customer experience is the only differentiator relevant to product development, sales, usability, operational quality and support when something goes wrong.
es being offered by CSPs for dozens of devices that are no longer restricted to a common access network. CSPs also have to manage traffic from third party bandwidth and content providers, as well as the intelligent devices in customer’s hands and homes. And yet, regardless of the source of a problem, the CSP will be blamed for a failure. As a result, CSPs are obligated to operate and maintain a rapidly expanding inventory of network elements, applications, servers, data bases and delivery environments.
Competition
The Four-C’s: complexity, competition, cost, and customer demand, are taxing every part of CSP operations. This pressure leads CSPs to rely more heavily on OSS/BSS to simplify operations and manage costs while rapidly delivering new, high quality services.
CSPs are still vulnerable to direct competition (other telecom operators), but now computer vendors (Apple), software vendors (Microsoft) and Internet vendors (Google) pose a threat as well. Those companies are not competing with CSPs at the network construction or operations level, they are competing strictly at the product level. That very fundamental difference between CSPs and over-the-top competitors emphasizes the need for CSPs that own network infrastructure to make maximum use of the capabilities of that investment to deliver products, quality and innovation to their customers that over-the-top providers cannot.
Complexity
Cost
The size and complexity of telecom networks has increased exponentially and so has the volume and variety of servic-
The ability of a CSP to monetize its network lies in thecapabilities of its OSS. Network infrastructure is a large capital in-
THE 4 C’S CHALLENGING CSPS
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
Ideas in brief: 4 OSS functions that will influence change in CSPs customer experience The most critical business priorities in CSPs assurance strategy The benefits of including customer data in the network planning, engineering and design processes
10
In focus: customer BSS/OSS TRANSFORMATION experience
CRM - the role of OSS for improving customer experience he role of OSS in customer experience improvement has been the subject of many articles published in the Technology Review magazine. Most articles tackle the problem from the customer service quality perspective, emphasizing the role of OSS assuring that customer services work anywhere and anytime significantly contributing to customer satisfaction. But can OSS systems also improve customer experience in the most traditional aspect of customer - provider relations and in particular in interaction?
T
Łukasz Mendyk
Comarch SA
OSS Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit
Sceptics may say, that nowadays customers do not complain, they just churn. This is why pro-activeness capabilities are so important.
The answer seems obvious, better customer QoS means more customers are satisfied and so CSP is perceived better. This contributes to more intangible flavours of CE which is about human aspects and thus beyond just measurable QoS. But can OSS systems improve these „human aspects” which are traditionally tackled at the BSS domain by Customer Relation Management (CRM) systems? The answer is yes, and it is not about OSS intruding the BSS layer but rather about seamless BSS/OSS integration. The idea is to provide, at the CRM level, a complete insight into all the issues that impact customer services and thus the customer itself, and originate from network problems. Having this insight is supposed to improve the „human aspect”. A scenario which demonstrates this is when a customer contacts the operator issuing a complaint about its servic-
es. When a CRM system has insight into customer service issues, the customer can be informed that the referred to issues have been detected, the root cause is known, and the resolution process has begun. If the customer can be provided with an estimated time of problem resolution then that’s even better. This means the ability to alleviate initial customer dissatisfaction caused by the experienced service problem. Sceptics may say, that nowadays customers do not complain, they just churn. This is why pro-activeness capabilities are so important. Pro-activeness has two aspects. The first aspect is the ability to prevent the customer from experiencing problems with services. In a nutshell , this requires OSS systems to be able to monitor the network, detect network problems and translate them into customer services impact. When customer services detect a network problem, the problem resolution process may begin, prior to the customer issuing the complaint. What is important is that customer impact serves as the priority gauge for the network/ resource resolution process. The second aspect of pro-activeness is that the lack of customer complaints does not necessary mean that the customer is happy. The OSS system provides insight into customer service issues to CRM and enables to pro-actively contact the cus-
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
In focus: customer experience
