In focus: Customer experience From the core of the network to the customer Infrastructure sharing ServCo vs. NetCo the competition shift.

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1 no 1/2012 [14] The Magazine of Comarch Telecommunications Business Unit In this issue: In focus: Customer experience From the core of the network to the customer Infrastructure sharing ServCo vs. NetCo the competition shift Beyond BSS/OSS OSS/BSS integration the building block of the era of big data Challenges and opportunities of multi-market transformations enhancement of roaming call back user experience

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3 Preface 3 C Customer experience is a strong point of all conferences and seminars in telecommunications. It s definitely a good topic for discussion because everyone agrees that it s a crucial problem for each retail business model since the market is saturated. Each OSS/BSS vendor has a number of software products and best practices under the common name of Customer Experience Management. Comarch also offers a substantial CEM portfolio of modules. But this issue is focused on how to implement customer centric processes in a traditionally technology centric organization like a telecommunications operator, and how to use modern user interfaces and technologies to simplify and automate interaction with customers and business partners. Very often it requires redefining the old market approach from what to how. Like, what we offer, what we do towards how it s delivered, how it s recognized, how it s supported. Nobody argues that Steve Jobs iphone defined a new era in telecommunications. People are moving from click based PCs, feature phones and Blackberries to touch screen handsets and terminals because it s more natural for us that we buy and take things by touching rather than clicking or typing in Internet browsers. This kind of interaction model requires adequate information about the product and delivery process, real time data exchange during order capture, and automation of delivery across network technologies and third party content services. Just touch and use. Don t hesitate to touch more! A simple and trusted service is the first key. In a recent white paper, View From The Digital Inbox 2011, published by Merkel, a customer relationship agency in July 2011, respondents were asked for the primary reason of becoming fans of big brands on Facebook. The majority s response was I genuinely like their product or service. 20% of respondents Like a brand s page on Facebook because their friend Likes or recommends it. Other findings show that customers don t expect tons of product newsletters and e-brochures. They want to receive exclusive deals and offers (57%), enter a sweepstakes (38%), receive exclusive content (37%). Everyone hates spam but likes to be nicely surprised and exclusively awarded. 20% of the results pointed to because my friends clicked on it already or recommended it. Discounts and promotions available to everyone such as 10% off of data transfer price don t build loyalty. A 10% off award or trial access to a pre-offered service for John Smith works for John Smith and for his friends. Developing a dynamic customer profile instead of static marketing segments is the second key. Customer experience in a retail business depends on the time we have to spend to park our car at a parking lot, on the quality of the products we purchase and the time we have to spend at the cashiers desk. Analogously customer experience in a telecom business is strongly dependent on the readiness of a network service, front service accuracy and back office performance operations. In an era of broadband internet, telcos are implementing proactive service assurance solutions supported by a self-optimizing OSS layer. A customer may forgive for the temporary lack of access or quality degradation of a service but won t forgive for the lack of accurate action and information from the operator s side. Proactive service management and closing the loop between the OSS and BSS domain are the third key in improving customer experience. The role of a software vendor is to actively support business transformation processes with products and best practices. I invite you to explore the customer experience topic with us, with this edition of the Comarch Technology Review Magazine. piotr machnik Comarch SA Vice President, Product Management & Marketing Telecommunications Business Unit Comarch Technology Review is a publication created by Comarch experts and specialists. It is created to assist our customers and partners in obtaining in-depth information about market trends and developments, and the technological possibilities of addressing the most important issues. Editor-in-Chief: Alina Wietrzny [email protected] Layout & DTP: Adam Dąbrowski, Dominik Pietruszka Proofreader: Katherine Meus Photos: Publisher: Comarch SA Al. Jana Pawła II 39a, Kraków Tel , Fax: Print: Skleniarz Printing House ul. J. Lea 118, Kraków Circulation: Technology Review is a free publication available by subscription. The articles published here can be copied and reproduced only with the knowledge and consent of the editors. The names of products and companies mentioned are trade marks and trade names of their producers. To receive your subscription to the electronic version or see the previous issues, please visit: tr.comarch.com. Comarch s offices in Poland: Krakow (HQ), Warsaw, Gdansk, Wroclaw, Poznan, Katowice, Lodz, Lublin Worldwide Offices: Americas Panama Panamá United States of America Chicago Europe Austria Vienna Belgium Brussels Finland Espoo France Lille, Grenoble Lithuania Vilnius Germany Dresden, Frankfurt/Main, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, Muenster, Duesseldorf, Bremen Russia Moscow Slovakia Bratislava Ukraine Kyiv, Lviv Middle East United Arab Emirates Dubai Asia China Shanghai Vietnam Ho Chi Minh City

