Subex Azure aims to offer CFOs insight into credit risks

Revenue assurance company Subex Azure Ltd. has added to its product portfolio with features designed to help operators better judge their risk of losing revenue on a customer, and an integrated platform that is designed to give chief financial officers the same visibility into revenue-related network information that a chief technology officer would have into the network’s inner workings.
According to Subex Azure founder and chief executive officer, Subash Menon, the company’s Revenue Operations Center, or ROC, integrates its suite of revenue assurance products, which range from fraud management to interconnect billing and inter-party settlement. Those can be stand-alone products or integrate to form one holistic system that is supposed to “help CFOs understand all of the things that are going on from a revenue perspective in the network,” Menon said.
Subex System Ltd. has acquired several product suites over the past few years, most recently closing on the acquisition of Azure Solutions and becoming Subex Azure in June. The ROC represents the integration of new and legacy revenue maximization products.
While telecom companies may have been able to overlook revenue leaks when times were flush, “times have changed now,” said Menon. “They have to be really, really careful.”
The risk management system, which is part of the ROC suite, allows operators to create a risk profile for customers that utilizes information such as payment delays, reversals or deviations in customer behavior.
Account delinquency, Menon noted, “is something that happens over time,” and there often are signs that a customer is going to default on a payment. The risk profiles then allow companies to head off large losses by keeping a close watch on customers behavior, he added-and on the other hand, recognizing valuable customers who pay responsibly.
A subscriber with a high-risk profile might end up with a reduced credit limit and possibly even disconnection, before the carrier incurs an extensive loss-while customers with low-risk profiles could be given an increased credit limit or targeted for marketing of additional services, Menon explained.
“It’s not just about controlling the risk,” Menon said. “Ultimately, that information is useful in getting more revenues in the door.”
The company recently announced an agreement with Sun Microsystems Inc. to provide Subex Azure’s revenue assurance products to wireless, wireline and cable operators around the world.
Subex Azure has nearly 30-percent market share in revenue assurance, and 150 customers around the world, including 23 of the top 40 telecom companies. Its American customers include T-Mobile USA Inc., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Verizon Communications Inc.