ORLANDO, FL—Verizon has invested well over U.S.$150 billion in platforms, solutions and services over the past ten years. The company invested in fiber to cover 17 million people by 2004. It acquired MCI, looking to enhance its IP backbone. With 007, Verizon embraced security, and two years later it focused on LTE. Now the carrier is looking at cloud, machine-to-machine (M2M) and digital services.
During this week’s TM Forum Management World Americas (check out all pieces and see our videos), Verizon’s senior vice president and CIO, Fari Ebrahimi presented Verizon’s eight focus areas for investment: LTE, fiber optics, global IP, cloud, healthcare services, security services and M2M as well as developing partnerships and joint ventures to deliver new products.
Ebrahimi stepped on the stage during the the event’s keynote session, highlighting how the consumerization of IT has impacted the wireless industry. “Bandwidth-intensive mobile use and IP services will accelerate the needs of the connected world,” he said.
In addition, Ebrahimi noted the impact of cloud computing and machine-to-machine applications. “Companies are spending more and more on cloud computing. Significant global enterprises are investing in cloud and M2M, so revenue opportunities exist,” he said.
After presenting Verizon’s eight focus areas, Ebrahimi explained how all of them are connected. He said that mobile, fiber, global IP and cloud platforms enable the next generation of innovative digital services. Above the network and transport layer, Ebrahimi set cloud, security, unified communications and M2M as key enablers. However, enriched digital services requires investing in analytics, conferencing, monitoring and payment, among other areas.
Check out the slide show containing Verizon’s 8 hot topic areas of investments at our Facebook’s page.