4 4 table of content s What s new 5 News in Brief In Focus: CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE From the core of the network to the customer Currently, operators face many challenges, this article will focus on four key OSS functions that, when concentrated on the customer, deliver CSP differentiation while controlling costs. CRM the role of OSS for improving customer experience The role of OSS in customer experience improvement has been the subject of many articles published in the Technology Review magazine. Most articles tackle the problem from the customer service quality perspective, emphasizing the role of OSS assuring that customer services work anywhere and anytime significantly contributing to customer satisfaction. But can OSS systems also improve customer experience in the most traditional aspect of customer - provider relations and in particular in interaction? Optimization of network planning processes as a key solution for increasing efficiency Planning and deploying a mobile network is one of the key cost generators for operators. When an operator chooses a multi-vendor strategy, the number of platforms and systems used to transfer the need of a site into a running network element is particularly significant. In this article I will discuss the way to integrate and rearrange the IT landscape, together with corresponding business process reengineering. Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance Customer experience (CE) has become the main battleground for communication service providers (CSP s) and a concept that defines today s BSS/ OSS systems. And, as quality of service (QoS) is one of the essential factors for achieving customer satisfaction, assurance systems gain importance. This all may sound like an obvious thing to say, but what is not so obvious is how (network) assurance can be turned into a measure of CE. Outsourcing network management directions and strategies Mobile and fixed operators face constant challenge to optimize cost structures. One of the approaches to realize this goal is to outsource network management. This trend already began a few years ago and seems to be growing constantly. On one hand, outsourcing may diminish network control, which is still considered by many operators as a core part of their business. On the other hand, it gives a chance to transform current relations with the network. This would give opportunity to adapt to new business design and concentrate on services delivered to a customer. 22 Infrastructure sharing - ServCo vs. NetCo - the competition shift Very interesting changes on the telecommunication market can be currently observed. Telecommunication operators (telcos), who have been very bitter competitors in the field of the infrastructure, are starting to cooperate with each other, going even as to creating a joint venture to realize the idea of infrastructure sharing. This idea is driven by the need to reduce huge expenses on infrastructure, that result from the fact, that capacity data services demand more and more capacity. 24 Win customer experience and transform techs from regular employees to customer advisors After the Service Management Expo 2011 conference, held in Birmingham, I realized that currently there are 3 most important aspects in field service management (mobile workforce management): field forces mobilization, scheduling optimization and human resources. CHICAGO VOICE 29 Building Customer Loyalty in the Telecom Market In the wireless industry, a new phone with a 2 year contract has been the definitive incentive program for years. The telecom industry, like others is plagued by churn; in fact the majority of new customers are churn customers. It is difficult to understand why most companies have not moved beyond this weak approach. The consumer has to choose between a huge amount of competitive products and services all offering similar incentive packages. Brands need to move beyond this antiquated method. Through the proper use of a pervasive loyalty solution, telecoms can begin to provide a memorable experience in order differentiate their product and attract and retain loyal consumers. BeyonD BSS/OSS 30 OSS/BSS Integration The Building Block of the Era of Big Data Frost & Sullivan has witnessed the telecommunications world change significantly over the last ten years. The evolution of customer demand, supported by the broadband development, has led to the emergence of new services such as internet television, video on demand and voice over IP. Customers require more complex, tailored packages with high service quality. 34 Challenges and Opportunities of Multi-Market Transformations In one of the previous releases of the Technology Review Magazine I introduced the principles of business transformation that go one or two steps further than standard transformations which in the telecom world typically mean OSS or BSS transformations. This article will address one of the challenges related to a multi-market business transformation from a practical point of view delivering similar products to different markets via different OSS systems and infrastructure of own and third party networks. 