The secret of smarter software and systems

Improving customer experience. Being more responsive. Both are essential for forward-thinking organisations because customers these days want to get their hands on the latest service features as soon as possible, rather than having to wait three months until the next software release.

At CityFibre, we’re committed to helping our ISP partners become much more fleet-of-foot – pushing out new service features quickly and reliably to their customers. To do that we need IT systems and software that’s nimble, scalable, smart and secure.

When it comes to agility though, the big industry barrier is non-standardised interfaces and vendor lock-ins. These cause friction and unnecessary cost for service providers and wholesalers looking to update and migrate systems quickly and seamlessly, and ultimately it is consumers who pay the price.

The solution, of course, is to promote open and standardised application programming interfaces (APIs) between vendors and service providers.

Fresh eyes for future benefits

As a young company, CityFibre is accelerating an approach to software development that not only helps our ISP partners but the industry overall.

We’ve already introduced more flexible ways of working to develop solutions for our wholesale partners faster and more efficiently. By increasing automation in our deployment and testing processes, we’re also pushing service features into production much faster.

At an industry level, we are actively championing Open APIs using TM Forum (TMF) standards to support event-driven architectures. We’re advocating a standardised approach. The goal is to be able to remove, add, or upgrade one app without interfering with other apps.

Once standardisation is achieved, changes become much easier, quicker and cheaper to implement, and the whole industry benefits, including end customers.

A modern mindset

Rapid-fire deployment of new releases is a key part of how CityFibre approaches software development. And so too is taking a more ‘DevOps’ approach, bringing together Development and Operations teams and stakeholders to work on shared business goals.

We actively practice Flow, Feedback, and Continuous Learning and Improvement – ‘the three ways of the DevOps’ movement. We aim to have a fast flow of features into our applications. We enable the three ways by following the industry-leading methodology - Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD). This methodology complements our DevOps approach, enabling us to make changes to features that are in development in minutes rather than weeks or months.

As opposed to the old ‘Big Bang’ approach, which seeks to get everything ‘right’ before product launch, the DevOps approach to product design is step-by-step, in small stages. If something is ‘wrong’ it can be rolled back immediately thanks to the constant and automated feedback loop.

This approach also encourages innovation. CityFibre is able to make frequent, ongoing improvements for ISP partners, benefitting them and their customers. We plan to interface much more closely with both build partners and wholesale customers to bring them into our DevOps ‘loop’. The goal is to roll out new features almost constantly in a controlled, intuitive and headache-free way. It’s about leading the way – but always in partnership.

Catalyst for change with TMF

Today, if operators buy a product off-the-shelf – CRM software, for example – it won’t natively work in an event-driven way with other apps. Bespoke code has to be written on top of it. With open APIs, however, products can plug together easily. Having consistent APIs for communication allows industry not only to be nimbler but also reap the cost benefits of a much more competitive supplier landscape.

TMF open API standards underpin the Forum’s vision of an Open Digital Framework (ODA) where all APIs are exposed in order to create standardised components. By using an ODA, operators’ ‘concept to cash’ timeframe can be cut from months to days.

The ODA vision is one CityFibre fully supports for event-driven architectures, it aligns with our challenger mentality and desire to set new standards for our industry. This is why we’re playing a lead role in a TMF Catalyst proof-of-concept (PoC) project – Async open APIs for event-based architectures. In summer 2022, two of our leading systems architects received an Outstanding Contributor Award for their part in TM Forum Collaboration work to drive progress in this space. In September, the event-driven Catalyst proof of concept, which has input from other operators and various vendors, was demonstrated and warmly received at the TM Forum Digital Transformation World event in Copenhagen.

TMF collaboration is something we’ll be implementing from now on and is another example of how we seek constantly to raise standards and expectations, for the benefit of everyone.