Charging systems are critical network components when it comes to monetizing new services and capabilities. But as Nokia’s Head of the Charging Business Line Jonah Pransky told RCR Wireless News, the introduction of 5G and cloud-native networks is widening the ecosystem of potential value with more customers and customer types than before. Therefore, Pransky said, communication service providers (CSPs) need more from their charging systems.
“Historically, the charging system was asked to meter and rate the volumes of usage of a particular service,” he said, adding that 5G standalone (SA) introduces more potential integrations between charging and other network functions, making available new charging variables that fall beyond the usual charging parameters of duration and data volume, such as SLAs, speed, location, API calls, device type and so on. By exposing these dimensions of a service as chargeable dimensions, CSPs are able to target new markets and industry verticals — factory automation, tele-health, smart cities and drone logistics — with services that are charged in accordance with the true value they bring.
In fact, Nokia has already tested and integrated these types of charging expansions. “All the work that we’ve done to say integrate with 5G network functions are things that charging products were not asked to do previously. Those integrations are already available and will help CSPs monetize different aspects of service in 5G than were possible in previous generations of wireless networks,” stated Pransky.
Further, as service providers begin to focus on enterprise customers, they can utilize the same charging system used to monetize network services to monetize other types of service, such as water or electric company services. In cases like this, monetization would occur not by the megabit or gigabit, but the cubic liter or kilowatt hour.
Additionally, Nokia’s charging solution is also available in a Software as a Service (SaaS) model because, according to Pransky, it enables its customers to undergo digital transformations much faster and still benefit from moving to cloud-native software. “Specifically for charging, we can take a proven product and deliver it as a Service, so customers don’t have to get into a massive transformation cycle, but they also now have a modern product that is built in with use cases that they just have to configure and these will continue to evolve as the product evolves,” he explained.
To accomplish this, Nokia has taken the real-world use cases currently deployed with their customers around the world to create new pre-defined and templated offerings within their SaaS charging solution. According to Pransky, this allows customers to develop a new 5G data offering very quickly and set it up in different dimensions of the service that they want to monetize. “These templated offerings are built into the product catalog, so they just have to configure it instead of designing it,” he added.
The telecom industry is familiar with how to monetize the volume of data used every month, but from Nokia’s perspective, it’s time to explore new dimensions of service using a charging system built for the 5G era and allowing CSPs to effectively charge for anything. Doing so, will allow CSPs and enterprises to better and more quickly monetize every network aspect and function that the latest generation of cellular makes possible.
Are you ready for 5G monetization? Learn more from Nokia here.