38 M2M Multi-level Communication Can you think of a logistic enterprise with a fleet of vehicles going around the globe with a single control center for checking locations, engine parameters, statistics of kilometers made, sending locations for the cheapest fuel prices etc. Now try to imagine a solution that supports all of the above. It could be covered only by a multi-level platform with a huge set of complex automated processes. Surely, it cannot be described in one short sentence. 42 What makes a good user interface for a mobile application The User Interface (UI) of a technical device of any kind, including computer applications, is the only way a human can tell a device what to do, provide data and get feedback from the device. In a nutshell, is the only way to speak to soulless machinery. There is, however, a huge difference between an interface allowing a person just to communicate with a device and one which makes communication convenient and effective. So how to achieve the latter? 44 Enhancement of roaming call back user experience Due to the increasing amount of players on the telecommunications market, operators must look for new strategies for cost reduction in order to retain their competitiveness and provide attractive services to their (potential) clients. The attractiveness of a service, however, is not only measured in terms of its price and functionality, but also in relation to the usability and user experience, which are major ingredients of how lucrative a service is to customers in the present-day market. 46 Comarch Private Cloud Computing Cloud Computing In its broadest usage, the term refers to the delivery of scalable IT services over the Internet. Those resources include application services and the infrastructure on which they operate. An organization can purchase these resources on an as-needed basis and avoid capital costs of software and hardware. 50 The Comarch Billing Cloud enabled fringout to grow from zero to millions of users Being that the mobile VoIP services market has advanced, fring designed an innovative product that allows making phone calls from their application to mobile and landline phone networks. The Comarch Billing Cloud solution was selected in order to provide rating, charging and billing of services of this revolutionary business idea in real-time. Telcosphere blog 52 4 Facts about Telco field services 54 Customer experience through the eyes of an average subscriber 56 The eternal question - repair or replace? 58 Escape from frequency migration havoc

5 NEWS In Brief 5 News in Brief Recent Contract Recent Partnership MTS Russia selects Comarch as a strategic partner for service assurance and service inventory Comarch Next Generation Service Assurance and Comarch Service Inventory Management solutions are to be used for managing MTS mobile and fixed networks in Russia. Recent Product Launches UPnP FORUM introduces new official compliance test tool developed by Comarch UPnP Forum, a leading global home networking standards group launched its new official certification test tool UCTT 2.0 developed by Comarch. This will surely strengthen the confidence in UPnP technology and extend the scope and relevance of the Forum s certification program Comarch introduces a Spectrum Migration Management Platform To support operators in facing the challenge of redeploying frequency bands in mobile networks, Comarch has enriched its Next Generation Network Planning solution with a Spectrum Migration Management Platform Comarch BSS/CRM Suite enriched with the new version of the loyalty management solution During the last decade, loyalty and reward management systems have evolved from simple tools designed to collect loyalty points and exchange them for low quality goods, to sophisticated systems and platforms supporting the most critical business processes of customer database management and active churn prevention. The new version of Comarch Loyalty Management enables for the development of effective, unique loyalty programs for residential, SOHO, SMEs and enterprise segments Comarch partners with OpenCloud to boost service provider innovation Comarch, a global telecom software provider and OpenCloud, a telecom service layer solution provider announced a global partnership agreement today. The partnership s goal is to enable service providers to increase service innovation with open development techniques, and operate efficiently within a multi-service and multi-network environment. Latest Memberships Comarch becomes a Silver Member of The Linux Foundation Comarch, a global provider of IT solutions for major economic sectors, announced today that it has become a member of The Linux Foundation, a nonprofit consortium dedicated to protecting and accelerating the growth of Linux open source software Comarch joins the GENIVI Alliance Comarch, a global provider of IT solutions for major economic sectors, announced today that it has become an Associate member of GENI- VI Alliance, an automotive and consumer electronics industry association devoted to the development and support of the In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI) reference platform.

