Communication service providers (CSPs) face a variety of unknowns as they draw up future strategies and invest in the operational and business systems to support them. Nonetheless, there are some common certainties, as senior executives from Airtel and Proximus discussed in the DTWS Hard Talk 'Building the telco of the future: an operational roadmap'.“I think probably there is no 100% full clarity [about what the operator stands for and where it is going]. In general, you see different telcos … in the world … taking off for different roads,” said Antionetta Mastroianni, Chief Digital & IT Officer, Proximus.
Telcos vary, for example, in how they perceive their role in future service ecosystems and the extent to which they will partner, as well as their focus on generating revenue from connectivity.
However, what all CSPs have in common, is “this needle boosting the connectivity and boosting the digital world and seeing the telco as the enabler of the digitalization of the future,” said Mastroianni.
“I think there is enough clarity on [what the operator stands for and where it is going,” according to Sudhir Kumar Mittal, Chief Architect, Bharti Airtel. “Of course, the bread and butter of telcos has been connectivity,” said Mittal. This month Bharti Airtel announced with Ericsson
a 5G trial to provide high-speed broadband coverage in a remote rural area of India. Mittal stressed the opportunity for CSPs to go beyond connectivity as they roll out 5G.
“It's really a big market for innovation. But having said that, connectivity per se is not going to create the perpetual value in the telcos,” said Mittal.
“There is really a challenge, or an opportunity, for telcos to go much beyond connectivity, and instead of becoming providers of connectivity, work on the digital solution providers, and with … digital stores and … with the new set of products bundles, and the scalable architecture of e-commerce.”
“It's not that the consumer is asking for just more bandwidth, consumers are asking for the innovation in the services and when telcos have to move up the value chain, that is where the real value lies, and that's where any other players are heading. By now we have a very clear vision in this direction,” said Mittal. “We are working towards the digital transformation providing the digital services, positioning ourselves as the digital solution providers, and that includes the connectivity.”
Optimus’ Mastroianni discussed how a move to operating within wider ecosystems will impact CSPs’ skills and culture.
“I really do believe that the future of telecom goes very much into the ecosystem [and] that means leveraging the power of the network to create and spill over digital services into the life of people,” said Mastroianni. “It's really important to be able to integrate every source of service … [and] in the future it would be quite difficult to have all the skills."
And one of the biggest adjustments for CSPs will be taking an open approach to partnerships.
“It's also new for all of us because we were very much used to have our own beautiful architecture fully integrated there and now basically we are requested to be much more open, much more flexible and eventually to integrate services, which originally were not a core part of our industry,” said Mastroianni.
Watch the DTWS Hard Talk 'Building the telco of the future: an operational roadmap' recording here.