about Business, Ideas, and Revenue & Risk Management et al..

Double Jeopardy for AT & T

2012-03-26T10:23:00.000+05:30

AT&T sued over alleged improper billing of services for hearing-impaired

this article caught my eye and I was left wondering of the woes of AT & T.

They charged improperly for services provided (to fraudsters), and now are liable to pay damage charges!

What are the losses?

1. Not being able to detect fraudulent usage.. Ouch, that always hurts.

2. (Therefore) Billing wrongly for services to Federal Communications Commission... That is a type of 'Bill Shock' for FCC

3. Now fighting lawsuit over False Claim Act.

Overall. AT & T lost on all sides. Provided services to "subscribers" (who by the way seems to be fraudsters); did not get money for the services provided (FCC claims that they were false billed); and now AT & T would be paying from their own pockets the services wrongly provided.

USD $16 Million is a ton of money!

D-Day-- ROC Revenue Assurance v5 Globally Launched

2012-02-13T12:25:00.001+05:30

No more teaser advertisements.... for today its D-Day.
My product ROC Revenue Assurance v5 is Globally Launched, and it definitely is significant for me.
One could say-- it is my first international product launch-- and well it is a grand scale of events for a grand product. Here is the link to the event: It is a Virtual Webcast.
It definitely is the one-stop shop for revenue assurance needs, and even then it is just the beginning.... for there is way more coming up.
Stay Put.

Subex to introduce ROC Revenue Assurance 5- a lot of 'first of its kind'

2012-02-04T12:42:00.000+05:30

I could not resist the temptation of blogging about my first large scale international product launch. Being the Associate Product Manager of ROC Revenue Assurance, it took us a great effort in bringing to the market the first of its kind Revenue Assurance tool. ... It is amazingly different.... and we made it happen.
Here is the first teaser ad. that team marketing got rolling into the web.

For anyone who reads my blogs, please feel free to join us [by registering at http://subex.com/roc-revenue-assurance-5-virtual-launch-13th-feb-2012-website-event.html] as we introduce a lot of 'first of its kind' capabilities for a market that is thought to be saturated and shrinking.

Tickling Human Emotions and Blaming it on Business by a Biased report

2012-01-28T21:58:00.001+05:30

I don't wish to sound like heartless ogre, but a report in The New York Times (find here) on the atrocities inflicted by Apple on its workers made me wonder about the purpose of such a biased report. Before I proceed, one quick question, does the reporter/(s) know about the conditions of the people [workers] who lived and worked to make Beijing Olympics a reality?

The first thing that the outlook lacks to the largest extent is the fact that Apple though the thing called 'Apps' has created one of the largest businesses and therefore one of the largest bread-earners for a ton of companies (and therefore human individuals) around the globe. The copy-cats like Samsung followed the same path as was shown by Apple, and that has in turn caused Samsung to grow by using Android. Although Apps were not invented by Apple, but they 'created' the economy.

Except for a single line about similar conditions in HP, Dell,Lenovo, Sony et al factories, this seems more of an Apple's-Back-Stabbing effort. It is not an un-imaginable situation to have cost of land, labor, capital extracted by selling 'product'. Product price points are set keeping these in mind. That is how any business house works. If China provides cheap labor, that is a driving factor for companies to open factories in these countries. Why look only at manufacturing industry, do You find any significant report on the work-life-balance (the so called must have) of IT creatures in India? Honestly, I could not understand the reason of this report targetted only for at Apple. It is because of the blasts and killed individuals? if yes, where are similar reports of such disasters in other billion dollar industries- not only electronics.

It no doubt is really grave to learn of the mis-fortunes of human individuals, but then-- a comprehensive and well made report is one that gives a full perspective and not a biased on like this!

I am not sure if such kind of 'Journalism' is what I am expecting from a paper as well known and circulated as New York Times. Talking of responsibilities, probably such biased reports are more detrimental to the society as a whole across the globe than the atrocities of Apple.

Power corrupts, Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely - The Story of a Mighty Fall

2011-12-16T23:14:00.001+05:30

After a long break from blogging, I thought it may be a good idea to be back to blogging with a story of honest efforts that failed because of a maxim that the people overlooked. My dad used to say, 'power corrupts, absolutely power corrupts absolutely'. It took me a good number of years to understand practical implications of the maxim. Time for the story........... NOTE: this bears no resemblance to real life and is intended only for highlighting a few good-to-know-points of management. Any resemblance is merely co-incidental.
------
At the same time when the twin towers collapsed in New York, and with it that collapsed fate of millions, a few determined people started a venture that rocked the world right from the beginning. Over a very brief period of time, these people reached the pinnacle of success and became the obvious reason of sleepless nights for the CEOs of a number of big firms. They became known all around for the 'effectiveness' of their work- for they did good work. As they grew, it was time to scale up, and the flood gates opened to increase head count. First point of failure started with that. Soaring revenue, year on year growth, brought about the hubris born out of success, and the good men started enjoying the 'power' that slowly grew just as the team grew into a mighty organization. They say, with great powers come greater responsibilities. But some otherwise 'wise' brains had already been clouded by the stories of success, the glitz and the glamour. The net effect was an inherent disrespect of 'prophecies' of High Priests of business world (and their teachings in books like Crossing the Chasm, How the Mighty Fall et al) of everything that can go wrong. Effectively it turned out the prophecies had been made after years of research and analysis and were bound to be true, and they were more than prophecies- the were 'ideals' of what all not to do during the growth years of the organization. But the veil of success becomes the curse for destruction. Over a short period of less than a year, power struggles erupted with organized coups. If only the wise-ones understood that they were just fighting against themselves and not the outsiders who the wise-ones thought were their out right enemies. The outsiders hadn't build the organization so they left just as they had come. During the power struggle though, something even worse was created- monsters of Frankenstein. Some of these were mere mortals who were glamorized in spite of dire in competencies and out right professional nakedness. Under the garb of loyalty and goodies-for-good-work, lay the 'personal preferences' of the 'corporate order'. The other monsters were process related where the wise-ones seemed to have lost focus on what all drives 'business'- viz., Sales does, cash does. Even when the grounds had started shaking uncontrollably, the last resort was 'methods to fool others' instead of solving the emergency. As again the maxim goes: 'you can fool some people sometimes but you can't fool all the people all the time', the walls collapsed ultimately leading to a sore that the founders would have never thought of.
------
Enough of the story, now for the perspectives of what needed to have been done:
1. Hubris born out of success: This is a human tendency and hence it is all the more important to do self-evaluations. Win-Loss profiles, and self evaluation of both reasons of success and failure with a commitment of not to repeat whatever went wrong and yet institutionalize the 'novel' practices that worked wonders- these were the things to do. But with success comes the greed of power and retaining power.
2. Power dissipation: It is important to note that with growth one has to rise above ranks leaving the control to the lower levels. It is one thing to give attention to detail- which is quintessential; but it is completely different from power transfer to enable lower levels become self-sufficient. Both are essentially required. But the question is to whom You would transfer the power. The people!
3. The People- A-Class Teams work with A-Class people: When You choose to compromise on the quality of people You hire, You have opened flood gates for the not-so-required talents to flow in without filter. With B-Class people around, A-team members would only deliver B-Class results, and in turn the quality degrades over time, and it essentially did, else one would not have had to resort to 'fooling people'. One never needs to do that, if You know what drives the business.
4. Revenue is Vanity, Profit is Sanity, Cash is reality: This was told to me by my mentor (someone who is a Father figure to me- I lost my dad to cancer, but the Lord thought otherwise to bless me with his company). One should have looked into the cash book more often. the other most important factor is how much sales You have been making year on year? Take a 'wise' and un-biased look. Don't fool Yourselves- at least on this front.
5. Personal goals and preferences above the organization: There are companies that put organization first (ITC) and there are others that put Employees first (HCL), but not a single successful company has ever put personal growth of the senior executives as top priority coupled with 'their personal preference' of employees over employees' capabilities. It raises doubts of reasons of preference.