6 6 Hot In focus: topic: customer Aiming for experience Perfect Customer Experience From the core of the network to the customer HOW OSS ENSURES A SEAMLESS CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE Nancee Ruzicka Stratecast (a Division of Frost & Sullivan) Director OSS/BSS Strategy A recent Stratecast survey of more than 120 Communication Service Provider (CSP) executives, worldwide, reveals that 91% believe their business must be fundamentally or substantially transformed to remain competitive in the future. The need for customer focus is resonating with CSPs as they reinvent themselves as retailers, rather than capacity plumbers. Customers want a one-stop shop; they want reliable products that are delivered quickly and easily. By defining processes as the customer sees them rather than what is convenient for the business or what has been used in the past, CSPs can retain their status as trusted providers and take advantage of the brand recognition they have worked so hard to establish. The transformation underway in the communications industry means that CSPs will compete to deliver products and quality, not connectivity. Networks have always been deployed based on customer demand, and as the volume and variety of infrastructure increases, the factors driving CSPs to invest have not changed. What has changed is the need for CSPs to differentiate themselves based on the quality of the multitude of products and services being delivered, while at the same time becoming competitive retailers that are relentless about customer satisfaction. The challenges are many and this report will focus on four key OSS functions that, when focused on the customer, deliver CSP differentiation while controlling costs: Fulfillment, from product definition to delivery Assurance, from the customer to the core of the network End-to-end network upgrade Dynamic capacity management using self-organizing networks (SON) While CSPs rotate their businesses to focus on customers, they must also horizontally align OSS/BSS to work consistently across the business and support multiple products, services, customers and partners. GOAL #1: EXCELLENT CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE CSPs are trying hard to focus on the customer experience. That requires a radical shift in thinking about the way that products are defined, created, delivered, billed for and supported. The connections, the devices, the features and applications, as well as billing and customer support functions must be simple, straightforward and of the highest possible quality. In order to monetize existing investments in infrastructure and OSS/BSS, operations must be responsive and reliable, while access to OSS/BSS by partners and customers must be seamless and automated.

7 In focus: customer experience 7 Figure 1. Customer experience requirements. Source: Stratecast Customers will buy based on device and application choice rather than network loyalty, and they will be driven away by inadequate offerings, inflexible product and pricing plans, inaccurate activation, poor performance and incompetent support. CSPs will differentiate themselves by understanding customer needs and accurately translating those needs into OSS and network infrastructure that can deliver. Maintaining a positive customer experience requires that CSPs deliver unique, high-quality products and implement customer-focused processes and OSS/BSS as shown in Figure 1. If the network is assumed and products are commoditized then customer experience is the only differentiator relevant to product development, sales, usability, operational quality and support when something goes wrong. THE 4 C S CHALLENGING CSPS The Four-C s: complexity, competition, cost, and customer demand, are taxing every part of CSP operations. This pressure leads CSPs to rely more heavily on OSS/BSS to simplify operations and manage costs while rapidly delivering new, high quality services. The size and complexity of telecom networks has increased exponentially and so has the volume and variety of services being offered by CSPs for dozens of devices that are no longer restricted to a common access network. CSPs also have to manage traffic from third party bandwidth and content providers, as well as the intelligent devices in customer s hands and homes. And yet, regardless of the source of a problem, the CSP will be blamed for a failure. As a result, CSPs are obligated to operate and maintain a rapidly expanding inventory of network elements, applications, servers, data bases and delivery environments. Competition CSPs are still vulnerable to direct competition (other telecom operators), but now computer vendors (Apple), software vendors (Microsoft) and Internet vendors (Google) pose a threat as well. Those companies are not competing with CSPs at the network construction or operations level, they are competing strictly at the product level. That very fundamental difference between CSPs and over-the-top competitors emphasizes the need for CSPs that own network infrastructure to make maximum use of the capabilities of that investment to deliver products, quality and innovation to their customers that over-the-top providers cannot. Ideas in brief: 4 OSS functions that will influence change in CSPs customer experience The most critical business priorities in CSPs assurance strategy The benefits of including customer data in the network planning, engineering and design processes Complexity Cost The ability of a CSP to monetize its network lies in thecapabilities of its OSS. Network infrastructure is a large capital in-