tomer. The idea is that instead of waiting for customer complaints, it is better to contact the customer and inform him about a detected problem and provide him with detailed information about the action being undertaken. Someone may argue that this may be a risky strategy to contact the customer without been 100% sure that he really is experiencing problems. Leaving aside the discussion whether it is better to unnecessarily contact 10 customers than risk losing one unhappy customer, the role of OSS is to provide precise information about customer service issues while avoiding unnecessary alarms. Moreover, OSS can provide detailed information about what the technical issue is. Although customers may not understand technical details, providing precise information when contacting a customer can be appreciated by the customer as proof that contact is not purely a marketing spam. This in return proves that CSP really makes an effort to provide the customer with the possible service. The presented capabilities can be a source of significant competitive advantage over other communication service providers. Customer experience surveys show that many customers are still disappointed with service providers who are very passive, and wait for customers to complain. And even when registering a customer complaint, it is not rare that customers are asked very difficult detailed questions that are hard to answer. Yet another role of the OSS system is to provide all necessary data to CRM in order to
avoid asking the customer technical questions. These detailed questions are sometimes perceived by the customer as a method to discourage him from issuing a complaint and thus avoid the cost of compensation for the poor QoS. This may seriously damage CSP’s image and cause significant churn. Details on how to achieve necessary CRM-OSS integration can be found in the Comarch whitepaper entitled „Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance”. In a nutshell, the idea is to employ the Product-Customer Facing Service (CFS) – Resource Facing Service – Resource model with CFS as the „uniting element” between BSS and OSS systems. All issues detected by OSS systems, which have impact on the customer, are reported on Customer Facing Service (CFS) which the CRM system should have insight to. Concluding, the role of OSS in improving Customer Experience is not only limited to assuring good customer service quality but also to help traditional CRM systems be pro-active in customer interactions. By providing insight into customer issues which originate from a network problem, the OSS system enables via CRM systems to create an image of the provider who really makes an effort to improve customer satisfaction. OSS can help make communication with the customer be perceived not just as a marketing spam.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
11
Ideas in brief: CRM needs insight into all customer service issues originating from the network Pro-activeness ability to contact the customer before he churns CRM-OSS integration is a must
12
In focus: customer BSS/OSS TRANSFORMATION experience
Optimization of network planning processes as a key solution for increasing efficiency
lanning and deploying a mobile network is one of the key cost generators for operators. When an operator chooses a multi-vendor strategy, the number of platforms and systems used to transfer the need of a site into a running network element is particularly significant. In this article I will discuss the way to integrate and rearrange the IT landscape, together with corresponding business process reengineering.
work contain a number of steps, needed to ensure that certain data is properly recorded in a given system.
Introduction
Configuration management systems, on the other hand, must cope with very closed and complex Network Management Systems (NMS) delivered by network vendors. Special features in the network caused these systems to be customized and, in many cases, hard to upgrade. Additionally, many of the older systems do not have an up-to-date picture of the network in their databases.
P
Jakub Załuski-Kapusta
Comarch SA
Telco Consulting Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit
A typical IT landscape of multi-vendor mobile operators consists of a number of different tools: Network inventories with site lifecycle milestones
Additionally, in most cases a lot of these systems (especially related to inventories and lifecycle management) are legacy, homemade tools. This is caused by the fact that many operators perceive their network management processes as unique and ones that require dedicated tools (or in the case of commercially available products, require huge customization).
Radio planning tools Configuration management tools.
Such an architecture also requires a number of various internal interfaces, which can either be automatic or based on manual export/import features. Any of the business processes introduced to manage the planning and rollout of the net-
All of these problems turned network planning and rollout into a very complex process, with hundreds of workarounds for simple operations, not supported by tools already in use. On the one hand, using these landscapes lowers the efficiency of network delivery departments, on the other hand, even when they produce configuration, it very often contains a number of errors and is not optimal.