While I was reading 'How The Mighty Fall', I never thought the dramatization of a 'fall' could actually take place in reality in such a vivid way with the steps as:
1. Hubris born of success
2. Undisciplined pursuit of more
3. Denial of risk and peril
4. Grasping for salvation
5. Capitulation to irrelevance or death
At least in the last stage where the organization represents a hell-of-doom; there is still time for a retrospective look at what all had gone wrong so that in future that is not repeated. Essentially when leaders fail, the actually 'innocent' workers suffer much more than mere financial losses.

Your thoughts please.!

On a Kill Bill mission--Bharti Airtel and RCom

2011-09-14T11:03:00.000+05:30

That competition is a fierce war, is apparent in Bharti Airtel's attitude.

Here is an article, that depicts the fierceness of the operator in its wake of penetrating into larger markets.

Now if anyone thought it is just Bharti-Airtel, lol..... here comes RCom with even more plans to offer. RCom would offer three times the data for the price of one plan. Here is the corresponding article.

If such action continues, I'm sure shortly enough, we would have Hollywood flicks coming up showcasing the wars and battles.

Building a Business- from the seed, to sapling to a giant

2011-09-11T13:23:00.003+05:30

When it comes to business, often I have seen, it is only a few key things that needs to be done right, at the right time, in the right direction, and most importantly in the right way. Essentially there is no rocket science for success except for the fact that You know what You are doing and don't try fooling all around- which includes Your own employees, who happen to be the biggest strength of the organisation (yet often this is forgotten by companies, especially small ones), Your investors and VCs and most importantly the customers.

Here is a great article from TechCrunch (viz. The Job Of A CEO At A 200 Person Company) - simple in thoughts and processes to follow when for startUps and budding organizations. The article ends with a fansatic opinion, that a few start ups and small companies over look - "You are human. You make mistakes. You get stressed. But at all times, be real! Your people and your market want to hear from you—they want to know you and know what you stand for. They can sniff bullshit a mile away. Don’t disengage with reality behind the CEO’s magic curtain—it’s all too easy. Keep it real.".

As a matter of fact, as seen even in this article, there is no rocket science of success and exactly similar thoughts are laid out by Guy Kawasaki in his book, "The Macintosh Way" which simply put reads as 'Doing the Right Thing' and 'Doing Things Right'.

One can interpret it simply as "be honest in transactions" and don't bullshit, for that won't help You in the long run.

'INRA'- could this be tomorrow's definition for today's RA?

2011-08-20T22:58:00.002+05:30

How about an acronym ‘INRA’ which reads as ‘Investment aNd ROI Assurance’?
Don’t worry, it is not a new mouthful marketing term that has just jumped out in some bright brain, but the concept and where it stems from is fairly simple. Let me try and explain.

Two questions: Who is RA for? and What is the scope of RA? The age old question that probably is yet to be answered is ‘what is the scope of revenue assurance?’ and we have opinions all around the globe w.r.t its scope, which typically and unfortunately resonates the safe home ground that the specific claimant is confident of. If protecting the revenues of the company is a target, then should revenue assurance not be a part of ‘every’ company on the face of Earth? Obviously the metrics and KPIs would be different, but how come RA is then spoken of as the terminal illness primarily of telecoms? Is it because of the loss volumes are deemed extremely high- could be? But then, by large all types of companies would need some system or the other for RA activities? I don’t seem to see a lot of claims around that- pardon my ignorance if that also is a big buzz word that I am not aware of.

So if one has to come up with a fairly benign definition of RA, should it not include safeguarding the investments and therefore determining ROIs of investments made by the companies? ‘End of day’, you try and “assure” “revenue”. I get it when one would say, revenue is all that for which You can raise an invoice, but hey, someone else also raised an invoice that You paid for in getting a bunch of systems that is supposed to do some work and get Your ROI in x-amount of time. Why would that not be considered a part of ‘assuring’ revenues?

Some terms like ‘cost assurance’, ‘margin assurance’ and the likes seem to speak in volumes of the work that is there for safe guarding revenues. So, if at the end of everything one is targeting to save revenues and mind it, at all quarters and corners of the business, should “everything” not be a part of something like ‘INRA’? And INRA is for ‘everyone’….nothing specific to telecoms only.

One more point; lets keep this straight and simple, first safeguard and stabilize your ‘today’ which is the present state, before trying to optimize for a better future. No point thinking of a glorious ‘future’ if You are dying today, and therefore optimization is definitely out of scope of INRA.

War of Worlds- The Tariff War in telecom continues- Time to Assure Business

2011-05-31T10:52:00.000+05:30

Don't think of the Tom Cruise starrer Hollywood flick, for this post is about the recent news of MTS slashing base calling tariff to half paisa per second, that is roughly $(1/9000) per second. Read the full article here.

Imagine the state of affairs w.r.t competition that a company (which like all other operators in the Indian sub-continent) is trying to make a living by cutting down the cost of calls in spite of itself (like all others) having to face still operational cost issues-- which effectively are all on the rise.

MTS is a relatively new incumbent in the market that is dominated by the likes of Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular, Reliance and Tata.

As the war for call tariff reduction as a tactic to increase the customer base continue, the operators (all of them) seem to be bleeding profusely trying to contain the costs while barely managing to make money in business.

Something tickles within me, when I see this happening and thus it seems to me that the obvious choice of survival for the telecom in this economic belt would be nothing less than 'consolidation'. The tariff war is taking a toll on the business economics of the telecom world and I don't see a lot of survivors in the near future.

The quintessential need of the hour before the wave of consolidation (which I so anticipate happening) sticks in and even after that would thus be 'business assurance'-- a term being now used frequently in the telecom C-level rooms. Still a flux in terms of the scope and definition, business assurance may be the answer to the methods that telecom world would use in order to :
1) contain costs across the board, while trying to increase
2) cash reserves,
3) cash flows,
4) EBIDTA
5) net-profit,
6) revenue and obviously bookings
...possibly in the above order of priority.

I guess, its just about time we see a wave of economics tsunami hitting the telecom world.

An excellent read on Business Assurance from TMNG and GTB

2011-05-19T14:27:00.000+05:30

The following article was published in http://www.globaltelecomsbusiness.com.
Since there was no link to share in blogger, I am copy pasting the content of the article in here.
Please read the original article here.

