TM Forum ‘Vibe’: Comptel claims context is king

NICE, France – RCR Wireless News this week met with Comptel at the TM Forum Live event, and conducted a short video interview addressing some key topics of the show.
One of these topics is contextual intelligence and the ability to provide predictive analysis to operators. The concept is quite interesting: By gathering historical information about the performance of a network and key factors that could have influenced the performance of that network, they provide a solution that predicts when these factors are likely to occur again and the implications to the network. But, what does this mean in the real world and how does it impact customer experience and operator churn? Let’s take a look at two examples.

The first scenario we discussed is related to “critical alarm prediction.” The Comptel analytics tool looks at data patterns from prior faults such as the type of alarm that occurred, the performance of the network leading up to that alarm and the environmental factors that were occurring at the time. Were there significant temperature fluctuations? Was there seismic activity? Did they always occur at a similar time of day or at a similar level of traffic on the network? Based on these factors, Comptel said its tool can analyze these factors and create parameters around providing a prediction that a similar fault may be about to occur and as a result issue a critical alarm prediction to the appropriate organizations within the operator.

The second scenario we discussed was the ability to predict and prevent failures related to order fulfillment. By analyzing historical results of order failure, Comptel can help to predict when these failures may happen again. The tool looks at the linkages within the network, the interfaces that were utilized and the order in which the connections were activated when there was a failure. As a result a process can be put in place to identify if certain complex fulfillment processes should be re-evaluated due to a high failure rate and identify in advance if there is a risk situation that requires additional oversight during the fulfillment process.
Being able to avert a performance problem before it happens should enhance the overall customer experience and is designed to help reduce customer churn and increase revenue retention. Predictive abilities seem to hold a great deal of opportunities for operators. If they are able to build a program of regular analysis of historical factors, create risk prioritization of specific network/fulfillment scenarios and decrease impacts to the end customer on a consistent basis, I could see operators creating a program for a higher level of guaranteed service performance for key customers. I also wonder if there isn’t a day when these tools can provide testing scenarios where operators could simulate specific scenarios where new offers are tested to ensure there is no direct customer impact prior to launching in the public sphere. I don’t know if this is in Comptel’s future product strategy, by maybe something interesting for them to think about. I can see a new world of possibilities.