Comarch Technology Review   01/2012
In focus: customer experience
Radio
Elaborate Configuration Proposal for Radio NE
Comercial Order
Execute Frequency Approval Radio
Radio Plan Parameters
Transport
Plan Transport Connection
Plan Transport Connection
13
Acceptance
Plan BSS Parameters
Core
Rollout
Elaborate Technical Proposal
Execute LOS Testing
Negotiate Lease Contract
Modify Infrastructure
Build Network Element/ Antenna
Send Notice Beginning of Operation
SIP Establish Connection to NE
Operations
Figure 1. Example of a business view of a process
Process Redesign In order to start thinking about lean, smooth and efficient processes, mobile operators have to stop thinking about applications. The most crucial step is to start the OSS transformation program with identifying the most important processes in a radio network, like a new site, a system swap or an integration process. At the beginning, a decent tool for process documentation should be selected. Still, it is quite common to use MS Visio diagrams, or MS Excel files to document work. Proper tools should allow to draw processes on different levels of detail, mapping them onto applications, interfaces and data models. The next step is to document the radio process, as it should be, without any applications working in the background. Such an approach allows to focus on important steps, without all the legacy steps, introduced to overcome the lack of functionalities. Fig. 1 presents a business view of a process without any application background. In order to get all the necessary operations, only the most crucial processes need to be modeled. Many other processes will just use the same business activities as crucial ones. When remodeling those process-
es, it is also important to remember about changes in the organization. User roles should be defined within the processes, without looking back at the existing organizational structure. Necessary mapping or changes can be carried out later, when implementing new processes in the mobile operator’s organization. Reassigning users to new roles is not an easy task. Of course, existing engineers will be strongly inclined to follow the existing processes. It is therefore required to introduce a real mind change regarding process reengineering, with the use of external experts if necessary.
Example of Process Reengineering – the network integration process One of the most crucial processes for a mobile operator is the network integration process. Efficiency of an operator and network quality result from this process.
A typical process Most operators still use the so called ‘Turn On Cycle’ (TOC) process to orchestrate changes. This process defines a number
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
Ideas in brief: Reengineering your planning and configuration processes Work and network under control process-driven planning and execution
16
In focus: customer experience
Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance
ustomer experience (CE) has become the main battleground for communication service providers (CSPs) and a concept that defines today’s BSS/OSS systems. And, as quality of service (QoS) is one of the essential factors for achieving customer satisfaction, assurance systems gain importance. This all may sound like an obvious thing to say, but what is not so obvious is how (network) assurance can be turned into a measure of CE.
C
Łukasz Mendyk
Comarch SA
OSS Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit
There are many issues on the way to achieving this goal. Many service providers have not yet implemented automatic diagnosing of customer complaints. Often, when such a complaint is issued, their network operation departments claim that the network is operating correctly and all technical metrics are in green. In these circumstances, more advanced service assurance that includes pro-active customer complaint management (the ability to prevent degradation of customer service quality) becomes “mission impossible”. These obstacles may result from the fact that network operation departments have been traditionally more focused on the network infrastructure than on the customer. But it’s
also an outcome of the increasing complexity of services, and the fact that various services may have different requirements towards the same technical parameters. This, in turn, changes the expectations towards OSS systems. The traditional network / resource perspective, typical for fault and performance management systems, needs to be shifted. Service providers need to start looking at the network from the viewpoint of the quality of services, that are delivered to the end customer. This article will describe such a transformation from network assurance to customer service assurance.
Towards customer service assurance – where to start? Traditional network assurance comprises of two complementary systems: Performance Management (PM) and Fault Management (FM). The first one deals with network performance metrics (KPI), and the second one – with network outages. Performance metrics can have a defined threshold, which should generate an alarm feed to the FM system, once ex-
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
18
In focus: customer BSS/OSS TRANSFORMATION experience
Outsourcing network management – directions and strategies
obile and fixed operators face constant challenge to optimize cost structures. One of the approaches to realize this goal is to outsource network management. This trend already began a few years ago and seems to be growing constantly. On one hand, outsourcing may diminish network control, which is still considered by many operators as a core part of their business. On the other hand, it gives a chance to transform current relations with the network. This would give opportunity to adapt to new business design and concentrate on services delivered to a customer.