"

A holistic approach to optimising business performance

21 April 2011

As operators continue to transform their businesses, c-level executives are increasingly turning to business assurance as a means to gain a holistic view of their businesses’ performance. Co-sponsored feature: TMNG Global

Howard Watson: Business assurance is now at the top of the
agenda of the COO and increasingly on the agenda of CEO


The term ‘business assurance’ is still relatively new in the telecoms operator sector and to an extent suffers from the hype cycle that often afflicts the emergence of new terminology. It’s important to understand that this is not a new name for revenue assurance or service assurance but a mature concept designed to describe the effort to gain greater insight into actual business performance across an operator’s environment “This is an assurance activity that sits at an executive level within the organisation,” says Howard Watson, managing director of Cartesian, a TMNG Global company. “While as a company we have a rich heritage in revenue assurance, process re-engineering and customer satisfaction, business assurance extends into the areas of cashflow, cost containment and into the financial operations of the business. Business assurance is now at the top of the agenda of the COO and increasingly on the agenda of the CEO.”
That advance into the boardroom underscores the importance of a disciplined approach to business assurance to the modern operator. However, adopting the business assurance mindset effectively requires operators to also transform their processes and operations from both organisational and cultural perspectives. “If you consider some of the business improvement methodologies that have been used, like Six Sigma, adoption requires a culture where everyone buys into the technology being used,” explains Watson. “In our experience, business assurance needs a similar level of corporate-wide commitment. We have found that this approach must be sponsored by the highest levels of executive management and embraced by the entire enterprise. Every new service introduction, technology change, process improvement and system development effort should be viewed through the prism of business assurance. Once business assurance is embraced by the enterprise it will facilitate that all of your key performance metrics are optimized – not the least of which is ensuring the highest level of service for your customers. For example, our QSA tool ensures when you finish migration and transformation, you leave behind a culture that solves the root cause of a problem.”
Watson certainly knows about the challenges operators face in ensuring lasting success in transformation and migration. Prior to joining TMNG he spent 16 years working in the UK cable industry, which became Virgin Media. Watson led the cable operator’s technology initiatives as its chief of Transformation and Technology. Under his leadership, the technology division of Virgin Media saw revolutionary change as Watson introduced new key and strategic positions, including CTIO and executive director of change, and implemented new strategies to earn the banner “most cost efficient division”. In addition, as the chief technology and information officer of Telewest, which later merged with rival provider NTL to form Virgin Media, Watson was instrumental in the establishment of Telewest as one of the best performing cable operators according to industry analysts.
“I spent 16 years in the UK cable industry and that was characterised by continuous acquisition and merger activity which meant a lot of transformational activity took place all the time,” says Watson. “What I learned, sometimes through bitter experience and sometimes more easily, is that successful transformation is about engaging the entire operation. Business assurance does pull all that together, bringing financial, technical and customer experience organisations together with a shared goal. At Virgin Media, the transformation was sticky, so it continues, that’s because everyone was engaged.”
“People want a partner who can help facilitate the various parts of the organization to pull together,” he adds. “These challenges cannot be addressed in a vacuum or from one vendor’s point of view. A best-in-class business assurance program must be holistic, addressing revenue, costs, margin, cash flow, service, customer satisfaction and operational efficiency, include all the vendors in the value chain, be highly automated, and include experts who fully understand the transformation that is taking place in the communications, media and technology industries.
Much of TMNG’s proposition appears to resemble the management practice applied to other industry verticals but Watson acknowledges that telecoms operators face an array of challenges that are unique to their industry in addition to other challenges faced by other verticals. “Obviously, each vertical has its own challenges,” he says. “The important characteristics of a telecoms operator are that essentially they have a lot of customers that are paying an annuity revenue stream. As an operator your revenue is about lifetime value of your customers which you try to increase. The utility and financial services sectors are similar in that respect.”
Given that, are telecoms operators as savvy as those similar sectors when it comes to business assurance? Watson says the message is getting through. “We need to continue to stimulate the market and ensure business assurance continues to stay in the front of operators’ minds,” he says. “The sector is very customer-centric so for that reason it becomes a top table consideration and is on the c-level agenda.”
TMNG Global has assembled both the technical expertise and the experience to aid operators throughout their transformations. “One of our core areas of expertise is in working with customer to transform their business,” says Watson. “That really applies across the entire lifecycle to what processes are required and what is the impact of specific changes. We can work with the operator to prioritise where transformation is required.”
TMNG Global’s Business Assurance assessments and solutions combine its expert business assurance consulting services with its award-winning business assurance software suite, Ascertain, their internationally-recognised, proprietary Quality Business Controls (QBC), eLexicon, and Quality Systems Audit (QSA) methodologies. For example, TMNG’s eLexicon is a web-enabled toolset and accompanying methodologies that contains user requirements gathered from numerous projects with more than 250 operators, both domestic and international. “We have methodologies for transformation and how to undertake transformation in a repeatable way,” says Watson. “We also provide our Ascertain Business Assurance Suite, which we deliver and leave in place, essentially providing the business with a business assurance dashboard and heartbeat.”
This type of integrated and comprehensive approach is increasingly required across the c-level suites at operators. “Business assurance is at the CEO, CIO, CFO, COO level,” confirms Watson. “Those functions all have this need in common and the underlying driver is the complexity that continues to increase within a telecoms operator, within its IT operations and, more and more, in the sales channels. Process and systems complexity increases quite dramatically at times and our operator customers are focusing increasingly on outsourcing and using third parties which means a framework is also required to simplify and manage those relationships.”
The business assurance market is certainly geared to address that complexity. “What was revenue assurance and resided in the CFO domain involved taking that information and focusing on the lost revenue,” adds Watson. “Now instead of focusing on loss, assurance might be about gaining insight into the 99.99% of revenue that has been assured. Operators might want to know how their high value customers have performed from a revenue point of view and that becomes relevant as a CEO dashboard – whether a CEO looks daily or weekly is an ongoing issue.”
The Ascertain Business Assurance Suite, mentioned earlier, is TMNG Global’s centralised business assurance portal that monitors, reports and analyses the many revenue streams and costs within a company. With a common interface that effortlessly collects and reconciles data while providing constant monitoring of activities and trends, Ascertain ensures users can focus on the results ensuring revenue is recovered, operating costs are reduced and permanent corrective actions are taken. “The key is to have that holistic approach and work from start to finish on a programme of corrective actions,” explains Watson. “Delivering the Ascertain platform enables operators to define symptoms and ensure issues have been corrected. The ultimate objective is to ensure that customer satisfaction has been increased.”
Watson says that while the holistic approach of business assurance delivers a wider set of benefits, there is still value in operators targeting specific aspects of their businesses. “You can and we still do target specific requirements with revenue assurance, for example,” he says. “Operators are looking at reducing the number of suppliers they have and the CIO wants to have integrated solutions so the holistic approach is becoming more the norm. Even with a single supplier, there tends to be a componentised architecture. We can provide a fully integrated architecture and that helps you find the cracks in the underlying architecture.”
For Watson, both schools of thought exist. The first thought is that a pre-integrated solution will have a lower total cost of ownership for the IT infrastructure, while the second thought centres on specifying best of breed solutions with integration done in-house. “There are pros and cons to both approaches,” says Watson. “From a business assurance perspective, we are ensuring we can work with both.”
The TMNG Global approach fits either preference and that, coupled with the market experience the company brings to its engagements, is the key differentiator. “We’re not just a mainstream enterprise software provider,” points out Watson. “Many of our staff have previously worked within operators and been involved in real engagements with real operators delivering added value. We know what it is like to get our hands dirty and we can bring that to bear in our engagements.” GTB

Using Social Media for CRM or CEM

2011-04-27T10:00:00.001+05:30

Here is a good article I caught up with on CRM / CEM. (This was published as an article in Yahoo)

On Cloud 2: making fans of customers on social media

By Siddharth Cavale

BANGALORE (Reuters) - In May 2008, a blog post caught computer maker Dell Inc by surprise: popular tech blog Gizmodo had broken news about Dell's Inspiron 910 mini-notebook -- months ahead of its launch -- after seeing CEO Michael Dell toting the notebook at an industry conference.