8 8 In focus: customer experience vestment, and the ability to improve the utilization of existing infrastructure, find under-utilized assets, improve planning efficiency and maximize the investment, is becoming apparent. As the volume and complexity of networks, products and applications continue to explode, many unintended consequences result from modifying an application or interface. Beyond the cost of implementing and maintaining this myriad of software, there is now a genuine risk that any change could adversely affect the performance of the network and services and, ultimately, the customer. Customer Demand As network access and communication services become commoditized, customer experience and service quality will become the differentiators for CSPs. While ensuring the health and performance of the connections is still a critical function, the demands on OSS continue to increase. And customers aren t letting up. They want mobile data capabilities that are as fast and capable as what is delivered via cable, DSL or fiber; they want video services on-demand and recorded for playback when they choose; and high-quality voice service is a given. Customers will be reluctant to add new services or continue to use a service that is not performing. There is no increase in revenue per user if a product or a provider is perceived as marginal. OSS THE KEY TO CUSTOMER satisfaction The commoditization of capacity and conversion of all traffic to data does not mean that the value of OSS is diminished. On the contrary, OSS is responsible for the quality and reliability of the connection to the customer and absolutely critical to enabling and ensuring a positive customer experience. CSP networks are large and complex, but customers only care about their own connection. The systems that activate, monitor and manage the quality of the products used by customers on a daily basis are the key to building and maintaining a solid customer relationship. Agile OSS is the key to executing processes that manage customer connections from the core of the network to the user device, while gathering, correlating and distributing critical data to all facets of the CSP business. Fulfillment A major consequence of the structural, and often organizational, divide between network-facing functions (OSS) and customer-facing functions (BSS) is a lack of coordination between the design of an offer and the functional and technical realities of delivering that same offer. CRM systems handle offer design and order capture functions, while network-facing fulfillment systems deliver against that order. But what these systems do not do well is communicate during the offer design activity to establish the technical and operational feasibility of delivering the offer; manage orders that have to be delivered across multiple fulfillment stacks; or handle changes to an order as it is being processed. As CSPs develop offers based on a virtually unlimited combination of individual product components, the importance of aligning OSS with the customer becomes apparent. The Product Lifecycle includes product planning, product availability, product activation, and product support. Delays in bringing new products to market are no longer just network issues. Rather, the focus has shifted to the OSS platforms and the business functions that are supported. To deliver unique, personalized products and ensure customer satisfaction while still managing costs, CSPs have outlined a number of key fulfillment requirements including: Reduced time-to-market Process automation and integration Reuse Customer self-service Cost reduction CSPs are developing fulfillment strategies intended to create a simple, reliable, accurate and unique customer experience. The execution of a cohesive process that gets a customer from the point of receiving an offer to using a product requires complex orchestration of disparate networks, systems and product offerings. Assurance A better customer experience requires a better approach to Assurance. While some CSPs still separate network assurance from service and customer assurance, many are evolving their operations to achieve the goal of customer assurance by correlating network status data with status and performance data collected about the services and the users. Assurance is only one factor in determining the overall customer experience, but it is the daily measure of CEM.