M
Szymon Buczak
Comarch SA
OSS Consultant, Telecommunications Business Unit
The growing interest in outsourcing is caused by many factors. Mainly, financial improvement, but this is not the only reason. Next Generation Network evolution, competitive business models and new applications have forced operators to concentrate on an efficient way to use of their network resources. Another advantage of outsourcing is the possibility to increase network flexibility and adopt new technology at a lower cost. It also simplifies the ever changing nature of internal support by transferring it to the outsourcing service supplier. In other words, it relieves network topics from management agendas.
Why outsourcing? Every operator has its specific rationale to introduce network outsourcing. However, the general reason depends on the size and structure of a telecom. Mature operators, especially in the EMEA region, are driven by decreasing average revenue per user (ARPU). Operators in growing markets look for a possibility to manage growth and obtain necessary assistance and knowledge. Mid-size companies will benefit from continuous network and operation optimization, as this area is usually marginalized on an everyday bases because of lack of dedicated staff serving that purpose. Independently of size or structure, outsourcing gives a possibility to improve the current network operation process. The very first step, which is a must for every operator willing to outsource a part of their network operations, is the organizational aspect. Outsourcing must follow internal improvement initiatives, especially network management process redesign. The structure of the area that is to be outsourced must be clear and transparent. This may be performed by assessing all areas that are impacted by the outsourcing scheme, so
Comarch Technology Review   01/2012
22
In focus: customer experience
Infrastructure sharing – ServCo vs. NetCo – the competition shift
ery interesting changes on the telecommunication market can be currently observed. Telecommunication operators (telcos), who have been very bitter competitors in the field of the infrastructure, are starting to cooperate with each other, going even as to creating a joint venture to realize the idea of infrastructure sharing. This idea is driven by the need to reduce huge expenses on infrastructure, that result from the fact, that capacity data services demand more and more capacity. This is also boosted by market regulators who perceive this as a natural path from local loop unbounding (known in the fixed network market) to „network unbounding” and network neutrality ideas. Infrastructure sharing can be described as dividing traditional telco into so called servco and netco. To get an even more complete view of the idea, it can be said that the complete model consists of Salesco, ServCo and NetCo, where Salesco is probably only a new name for the role of e.g. MVNO. Infrastructure sharing means that for example two collaborating telcos decide to create one netco which is to serve two ServCos on an equal basis.
V
Łukasz Mendyk
Comarch SA
OSS Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit
The best way to explain the roles of SalesCo, ServCo and NetCo is to employ a TMF SID model. Starting from the bottom:
NetCo is to manage resources and provide fine grained Resource Facing Services (RFS) to ServCo
ServCo’s role is to manage services, which means using fine-grained RFS to create a Customer Facing Service (CFS) and fine-grained products that are to be provided to SalesCo
SalesCo is to create final end customer products, product bundling and products offerings based on CFSes and fine grained products delivered by ServCo
Infrastructure sharing relates to a very interesting business model and redefining competition between collaborating telcos. In this model telcos collaborate at the NetCo level, becoming in fact one company which is to serve the still competing servcos at an equal basis. So what is the domain of competition between ServCos? It is definitely not infrastructure (network resource management). If we leave competition on the customer targeting and the pricing level to SalesCos, then the competition between ServCos is all about how to create and manage customer services CFS „better” while using the same network resources. In other words, this means a competition shift from the network (resource) level to service competition. The word „better” can be understood as better usage of the same network resources to create cheaper and more interesting Customer Facing Services of higher quality and thus providing better Customer Experience.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
In focus: customer experience
23
Ideas in brief: Splitting Telco into ServCo and NetCo (and SalesCo) Infrastructure sharing = common Netco + competition at ServCo (and SalesCo) Competition: who creates better customer services based on the same network resources (Lego blocks)