Instead of staying mum, Dell saw an opportunity in the frenzied online buzz to track what was being said about the notebook and gauge the level of potential users' expectations.

And it paid off.

Dell realized potential customers were planning to pass up a competitor's projects for the new Dell Mini 9; the social media chatter was extending the buying cycle and driving demand. (http://www.slideshare.net/Radian6/dell-social-media-case-study)

A combination of social media and traditional customer relations management -- social CRM -- is allowing companies like Dell to track customer conversations, react swiftly to issues they raise, gain insight into their needs and interact with them.

"The (social CRM) market is over $1 billion in social business solutions this year and is growing at 30-40 percent," said Michael Fauscette, analyst at research house IDC.

Companies that provide customer relationship management services on the Internet, or 'cloud' services, are alive to the opportunity and are snapping up firms that offer social media monitoring services.

This marriage of social media, such as Facebook , Twitter, and blogs, with the 'cloud' -- a term that refers to the shift to providing software, computing power and data storage on the Internet -- has been dubbed Cloud 2.0.

Last month, Salesforce.com bought Canada-based Radian6, which counts Dell, Kodak and PepsiCo among its customers, for $326 million. Smaller rival RightNow Technologies bought HiveLive in late 2009, and SuccessFactors last year bought out CubeTree.

CRM vendors' spending on social software to support sales, marketing and customer service processes will top $1 billion worldwide within two years, IT research firm Gartner estimates.

That figure compares to a forecast of more than $12 billion for overall spending on CRM software in 2012, meaning social CRM will account for around 8 percent of total CRM spending next year, double this year's level, Gartner said.

Given how so-called cloud stocks have performed, investors appear receptive to companies making these acquisitions to accelerate growth in new areas like social media. Shares of Salesforce rose 6 percent after its Radian6 news, and Successfactors gained 8 percent after buying CubeTree.

Industry analysts say cloud computing projects tend to generate quick returns, allowing companies to quickly recoup what they spend on the projects and see tangible benefits to their businesses.

INTEREST IS THERE

"I bet a lot of Salesforce's peers are looking at this as well ... it looks like a lot of them are slow or are confused about social CRM, which they say is still in its infancy," said Lyle Fong, CEO of Lithium Technologies, which provides similar social media monitoring solutions to Radian6, and is cited by analysts as a potential acquisition target.

Lithium, which used to provide Internet traffic monitoring, bought Scout Labs last year and transformed itself into a social media monitoring service.

IDC's Fauscette sees Oracle and Salesforce -- which was founded by CEO Marc Benioff in 1999, when he left Oracle -- as potential buyers for Lithium Technologies.

"I'm not sure Salesforce's acquisition of Radian6 indicates a broader trend of consolidation in the industry," said Subha Rama, senior analyst with ABI Research. "However, it does demonstrate that companies are looking to understand the return on investment from their social media initiatives."

As this capability is better delivered from the cloud, you might see software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers buying smaller analytics firms to fill a skills gap, Rama said.

"I don't think IBM will do a buy ... they already have an in-house solution, but Oracle is definitely going to look to acquire some products in this space," she said.

Lithium Tech's Fong reckons all the social media monitoring companies will be bought out in the next year.

"All the big ones are already gone ... that space will disappear as a stand-alone space very shortly," he said.

(Reporting by Siddharth Cavale in Bangalore; Editing by Unnikrishnan Nair and Ian Geoghegan)

-- This article was published in Yahoo.

The following is the link for the same:

http://in.finance.yahoo.com/news/On-Cloud-2-making-fans-reuters-2825969472.html

Telecom Asia Awards 2011 Presentation

2011-04-26T10:18:00.000+05:30

Telecom Asia Awards 2011 Presentation

....

but it is surprising to see no Indian operators on the top!

(This is a direct link to 'Poulos Ponderings' at http://tonypoulos.com/videos/ )

Oracle CRM: Delivering a 'Wow' Customer Experience

2011-04-20T10:22:00.000+05:30

"Optimizing" Revenue Assurance

2011-04-13T11:50:00.000+05:30

For a number of years now, there has been fair bit of 'buzzzzzzzz' on Proactive Revenue Assurance.
Let me try and put a few things straight first:
- (Reactive) Assurance: Assuring after the fact and preventing recurrence in future
- Active Assurance: Assuring 'as and when' things are falling apart, fixing and hoping to stop things from falling apart in future.
- Proactive Assurance: Playing 'Minority Report' (the Tom Cruise starer movie). Just joking. The concept I hope is to 'assure' before things fall apart.

Using the word 'Assuring' so as to avoid having to define the "scope of revenue assurance" et al.

Nice thoughts and for all practical purposes all are flawed-- whatsoever the Gurus of Marketing of pro-typical software vendors may say. Ask the real guy who works his ass off in assuring revenue and You would get the real picture of the actual facts of what works and what not.

Essentially what is typically necessary is means to 'automate' reporting and controls that are put in place. Imagine having to use a 100 person strong team for regular reporting and control purposes. The effective tool is one that helps to free up the human resources by automating the manual activities, so that the same set of people can be effectively used for finding and 'assuring' other areas of the business, else the capacity is under-utilized.

Note however, a effective output (efficiency) of any process in any place/industry/region is guided by the throughput of the slowest working unit of the process. If you increase capacity in one or more working unit only without considering how to improve the overall efficiency, all that is done is maximizing 'inventory' thus building up operational costs with no output. End of day You hurt Your own business. So howsoever You try and fix everything about reporting and controls, if the bottleneck is in getting the data itself in the first place, all other processes is guided by how well You get the data and process the same.

Success of a effective processes around revenue management and business assurance (say call it 'Optimized Revenue Assurance') therefore is guided by the capability to optimize the throughput of the slowest process. The key steps therefore are:
1) to identify the slowest process
2) identify how to optimize the same
3) ensure the rest of the processes are aligned to the output capability if the slowest one.
Note, it is not necessary to have the rest of the processes running at full capacity over and above the capacity of the 'sub-optimal' process-- for that would just increase the operational costs for the organization.

This is a very engrossing topic.... hope to write more on the same in future posts.
All Comments of All Forms are Welcome.

