Software is becoming an increasingly important part of telecommunication networks and deployments as both wired and wireless carriers look to add functionality to operations while increasing simplicity and reducing costs. RCR Wireless News is keeping an eye on recent developments through its weekly “Software” wrap up.
Telecom providers are expected to divert more spending toward big data and analytics solutions in an attempt to better understand and manage customer interactions, according to a new report from Infonetics Research.
The firm noted that as part of its “2014 Subscriber Intelligence Strategies: Global Service Provider Survey” it found telecom providers were becoming more interested in big data solutions and the analytics platforms necessary to parse pertinent consumer information.
“Operators have long leveraged analytics for revenue-preservation use cases such as revenue assurance and fraud and churn management,” explained Shira Levine, directing analyst for service enablement and subscriber intelligence at Infonetics. “But as they look for ways to better monetize their customer base and differentiate against new competitors, we’re seeing interest in a wider range of analytics use cases, including identifying next-best-action marketing opportunities, ascertaining a subscriber’s relative profitability, and enabling variable charging based on factors such as network conditions and customer value. As this occurs it’s creating opportunities for not only the traditional analytics and business intelligence specialists, but also suppliers of the data sources – including (deep-packet inspection), network management and CRM vendors – as well as consulting and integration players.”
The report noted that the cost and time associated with “subscriber data integration and migration are significant barriers to subscriber intelligence projects,” and that those surveyed said they were either buying or likely to buy subscriber intelligence solutions from “traditional analytics vendors, though nearly half indicated they were likely to buy from DPI vendors.”
In other software news:
• Telit Wireless reported a deal with Google Cloud platform to launch an “Internet of Things” big data “challenge” aimed at “promoting and accelerating innovation” around the IoT.
The competition will allow developers to create Web-based and mobile applications using data from connected sensors and devices. Those participants will use Google’s Cloud Platform offering “to harvest the IoT data in order to illustrate the power and simplicity of developing compelling IoT solutions.”
The competition kicked off on Dec. 2 and is set to run through Jan. 9. Telit said a panel of judges will review submissions and select winners based on “innovation, commercial impact and benefits to society,” with winners announced in late January and early February.
• Boston-based signaling control solutions provider NetNumber said it has become a member of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute’s NFV Industry Group.
NetNumber claims its Titan platform is deployed on more than 350 servers on five continents and supports more than 200 billion transactions per month.
The ETSI group was established in late 2012 in a move to help shape standards for network function virtualization and other virtualized functions. The group earlier this year gained new leadership with plans to focus on what it termed “phase two” of its NFV initiative.
• CSG International reported that enterprise customers of Australia’s Telstra had recently “gone live” on a new CSG solution designed to simplify the corporate billing environment. CSG is managing the billing platform, which it said would allow Telstra to focus its efforts on customer satisfaction and service innovation.
• Telecom equipment giant Huawei announced a global partnership with open-source solutions provider Red Hat to enable OpenStack-based cloud deployments and accelerate collaboration around OpenStack for NFV and software-defined networking solutions.
A number of tech companies have begun to throw their support behind the OpenStack standard, including an announcement earlier this year from Hewlett-Packard that it planned to invest more than $1 billion in OpenStack development.
• OpenDaylight, another open-source community focused on NFV and SDN advancement, announced that Intel had bumped up its status to a Platinum Member of the organization, joining other Platinum Members Brocade, Cisco, Citrix, Dell, Ericsson, HP, IBM, Juniper, Microsoft and Red Hat. Intel was one of the founding members of OpenDaylight.
• Plumgrid, which provides virtual network infrastructure for OpenStack clouds, announced partnerships with Dasher Technologies, Datavision and Redapt targeting enterprise customers. The three companies join Plumgrid’s Global Alliance partnership program.
• NFV and SDN solutions provider NoviFlow said it has closed on a round of investing from private firms based in the U.S., Canada, Japan and Taiwan. The undisclosed investors provider an undisclosed amount of funding.
Make sure to check out the latest in telecom-related software news at RCR Wireless News’ dedicated software page. Also, if you have telecom software news to share, please send it along to: dmeyer@rcrwireless.com.
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