ServCos will compete by creating better CFSs, using the same building blocks - fine grained RFSs provided by the same NetCo. The key tool needed by ServCos is the service catalog which enables to define CFS, built from fine-grained RFSs, and to drive both fulfilment and assurance processes. This means employing next generation OSS which supports the service domain. The service fulfilment solution role is to be able to orchestrate NetCo by ordering low level RFSes and then „assemble” the customer facing service according to the service catalog’s definition of CFS. Service assurance along with the SQM system is responsible for translating network related alarms and resource centric KPIs provided by telco into CFS alarms and CFS Key Quality Indicators (KQI). Translation is to be done along the same service model as fulfilment defined in the service catalog. Concluding: competition between ServCos resembles creating the best possible structure using the same Lego blocks. Details concerning the Service Fulfilment solution can be found in Comarch’s whitepaper entitled „ Fulfilling the Promise of Component-Based Service Creation”, and details about Service Assurance in the whitepaper „ Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance”. Specifics on service management as a whole can be found in Comarch’s whitepaper entitled „ Comarch Next Generation Service Management”.
But what about NetCo? In the description provided above, the role of NetCo was network resource management and providing fine-grained RFS services for ServCos. But as NetCo is to be a separate company which needs to earn money. And what is better is, it does not clash with the previous description based on TMF SID. The previous description was based on a global perspective, and on the value chain model. When looking from the “local perspective”, the NetCo apart of network resources needs to manage CFS and products which are offered to ServCos. This might sound confusing when bearing in mind the previous description, but it simply means that NetCo’s CFSs and products are just RFSs from the perspective of ServCo. It proves that the TMF SID model is useful in describing all kinds of business and what is extremely important enables to provide both a „local” and „global” perspective. As NetCo does sell products, this means that the NetCo apart of OSS systems, which manages network resources, also needs a service layer and even a BSS system. The latter part is a natural consequence of separating NetCo from ServCo and establishing it as a separate business entity. What is important is that the role of a BSS system at NetCo has a significant part to play and is to be used as a control point that checks whether NetCo serves all ServCos at an equal basis.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
OSS for ServCo – managing the service layer (CFS and RFS) in assurance and fulfilment areas
The competition winner among ServCos will be one who can create a better CFS model. Better means choosing the right RFS type provided by telco for the right type of CFS. The right type of RFS can refer to: less fault prone, delivered faster.
24
In focus: customer BSS/OSS TRANSFORMATION experience
Win customer experience and transform techs from regular employees to customer advisors
fter the Service Management Expo 2011 conference, held in Birmingham, I realized that currently there are 3 most important aspects in field service management (mobile workforce management): field forces mobilization, scheduling optimization and human resources.
A
Scheduling optimization and technicians mobilization (understood as mobile access to information in the field) are cru-
Szymon Uczciwek
Comarch SA
FSM Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit
cial for the optimal utilization of resources and increase of customer satisfaction. The human aspect is also substantial but very often not noticed by operations or field service management and is not considered in operations transformation projects. I have the opportunity to be involved in field force transformation projects in which at the beginning the program manager tried to hide all information from the technicians and assumed that they would simply start working
Measured engagement of techs in daily work
Influenced KPI
Average value of KPIs in context of engagement metric
< 0,7
Customer retention
72 %
> 0,7
Customer retention
87 %
< 0,7
Workforce utilization
56 %
> 0,7
Workforce utilization
69 %
< 0,7
Revenue increase
7%
> 0,7
Revenue increase
8%
Figure 1. Correlation between technicians engagement and selected KPIs
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
28
Chicago voice
Building Customer Loyalty in the Telecom Market
the wireless industry, a new phone with a 2 year contract has been the definitive incentive program for years. The telecom industry, like others is plagued by churn; in fact the majority of new customers are churn customers. It is difficult to understand why most companies have not moved beyond this weak approach. The consumer has to choose between a huge amount of competitive products and services all offering similar incentive packages. Brands need to move beyond this antiquated method. Through the proper use of a pervasive loyalty solution, telecoms can begin to provide a memorable experience in order differentiate their product and attract and retain loyal consumers.