Fumbled Tablet Strategy Cost Acer CEO His Job

2011-04-04T16:41:00.002+05:30

Fumbled Tablet Strategy Cost Acer CEO His Job, Sources Say

CEO Gianfranco Lanci’s departure from Aceryesterday was both sudden and unexpected. What precipitated it? The company line says it was his differences with Acer’s board of directors. But over what, specifically? Evidently, Lanci grievously misjudged the impact that tabletswould have on the company’s core business.

Sources at Acer told DigiTimes that Apple’s iPad undercut the company badly in the netbook market. And it quickly became clear that simply boosting shipments of notebooks to win market share was no longer a viable strategy. “We were almost too successful in the past…but more recently the iPad and other new form factors have had a very big impact on the PC market,” Acer Chairman J.T. Wang told the Financial Times. “We have to change our business strategy.”

And leadership. Because Acer needs to replicate in tablets its success in notebooks. To do that, it must approach the market as Apple or HTC might, searching out profits on high margin devices. And according to Acer execs, Lanci was too busy fighting a pricing war with Dell and Hewlett-Packard to realize it. Said Acer CFO Tu Che-min, “There is good consensus among the board members that the tablet is the way to go.”

Time to chase profits over market share.

SOURCE: http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20110401/fumbled-tablet-strategy-cost-acer-ceo-his-job-sources-say/

Mobile Banking-- could this be a possible pain-reliever for telcos in India ?

2011-03-29T11:41:00.001+05:30

In a recent article MasterCard''s India-born President and CEO Ajay Banga said, India presents much more exciting opportunity than China in terms of growth of the credit card business. Read the complete article here.

He argues .."that cash is expensive for an economy to print, distribute and secure, costing between 0.6 to 1.5 per cent of the country''s GDP". However, another reader (Satheesh S) has put up a valuable where he says "Nearly 80% people in the village didn't know how to use debit card,Because lack of awareness and they are illiterate, so we need to convert the all the people in our country in to literate.Then only we Exciting in these matter".

What is significant to note here is that there is an opportunity for the telecom operators in India. With the ever dwindling ARPUs, increasing cost of operations, lack of bandwidth for matured operators and lack of subscribers for new incumbents, being the few challenges being faced, the vast rural market is almost not utilized as significantly as it should/could have been. DoT, in a first ever forecast of mobile penetration across India for the next six years, has projected a billion mobile phones by 2014. It has been said that in 2014, India's population is expected to be 1.26 billion, with mobile penetration of 1.01 billion the mobile teledensity would be 80% above. It would mean 8 out of every 10 Indians will have access to a mobile device. (read a related article here).

In such a situation, operators in this era of telecom commoditization could be looking at leveraging on mobile banking as a possible solution of increasing the revenue of the business. This could be a significant advantage even for businesses like MasterCard who would look at improving businesses in India and China and such growing markets.

What is required is therefore a business model which :
1. makes operators provide the backbone for service provisioning and availability,
2. MasterCards and banking systems to become the gateways for validations, verifications and authorizations of transactions over the mobile phone where the device acts as the 'wallet' for the consumer,
3. businesses to leverage on the gateways and telecom backbone and have direct interactions with the consumers.
In such a model, for every transaction, the telecom operator and the MasterCards get a percentage-- as part of service charges.

However this model would fail if in markets like India, operators start competing for such services instead of working in a hand-shale mode. India has seen the fall of telecom revenues and the near collapse of an economy due to competition where incumbents brought the house down by reducing tariffs in order to compete-- end of day bleeding to death themselves.

It may be a good time to have the business houses sit together to understand and consolidate the business for sustained growth and stabilizing the economies. Of course what really needs to be worked out first are the set of compliance required and changes to regulations that may be necessary for India. These act as significant blockers for rolling out of operations like mobile banking in India.

Customer Data, Analytics and Future

2011-03-27T13:34:00.000+05:30

In a time when the buzz word is about data analytics and deriving value out of the humongous volumes of data, a question definitely arises, how secure could personal information be in the future when the world would have been able to get over the current challenges of data processing, analysis, finding 'valuable information' and storage issues.

Here is a hilarious video that probably depicts the message from the future.

Enjoy, and do share Your Comments

'Face Off' - from revenue assurance to revenue optimization and the way forward

2011-03-25T13:41:00.003+05:30

If only it was possible to surgically put faces-off from one skin and fix it on the other, as had been shown in the Nicholas Cage, John Travolta starrer movie 'Face Off'; business tycoons would surely have used a similar technique to change the cover pages of business. I say this because there has been a lot of buzz in the business of telecom world on where 'telecom business' as a whole is headed and the 'face off' of the same therefore. Obviously with the changing landscapes of telecom, the associated businesses are also facing a similar crisis and searching ways out to morph into something else.

Where is the mythical 'revenue assurance' headed? In an interview with Tony Poulos, Alvaro Ribero from WeDo technology (view the interview here), talks about the 'new additions' to revenue assurance domain. In my earlier posts on 'Managing costs'; 'Revenue assurance to Revenue Maximization'; 'the Real Value addition of RA'; I tried to portray similar concepts where the scope of RA changes to include a bunch of new activities, within the scope of work for revenue assurance.

The following diagram is 'my' personal vision as to where the domain of 'optimization and maximization' is headed, and may therefore be regarded as a much larger scope of 'business process optimization'.

Why is this important going forward?
The reason is simple.
Effectively, as of now there is a lot of flux in the business of telecom and a lot of ideas are floating around w.r.t what should be the way forward. I had a brief discussion with an experienced and seasoned professional who is a pioneer of the revenue maximization industry, where we discussed that there are three most important aspects we would be looking at in the near future:

1. The telecom business as a whole would have largely two kinds of business models: the value players and the economic players. Todays large telco players could largely be morphing into the "back-bone service providers" in a n N-Sided business model, where different services would be provided to the subscribers on the other side through the telecom backbone.

2. The business landscape would therefore see a lot of 'Commoditization' along with the consolidation of businesses across the globe. Deriving value for money for the business houses in such a landscape, would be of prime importance.

3. Thus, effectively the need and growth of analytics is being considered as the game-changer for tomorrow.

What is interesting to note about analytics is the capability and its impact on business. In another post on the value additions of analytics, I tried to argue the relative importance of the same especially w.r.t the cost of operations vs the benefits derived from analytics. On a similar note, 'Ajay Kellar' (COO of Hansa Cequity) has put up a poll in LinkedIn on 'Why Companies Don't use analytics?' where he aptly puts that the biggest reasons for the same may typically be identified as:

a. They do not have enough data
b. Companies have not understood the benefits
c. Companies do not have the expertise in house
d. They don't believe it is actionable

It would therefore be interesting to note, what the future beholds and if Analytics would the all-encompassing solution for the needs of business optimization.

Do share your thoughts.

India - Is Your 'Middle' Class Vanishing or Are You approaching an effective Tipping Point ?

2011-03-14T22:18:00.000+05:30

While watching the recent promos of an Indian film viz. 'Dum Maaro Dum' in which Deepika Padukone - (one of the most popular India female lead actors) is found grooving in smoke ridden environment - I suddenly asked myself...Is that the face of the current "young generation" in India? Amazingly I found the answer geared more towards 'yes' than I would have hoped.

