Transformation can be a challenge for many telecom operators. While once a historically slow process, now time is of the essence to deliver a valuable cloud offer. For a telecom operator to transition to the cloud is not just about getting there, but about doing it quickly and achieving operational, cost and energy efficiencies.
CenturyLink said:
“Achieving operating efficiencies is an important component of our transformation. As our revenue mix continues to shift from legacy services to lower-margin strategic services in an increasingly competitive operating environment, we have focused on driving efficiency in our business. We are simplifying, rationalizing and modernizing our network and improving process automation to reduce costs. We are also implementing applications and work tools to improve sales efficiency. In recent years, we consolidated our internal IT operations from more than 10 data centers to four, and, by year-end 2015, we expect the vast majority of our new and strategic internal IT applications to be hosted in the cloud.”
The telecom operator’s transformation to the cloud requires the ability to achieve these efficiencies easily.
Remove manual processes
One area of importance is to remove manual processes to gain productivity efficiencies. Why? Because time consuming provisioning or manual intervention means the customer waits. Waiting means they turn to other cloud providers. One requirement for business transformation is becoming more automated with the cloud. Telecom operators need to add value over and above the cloud as well as OTT cloud services.
Leverage the existing user base
Telecom operators are in a unique position – they have a fantastic user base to leverage. They are already delivering telecom services, combined with enterprise adoption of cloud, so operators can deliver a high quality experience to secure their cloud business from the likes of Microsoft Azure, IBM, AWS or others. Enterprises try to consolidate the number of suppliers they purchase from. If a telecom operator can offer them the efficiency gains of having one supplier, they are well placed to maintain that relationship, so long as they deliver the same ease of use and range of features as a large cloud vendor.
Leveraging current infrastructure
Telecom’s already own the network so getting to the cloud is about giving an end-to-end high quality service.
The goal for the telecom operator is to increase end-user network consumption, gain or retain a billing relationship with customers, keep pace with customer demand and compete for cloud business. It’s all about leveraging the existing customer base to deliver cloud services that expand revenues. This transformation requires a reinvention and a mature cloud management solution is required to achieve this.
Grid Telekom Transforms with Flexiant
With over 20 years’ of experience, Grid Telekom is one of Turkey’s leading telecommunication companies. To offer its cloud services, the telco needed to move away from its manual process to provide a self-service platform.
Khalid Ahmed, Grid Telekom said, “We needed a cloud orchestration solution so we investigated Flexiant, InContinuum and VMUnify. We chose Flexiant Cloud Orchestrator because of its ease of use and feature set.”
Ahmed continued, “Flexiant’s user interface and control panel was straightforward giving us exactly the self-service capabilities we required.”
To learn more about what’s needed to complete the telecom transformation, download the whitepaper on Cloud Risks and Opportunities Every Telecom Operator Needs to Know.