IN
Alina Pyzowski
Comarch Inc.
Solutions Manager Enterprise Marketing Management Loyalty Business Unit
The path of the past In the past, telecom providers have dedicated tremendous energy and resources to customer and company acquisition to develop and grow their businesses; this was a successful business model at the time. Currently the developed telecom market must face low GDP growth, stagnating population and high service-saturation levels. Years of pursuing the same strategy by growing in numbers and acquiring new companies is no longer a sustainable business model. The necessity to focus on understanding the customer experience has proved daunting as most telecoms’ strategy and information is siloed in unique lines of business; fragmenting one customer into many different views.
Data, data and more data As telecoms began pursuing growth through mergers and acquisitions, the consequences of such cannibalistic pe-
rusal led them down a path to multiple disparate technologies. This has caused customer data to be scattered across multiple customer databases, where data is often duplicated and inconsistent. Typically, customer information is divided in data silos across lines of business with little integration or transparency amongst them; resulting in a single facet of the overall customer profile. For example, the wireless division collects information but often doesn’t share it with the TV cable division. There is no complete view of a customer across different channels— stores, websites, call centers. This means that a customer calling in to speak with a representative may have a com pletely different experience depending on the department they speak with. They may receive different information, offers, or advice. As a result, telecoms at any given moment have had a fragmented and inconsistent view of an individual customer.
A unified view Building an integrated customer data set is the first step toward developing a more detailed and nuanced understanding of customers. The technology and concepts to create a single, integrated view of the customer have been available for many years, but very few telecoms have adopted these methods effectively. Most telecoms have a CRM system with a “360 degree” view of the customer; however due to data silos across lines of business and inconsistent sales and marketing strategies and actions and the customer view is not truly integrated. Airlines, retailers, hotels, and many other industries have already recognized the importance of integrating data from every customer interaction and are continuously working to improve in the area.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
30
BeyonD BSS/OSS
OSS/BSS Integration – The Building Block of the Era of “Big Data” Fundamental Challenges Faced by CSPs Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
BeyonD BSS/OSS
rost & Sullivan has witnessed the telecommunications world change significantly over the last ten years. The evolution of customer demand, supported by the broadband development, has led to the emergence of new services such as internet television, video on demand and voice over IP. Customers require more complex, tailored packages with high service quality. As a re-
F
31
sult, communication service providers (CSPs) need to place greater focus on the overall customer experience and - given intensifying competition - the speed of bringing new services to market. At the end of 2010, Frost & Sullivan conducted a survey of global Tier 1 CSPs. Based on the results of this research, Figure 1 illustrates the most significant challenges currently faced by leading service providers.
7%
Dealing with regulatory issues
13%
Network congestion Sustaining profitable growth
20%
Keeping pace with new technology trends
20%
Reducing complexity of the company’s structure
30%
Reduced time-to-market
30% 37%
Growing customer expectations
40%
Efficiency improvement
57%
intesifing competition 0%
10%
20%
30%
Figure 1: Key CSP Challenges, 2010. Source: Frost & Sullivan, 2010
40%
50%
60%
Dealing with regulator
Network con In order to keep pace with market evolution, CSPs have been prompted to redefine their strategies. The majority have transformed themselves from basic network access providers to service aggregators, providing network access as a medium for delivering content and other value-added services. The implementation of new strategies is a lengthy process, requiring the engagement of a broad range of a service provider’s resources as well as a change of mindset and technical improvements: CSPs need to ensure comprehensive integration of their operational support systems (OSS) and their business support systems (BSS).