It is significant to note, that with the rise of modernization and development, the rise of activities pertaining to the night-life culture (which is primarily West gifted) is on significant rise. India as a whole had the concept of a the 'middle' class which was actually the set of people who would concentrate more on 'savings' than on spending. A paradigm shift in the same is to be noticed these days. Not so long ago, people in India could seldom be found spending over a couple of thousand bucks per person for a few hours in a disco, or on Martinis (the Bond way) and Margaritas and others-- however this is common place today in the 'everyday' life. The small towns are fast catching up the metros in this aspect. With growth is such a (termed 'chilled out' and or 'kool') life-style the immediate effect is actually seen on the Young-generation who have money enough to spare in 'THEIR' hands, the source of the same could be it through pocket-money, or be it through earnings in small-time jobs (and not so often, long time careers). What is even more significant to notice is that these Young Bloods actually would not think twice of their savings before smoking off on pot, hash et al, along with the very many mocktails available on the menu. Somehow, although known to the seniors of the society and therefore the parents of such 'kids', yet no one seems to be actively stopping the growth and penetration of such irregular and harmful lifestyles.

There is no point in saying that people must enjoy-- but this time the cost of the enjoyment is far significant on the economy of the country as a whole. The inherent effect of the same is the fall of the 'Middle Class' that has always been a source of 'potential' for driving India. Some 10 year back when the population of India was around 900 million, a national survey had resulted in the following classification w.r.t the income groups:
1. The Very Rich = 6 million
2a. The Consuming Class = 150 million
2b. The Climbers = 275 million
2c. The Aspirants = 275 million
3. Destitudes = 210 million

2a, 2b, 2c form the Mythical Middle Class of India. This was never a single sect.

Over the 10 years, population of India has grown well over a billion now, but the growth in the Very Rich sect has not been much. Poverty has decreased because now more people live above the poverty line -- the benchmark for the same being having income of over $5 a day. But the most significantly affected sect (or sects) has been the Middle Class. which forms the mass of the population.

The shift is fast affecting the mind-set of people which is evident by the shocking rise of crime rates in and around the national capital and Delhi. Here is an article on the rise of Crime in 2010 in the same area where although the authorities want to paint a picture of lowered crime rates, the actual scenario is very different. The following excerpts are from the same report and it shows shocking numbers:

The number of cases filed under the IPC (Indian Penal Code) in 2010 was 48,161 against 47,069 in 2009 (an increase of over 2 percent),
There was a rise in rape cases in 2010. A total of 489 rape cases were registered last year as compared to 459 in 2009.
Cases of molestation in the capital rose to 585 in 2010, against 528 in 2009.
There was a decline in murder cases, with 519 cases being recorded in 2010, as against 527 in 2009.
An analysis of motives in such cases revealed that 15 percent of the cases were due to "sudden provocation", while another equal percentage was due to "sex related" motives.
The number of heinous crimes climbed up with 1,969 cases reported last year, against 1,948 in 2009.
There was a decline in dacoity cases. In 2010, 31 cases were reported as against 33 cases in 2009.
Motor vehicle thefts accounted for 29 percent of total crimes registered under the IPC.
There has been a substantial rise of about 24 percent in the number of snatching cases.
The commissioner also stated that 93 percent of these criminals arrested for snatching were first time offenders and 61 percent of them were illiterate or school drop-outs.
Interestingly, all the criminals arrested for the 16 kidnappings in 2010 were "first-timers", with no previous criminal record. In 87 percent of the kidnappings, the accused were known to the victim's family.

The question therefore is, should this continue, where would India be in the next 5-10 years? Apparently speaking is could sound like a silod view of the state of India, but effectively could we be looking at a 'Tipping Point' in India's form and state ?

A lot remains to be discussed ! Let me know Your thoughts.

Deriving value out of analytics softwares in telecom - the question is how much ?

2011-03-01T12:34:00.001+05:30

"Mobile broadband will have the greatest impact in both mature and growth markets, but finding the right business models and managing costs will be the keys to operator success". This is a direct quite from the an article in Analysis Mason on 'Worldwide telecoms market forecast 2010–2014. (Click on this link).

The right questions are being asked given the following facts:

1. Decreasing ARPU

2. Increasing costs of operations

3. Regulatory challenges

et al.

Somehow in between, technology enthusiasts are proclaiming a lot on the capabilities of 'analytics' driving the face of the market. However, I have a small question with respect to the ability to use analytics for meaningful information in telecom.

The first question is, what is "meaningful information"? Possible answer is, anything that would help in increasing the top-line revenues for the telco. It obviously can be expanded to include a lot of things.

The very next question is, how much would it cost to extract the information and therefore how much valuable the information extracted would be? Essentially what would be the ROI and how would one be able to guarantee the return on the investment.

The reason I ask is another similar discussion chain that is on the table for a long time. Data growth to kill mobile telco profitability in three years. Read the full article here.

In case telco profit in itself is dwindling, how can the investment on analytics softwares help? Well, I don't want to sound cynical, but it is a question, I'm sure the answer of which would be available a few years down the line.

But today I ask this question is because, which-so-ever analytics platform/software et al we speak about needs to be able to check all the following:

1. handle exponential volumes of data

2. take care of hardware and storage requirements (although in theory it is very easy to have storage considerations ignored, as a DBA or an IT guy where the pain is, and the answer would be in handling and dealing with the volume of the data).

3. derive the results in real-time, because, all information has a life-time and information lost is as good as opportunity lost.

Sounds like utopia!!! The question therefore is very simple: 'How many known analytics softwares actually

1. can handle exponential data growth

2. derive meaningful information in real-time (or even near real time)

3. operates at very little cost

4. aids in adding to top-line revenues for the telco ?’

Given the situation of telecom business and revenues, I feel it may as well be a better idea to figure out a way of auditing softwares and processes being used, so as to optimize the costs and effort being spent on ‘trying to derive’ values out of business.

User Specific Attention from Google

2011-02-13T10:44:00.000+05:30

Many a times and often, when we send emails, which is supposed to have attachment, and we forget to attach them as part of it, the reader has to revert only after which we apologize and resend the attachment..... seems like one of those very common errors. But this error serves a real bad taste say when You are applying for a job and sent the email (may be just by mistake) without the attached CV.

I was sending an email in one such situation which would have annoyed the recipient and 'Google' saved me!
A pop-up that read :

"
Did you mean to attach files?

You wrote 'I have attached' in your message, but there are no files attached. Send anyway?
"
came up after I had hit the 'send' button.. The following is the screenshot (i have deliberately hidden the name of the addressee)

To check if this was only searching for the form of the word 'attach' I typed another email to a friend of mine with the words 'I am attached to You' and tried sending it- and then there was no pop-up at all !!!

It is simply amazing for me primarily for a couple of reasons:

1. This is being checked in 'real time'

2. I am one among hundreds of millions, and yet Google almost seems to be giving personalized attention- and as a user, it feels great. It simply feels awesome.

There is a lot of talks about Consumer Centric Analytics in today's world which aim to provide better 'Customer Experience'. But I guess this is what Consumer Centric Analytics and therefore Customer Experience Management is truly is, and is at its best of its forms. In other cases, all I am given (as in when I am a consumer) is bunch of text messages and emails which are pro-typical promotional offers - almost 99% of which irritates me.