OSS/BSS Convergence as an Answer to Operator Challenges
FrostSustaining & Sullivan profitable is actively engaged in identifying, researching, Historically, CSPs tend to purchase best-of-breed applicaKeeping pace with new technolog and developing tions for specific functional areas and they have a long traopportunities, growth dition for in-house software development. In consequence, models,ofand strategies many proprietary or highly customized OSS/BSS systems reReducing complexity the company’s s that enable clients to main in operation. This strategy was justified when their portaccelerate growth. folios only contained a few services. However, with multiple Reduced time-to new services and growing complexity of the CSP architecFor more info please visit: ture, this approach has become untenable. Mergers and acwww.frost.com quisitions have further complicated the back office of many Growing customer expe CSPs. Many providers have added new systems to their IT architecture from companies that they had acquired, with
Efficiency impr
Intesifing com Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
Figure 1: K
42
Beyond BSS/oSS
What makes a good user interface for a mobile application
he User Interface (UI) of a technical device of any kind, including computer applications, is the only way a human can tell a device what to do, provide data and get feedback from the device. In a nutshell, it is the only way to speak to soulless machinery. There is, however, a huge difference between an interface allowing a person just to communicate with a device and one which makes communication convenient and effective. So how to achieve the latter?
T
Grzegorz wĄchocki
Comarch SA
R&D Department Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit
One thing that comes to mind is data bandwidth. A good user interface must enable parties to transfer a number of messages big enough not to introduce any unnecessary delays in the performed operation. Thus, the faster the messages pass through the interface, the better it is usually considered to be. Another feature which contributes to the quality of a user interface is the time an inexperienced user must spend to learn how to get the machine to do what he wants it to do. Unsurprising is the fact that the shortest possible time for learning a new interface is the one most optimally desired in this case. Ideally, a user interface should be so intuitive that anyone can make the device work right away without the necessity to read a manual or learn beforehand. Before we begin discussing mobile applications let us briefly consider PC (Personal Computer) applications, which first brought user interfaces, and have shaped our thinking about them. A typical computer cannot understand what people think, recognize gestures nor read human moods. The first
computers could not be communicated to through the same senses people communicate, so new methods had to be invented. This is why today we have the keyboard, the mouse and the monitor. But let’s not go too deep into history, this is not the point here. These means enabled people to cooperate with a computer application but in terms of our UI quality criteria, would not be highly graded. For a newbie, a keyboard and a mouse were not very natural means of thought expression, which led to a very limited amount of data people could send to an application in a unit of time. There can also be no doubt that a PC interface was not intuitive for someone who didn’t use computers before and it required a lot of learning in order to be used efficiently. In terms of today’s criteria the UI of an ordinary PC was far from being convenient and effective. There were not too many alternatives in those times so people had to accept the fact that they have to spend a significant amount of time in order to efficiently use computers. As a result, more and more people got used to PC interface tools and in result they became quite popular over time, and currently most people can use them efficiently. However, this was not the case with mobile devices because, nowadays, people do not want to take on the burden of interface limitations and spend time to learn how to use it. In comparison to PC beginnings, expectations regarding the intuitiveness and easiness of the device interfaces are much higher now especially that mobile solutions are entering virtually all areas of our private and business lives.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
46
Beyond BSS/oSS
Comarch Private Cloud Computing loud Computing – In its broadest usage, the term refers to the delivery of scalable IT services over the Internet. Those resources include application services and the infrastructure on which they operate. An organization can purchase these resources on an as-needed basis and avoid capital costs of software and hardware.
C
Piotr Piątkowski
Comarch SA
Business Solution Manager, Data Center Business Unit
The Comarch Data Center experience in hosting services shows that the most important element for clients is a service which fulfills business requirements (KPI parameters, i.e. number of users, transactions, etc.) with needed availability (defined in SLA, i.e. 99.9% at 24/7/365 mode), security and scalability (warranty of fast upgrades in case of business growth). The service provider is fully responsible for ensuring and maintaining proper hardware configuration. These client demands are fulfilled by CDC Private Cloud dedicated to Comarch’s and third party applications. A shared environment in the PaaS model decreases installation costs and shortens service delivery time (eliminating problems with hardware delivery).