This 'analytics' helped me-- the promotional junks don't.

I don't know how this has been achieved by Google, but if anyone knows how this has been done, please do share with me.

Put boundaries to Revenue Assurance - or Just treat the Subscriber as the metric?

2011-01-26T22:52:00.000+05:30

Almost after two months of near-zero activity in terms of blogging, I thought of posing a question about the outputs of 'revenue assurance' function and the method of measurement.Before that, may I clarify, I strongly hold the opinion that 'RA' as a function has no boundaries-- anything that contributes to loss of money for the organization falls under the scope of revenue assurance, because end of day, One has to 'assure'.

So to start with, think of the situation- for a mis-configured newly launched rate-plan, of which the details of tarrifs are wrongly depicted in the website (this happened to me thrice with my own mobile operator), a post-paid subscriber who opted for it, was charged wrongly. The subscriber leaves the network, like many others (especially that MNP is available) because of 'wrong' charging. At the same time, miscreants who knew of some fallacy in the configuration, used the same to their benefit and was not charged. A group of people made use of the fallacy and got away.

Many a time, this is the exact scenario for an operator. The question therefore is, should the operator create a divide in the RA, FM, CEM and CRM functions? or does it make sense to have a single view of subscribers across the network where the processes are assured as an integral part of the same activity? It seems to me an obvious choice to track the subscribers life-cycle as an integral part of the revenue management activities. Subscribers affected by wrong configurations would not be happy to stay in the network and would leave- thus causing a case for CEM or CRM applications. Complaints in the Customer care about services not available typically point to some problem in the network, which if not resolved would cause customers to churn.

If the subscriber is the dimension of analysis, it would typically tend to serve multiple problems at the same time. More so because, typically all errors ultimately reflect in some way or the other on the customers and their reactions to the same. But since it is the customer driving the revenues of the business, would not tracking the customers be of more significance than having point applications that do not talk to each other, or even creating boundaries viz. revenue assurance, revenue maximization, customer experience management and the such ?

Think about it, a rule that is supposed to find customers making more than x-amount (in $ or duration) of a specific type of calls. This rule if fired in the database, the result set when used in conjunction with link analysis, segmentation and customer profiling, would actually help in finding the customers trying to defraud or the customers actually interested to use a better offering to help their cause (leave the outliers or the false positives, they would always be there). Then what is the point in trying to have multiple systems, if the subscriber dimension helps. For the same rule, now find, if for all the destinations the calls are properly maturing, and are being charged in the right manner- that addressed the revenue assurance and network error related problems. This is just an example though. There could be hundreds of such scenarios which can be monitored if the customer is treated as the dimension.

Also, understanding the customer's behavior actually would help in identifying potential problems that may have to be solved. Example, network congestion in festive seasons is a known fact. This is guided by the subscribers' usage patterns more than anything else. Thus monitoring 'the subscribers' would help in addressing the situation before the problem actually strikes. So why create boundaries, when the subscribers themselves can help the business??

That is my thought. What would You say about using the Subscriber as the measuring yard ?
Let me know Your thoughts.

'3G tech vulnerable to cyber crime, says experts'

2010-12-09T15:57:00.000+05:30

This was a good read from on Yahoo.

As 3G mobile services are set to be rolled out soon in the country, cyber experts sound a word of caution about the high tech enabled mobile phones, which they say are more vulnerable in the world of technology related crimes.

While the next generation technology aims to make life simpler enabling downloading of movies and music within minutes, it can also be used for various unscrupulous activities.

"With 3G, cellphones will have faster broadband Internet and with such speed you can watch television live, make video calls and download music and movies in no time. But through spying software and virus, the hacker can easily break into your system," says Ankit Fadia, an ethical hacker and cyber security expert.

"The hacker can record all the audio conversation and video files. Not many people in India install anti-virus in the phones. I would recommend them to install anti-virus and fireballs while using 3G, says Fadia who recommends switching off the bluetooth function of the phone when not required to protect the user's password.

Not limited to an individual's privacy issues, the 3G technology will also lead to increase in piracy of films and music, thereby giving a staggering amount of losses to the entertainment industry that is battling the piracy threat.

"It will become extremely easy for anybody to download an entire Bollywood film in few minutes using 3G. This is going to lead to further tremendous growth of websites like torrents," says advocate Pavan Duggal, a cyberlaws expert.

The Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) points out that Bollywood would be hit most by the 3G and wants service providers to adopt a stricter approach to check cybercrimes.

"Today it takes several hours to download a new release Bollywood film but with 3G it will be in minutes that will encourage people to use illegal means to view a film," says Rakshit Tandon, consultant, IAMAI.

According to a PricewaterhouseCoopers report titled, "Indian 3G broadband subscribers," the mobile subscriber base is projected to cross one billion in 2014. The 3G broadband subscriber base is expected to cross 107 million by 2015.

Indian law enforcement lacks the necessary training to deal with cyber-crimes and there is a distinct need for amending the law and making security agencies aware about the Internet, say experts.

"Laws are there to protect but our police agencies are yet not ready to take-up the cyber crime challenges, especially 3G. They need to be trained to tackle the growing usage of Internet by criminals," says Fadia.

Duggal, who is a Supreme Court lawyer, says there is a distinct need for amending the law so as to provide for far more broad generic provisions which can withstand the onslaught of any other new technology.

"Further adequate statutory protections needs to be given to users so that whatever limited right to privacy they have in the context of the electronic ecosystem are not appropriately compromised with the advent of new technology," he says.

As mobile handsets is becoming an integral part of the consumer experience, the availability of a large number of feature-rich handsets at affordable prices or in attractive bundled offers is likely to further drive the adoption of 3G value-added services, according to a report by RNCOS.

The industry analysis provider also predicts that the number of 3G mobile subscribers is expected to grow at a CAGR of around 80 per cent during 2011-2013

This report was published in the following site: http://in.finance.yahoo.com/news/3G-tech-vulnerable-cyber-yahoofinancein-4160707769.html

Telecom Business = Analytics + Social Media + Advertising + Usage platform + Consolidation

2010-11-06T00:01:00.005+05:30

It's time that telecom business actually started looking deep down into customer analytics and started raising the bar of expectations of consumers with the innumerable 'next gen' possibilities that customers can make use of using the telecom infrastructure; rather than concentrating only on price wars, effectively jeopardizing the entire associate economics. Customer Experience Management (CEM) is only the first step for achieving the same.

How this helps?? The following observation caught my eye..... Search for a song in You-Tube. Surprisingly enough, along with the song you would also find a multitude of videos created and uploaded, on the same song, by users. A simple search of a popular song of Backstreet Boys (viz. As Long as You Love me) threw up a huge set of results although there is only one official video though. The rest of the content is completely a user driven and user created! The point is, that web content is user driven is not something that is new, has been all around-- but the question is then how to make a sustainable business out of the same?? and how does today telecom operators look at capitalizing on the intelligence from the data that is available and can be used for business outcomes.