Why Cloud Computing? It’s about economics:
Paweł dyl
Comarch SA
Business Solution Manager, Data Center Business Unit
Faster – applications are ready to use a lot faster than in the standard way of implementation Simpler – applications can be accessed from anywhere, anytime and are maintained by the outsourcing company
Cheaper – to use cloud apps, it’s easier for application vendors to reach new customers and reduce the cost of delivery and of the supporting applications. Ability to drive down data center operational costs. There is no upfront capital required for servers and storage because applications are installed on the shared hardware (storage and server). There are no ongoing operational expenses for running a data center
Cloud computing models Software as a Service (SaaS) – organizations do not buy software, they simply use their browser to access the software as it is provided over the Internet (software provided as a service). More and more organizations are consciously going for selected applications to be operated on Software as a Service. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) was one of the first areas where SaaS became a common solution due to software utilization without extended implementation time frames, software modification without IT bottlenecks, world class infrastructure without capital expenditures and 24 by 7 uptime without round-the-clock staffing Platform as a Service (PaaS) – is a software development environment that allows developers to create software applications they can offer as a service to their customers or users. The PaaS provider takes care of hosting the created services, for an agreed price. Because PaaS providers can share data center expenses between their clients and offer a better price for the same standalone solution
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
50
Beyond BSS/oSS
The Comarch Billing Cloud enabled fringOut to grow from zero to millions of users
Comarch’s flexibility, both technical and commercial was exactly what we were looking for in our billing provider. The Comarch Billing Cloud enabled fringOut to grow from zero to millions of users, without compromising the quality of service. Thanks to Comarch we were able to launch the service very fast and can easily adjust it as the business evolves. Alex Nerst – CTO, fring
eing that the mobile VoIP services market has advanced, fring designed an innovative product that allows making phone calls from their application to mobile and landline phone networks. The Comarch Billing Cloud solution was selected in order to provide rating, charging and billing of services of this revolutionary business idea in real-time.
The solution
Business needs
The service provides real-time charging, balance control and replenishment functionalities. The customer care module supports system operations, such as product catalog, user management or report generation. Every user can review their account history, credit and settings, using Web or a mobile self-care interface. The highly available Comarch Billing Cloud ensures expected performance and scalability. Real-time session control, necessary in the prepaid business model, is supported by a RADIUS server.
B
fring already provides a smartphone application that enables users to make voice/video calls and text chat for free in the fring network. As the next step it was decided to allow to make calls to mobile and landline phone users – the new service was called fringOut. fring planned to enable its subscribers to make phone calls from 1¢/minute to any country. To launch this service, fring needed a billing software for support. fringOut was to be built from scratch, with no guaranteed success, yet with a solid potential customer base of 10’s of millions of fringsters. The supporting software was expected to be flexible – start small and then grow with business while maintaining telcograde robustness. After reviewing several vendors, Comarch Billing Cloud was chosen as the solution that best fits fring needs.
Comarch Billing Cloud is a modern solution, perfectly suited for start-ups because of its flexibility and short deployment time. It comes in a variety of business and licensing models including “pay-as-you-grow”. The final solution can be developed in an agile way, allowing required customizations to be delivered dynamically.
User registration is carried out online. The solution also provides integration with external business partners such as PayPal and G2S (gate2shop). Comarch Billing Cloud is hosted in the Comarch Data Center and is made available to fring via a Virtual Private Network (VPN), connecting over 20 fring data centers around the world.
Comarch Technology Review 01/2012
Thought Leadership
The ideas and insights of Comarch experts that make us one of the industry’s thought leaders. Browse online the recent white papers, watch the webcasts and tune to our blog.
telecoms.comarch.com