The pre-requisites along with the 4 things that would help getting telecom operators good business:

1. Studying the 'segments' of customers allows the telecom operators to know what is the appetite of the customer more than anyone or any other industry. It is about building and owning a subscriber intelligence database.

2. Enable consolidated connections through social media for the subscribers. Customers these days spend more time on online social media than with their own physical family-- you can read two related articles here and here. Hence advertisements in social media, based on profiles of the customers would add a lot of value. The telecom operators need to understand the expectations of the customers before sending advertisements. Hence data analytics for business outcomes of usage is a must have.

3. Act as the middle-men between the service providers and the customers. This is the same n-sided business model that has been discussed over and over again.

4. Act in a consolidated manner instead of trying to define boundaries of operations. In an earlier post here, I have tried to explain why telecom operators should look towards consolidation of business for sustainability.

5. Operators already own the infrastructure for supporting the subscriber bases. It is imperative to see that the infrastructure is used 'optimally'. Often it is found that expensive infrastructure stay under-utilized although cost of operations soar high.

6. Something new would be to enable the users create the content as well as the applications by themselves with supporting applications that the telcom operator provides. The point I am trying to make is, what is the operator doing to help the consumer create the content, in this consumer-content driven world? Currently content can only be created with the help of a computer. This is typically not practiced directly as a part of the 'mobile phone' usage. Today the applications available from mobile app stores does not exactly allow two-way communication between the consumers and the web. Platforms like Android are still technical for a lay-man to be able to create applications for communication. But nonetheless, the time for 'simplification' is not far off. It should be on the operators mind to help the users create the 'content' instead of depending only on the content providers.

However, all said and done, managing costs is the consideration that operators would have to aim for. Hence, solutions that allow a complete 360 degree view of the operations is an ideal tool-kit yet the telecom market lacks such a tool. Most of the analytics tool kits available provide fragmented views of the data and hardly any derive or even help deriving intelligence from the same.

Over and above these, the operators would have to aim at providing 'services' or abilities to the consumers which exceed their exceeding expectations. Constant innovation for enabling the utilizing of the end-less possibilities is a key for driving the next wave of revenue sources.

The question is -- would operators look at business consolidation and revenue sharing as a mode of sustainability? Also, innovations cannot be made by teams working in silos within the operator, which is effectively the situation in all telcos. Would telcos therefore be willing to "spend" to increase internal development and understanding of the business situation?? I doubt that, and hence it would be interesting to see what the future beholds. It is quite possible that following Darwin's theory -- only the fittest would survive... which could essentially mean that only the giants would survive the price and economic wars while newbies sublime.

is it wise to charge for Customer Care-- especially for telcos?

2010-11-02T21:36:00.000+05:30

In an interesting article, Tony Poulos mentioned that it may not be wise for operators for charge for Customer Care operations. You can read the article here. The question is, could this be a revenue generator source for the telecom operators?

This being an interesting situation, the following is what I commented (the article has the complete details) :
"

This is an interesting topic! let me provide my perspective on this–
If you look at it, it is surprising that Customer Care could be a revenue generator option.

If you look at it– for a normal stand point this may not look beneficial for the telcos at all. But I tried to think about it from the perspective of a n-sided business model where the telcos would serve as ‘The Backbone’ for a multitude of offerings that are provided to the subscribers. True that if angry customers call up customer care, and are asked to pay there is a probability of churn– but probably there is also a large set of customers who could be made aware of the latest and greatest of offerings that they could avail of (from the companies who are participants in this n-sided business model) which in turn would help customers get the best in class service offering, aided by guidance from the customer care agent, and also allow the companies make money out of the transactions. In such a scenario, every transaction over the phone that the agent makes (or even speaks and thus advertises) with the customer could be a chargeable event for which the particular company pays the telco a charge similar to ‘advertisement’ charges. If the subscriber agrees to opt for the service after a successful persuasion by the customer care agent, the telco would not only gain from the call charge from the customer, but could potentially gain from the participating firm as a royalty for enabling business development for the company.

In such scenarios, the customer care agent really has to ‘act’ as the person taking “Care” of the customer.

This is not new, Having worked in ‘outsourced’ customer care departments for some other companies (primarily computer and hardware) I have seen customers’ mood swinging from irritated to understanding to finally happy. Some companies like HP even sell through regular customer care agents. (Agents get incentives for successful sales).So a lot actually depends on the ability of the customer care agent. Typically in these scenarios the agent needs to be able to ‘connect’ to the customer– that is a key element.

Similarly for telcos. If we look at a future of telecom consolidation, customer care could possibly one of revenue generating sources. Of course the telco would have to provide support to enable that ‘customers actually get benefits’ out of such service. Else, as you rightly say, churn is big possibility.

Last but not the least, in such scenarios, it is probably advisable to the telcos not to use AHT (Average call handling Time) as a metric of performance for the customer care agent. Typically for the AHT a customer care executive tends to undermine the real need of fulfilling the customers’ needs. Instead of AHT, the metric should always be targeted to estimate the ‘effort spent’ ‘BY’ the ‘customer’ in resolving the issue. This creates a case for creating satisfaction within the customers by lowering the pains of the ‘customer’.

"
It would be good to see where telecom as a business would land up in the future. An even more interesting phenomenon thus would be to see if 'business consolidation' could actually help in a sustainable business, or if it would simply mean that the giants survive while the newbies shrivel.

Do share your thoughts!

about Business, Ideas, and Revenue & Risk Management et al..

Double Jeopardy for AT & T

AT&T sued over alleged improper billing of services for hearing-impaired

D-Day-- ROC Revenue Assurance v5 Globally Launched

Subex to introduce ROC Revenue Assurance 5- a lot of 'first of its kind'

Tickling Human Emotions and Blaming it on Business by a Biased report

Power corrupts, Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely - The Story of a Mighty Fall

On a Kill Bill mission--Bharti Airtel and RCom

Building a Business- from the seed, to sapling to a giant

'INRA'- could this be tomorrow's definition for today's RA?

War of Worlds- The Tariff War in telecom continues- Time to Assure Business

An excellent read on Business Assurance from TMNG and GTB

A holistic approach to optimising business performance

Using Social Media for CRM or CEM

Here is a good article I caught up with on CRM / CEM. (This was published as an article in Yahoo)

On Cloud 2: making fans of customers on social media

Companies:

On Tuesday 26 April 2011, 12:00 PM

Telecom Asia Awards 2011 Presentation

Oracle CRM: Delivering a 'Wow' Customer Experience

"Optimizing" Revenue Assurance

Fumbled Tablet Strategy Cost Acer CEO His Job

Mobile Banking-- could this be a possible pain-reliever for telcos in India ?

Customer Data, Analytics and Future

'Face Off' - from revenue assurance to revenue optimization and the way forward

India - Is Your 'Middle' Class Vanishing or Are You approaching an effective Tipping Point ?

Deriving value out of analytics softwares in telecom - the question is how much ?

User Specific Attention from Google

Put boundaries to Revenue Assurance - or Just treat the Subscriber as the metric?

'3G tech vulnerable to cyber crime, says experts'

Telecom Business = Analytics + Social Media + Advertising + Usage platform + Consolidation

is it wise to charge for Customer Care-- especially for telcos?