9 In focus: customer experience 9 There is no longer an expectation that, just because the network is working, a service is working or the product being used by an individual is working. Likewise, failure of an individual s service will likely not show up as a network failure. The one-to-one correlation is gone and has been replaced by a many-to-many correlation that is much harder to manage. End-to-End Network Upgrade CSPs have begun to embrace a factory approach to the design and delivery of communication products. This approach emphasizes horizontal integration within and among processes such that the resultant processes are common across sales channels, product offerings and operations. The result is that network and OSS silos can be collapsed, consolidated and integrated to operate more accurately, efficiently and cost effectively. While particular attention is being paid to implementing customer-facing product strategies; there has been less attention paid to the factory itself the network. Since there are no products without the network, it is equally important that network planning, engineering and design functions also embrace a customer-facing approach. Upgrading the network provides the machinery on which all production occurs. If those architectures and processes are not aligned with customer and product demands, CSPs will experience significant fulfillment and assurance problems. Dynamic Capacity Management As the use of bandwidth increases and subscribers use more applications than ever before, the network is under pressure to deliver the right amount of capacity to multiple access platforms. The process is neither cheap nor simple. The mobile nature of customer devices, and the amount of capacity being used, makes predicting the location and time that demand will change very difficult. The alternative is to over-build the network such that every site can accommodate every possible demand scenario, which is expensive and likely to make mobile data services even less profitable. Even though billions are being spent to build additional capacity, it is important to ensure that the network is optimized and capacity can be delivered just-in-time. Dynamic Capacity Management should be seen as an OSS function that is closely aligned with Assurance but not too far removed from Network Planning and Engineering. Network planning and engineering groups are responsible for construction of the network, creation of capacity, deployment of network assets and configuration of both the logical and physical network, as well as the configuration of underlying service elements. Capacity planning and engineering groups are responsible for adjusting traffic and modifying existing configurations to respond to immediate customer and traffic demands that result from increased utilization, outages or changes in customer behavior. A lack of automation and inconsistent data result in numerous design errors, incorrect budget calculations, configuration errors, delays and increased costs. Mobile network operators are considering implementation of self-organizing networks (SON) for traffic management and capacity optimization. Although currently associated with LTE deployments, a number of network element vendors are developing add-ons for existing equipment. SON distributes a number of OSS functions directly to the hardware, while sophisticated software correlates network, product and customer data to determine where capacity is needed and when. Although the concept of SON is not new, only recently have vendors and CSPs been able to deploy the network infrastructure and OSS required to make SON feasible. The customer experience is improved by SON as new products are activated quicker and the time required to solve problems is reduced. New products can be rolled out faster and users experience better performance while network costs are contained. SUMMARY The technological advances of the past several years have allowed CSPs to evolve from traditional suppliers of separate, network-dependent services into carriers delivering converged services on top of converged networks. That convergence, while creating transport efficiencies and enabling the launch of a plethora of new products, comes with significant OSS challenges. CSPs recognize that responding to customer demands for product innovation requires an OSS strategy that delivers timely, accurate data to users across the business, while maintaining the high standards of quality that customers have come to expect from communication networks. Managing the customer experience requires OSS capable of delivering products that ensure quality from the handset to the core of the network, as well as rapidly responding to problems. * This article is an abstract of a more detailed white paper. To download the white paper please visit

10 10 In focus: BSS/OSS customer TRANSFORMATION experience CRM - the role of OSS for improving customer experience Łukasz Mendyk Comarch SA OSS Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit Sceptics may say, that nowadays customers do not complain, they just churn. This is why pro-activeness capabilities are so important. T he role of OSS in customer experience improvement has been the subject of many articles published in the Technology Review magazine. Most articles tackle the problem from the customer service quality perspective, emphasizing the role of OSS assuring that customer services work anywhere and anytime significantly contributing to customer satisfaction. But can OSS systems also improve customer experience in the most traditional aspect of customer - provider relations and in particular in interaction? The answer seems obvious, better customer QoS means more customers are satisfied and so CSP is perceived better. This contributes to more intangible flavours of CE which is about human aspects and thus beyond just measurable QoS. But can OSS systems improve these human aspects which are traditionally tackled at the BSS domain by Customer Relation Management (CRM) systems? The answer is yes, and it is not about OSS intruding the BSS layer but rather about seamless BSS/OSS integration. The idea is to provide, at the CRM level, a complete insight into all the issues that impact customer services and thus the customer itself, and originate from network problems. Having this insight is supposed to improve the human aspect. A scenario which demonstrates this is when a customer contacts the operator issuing a complaint about its services. When a CRM system has insight into customer service issues, the customer can be informed that the referred to issues have been detected, the root cause is known, and the resolution process has begun. If the customer can be provided with an estimated time of problem resolution then that s even better. This means the ability to alleviate initial customer dissatisfaction caused by the experienced service problem. Sceptics may say, that nowadays customers do not complain, they just churn. This is why pro-activeness capabilities are so important. Pro-activeness has two aspects. The first aspect is the ability to prevent the customer from experiencing problems with services. In a nutshell, this requires OSS systems to be able to monitor the network, detect network problems and translate them into customer services impact. When customer services detect a network problem, the problem resolution process may begin, prior to the customer issuing the complaint. What is important is that customer impact serves as the priority gauge for the network/ resource resolution process. The second aspect of pro-activeness is that the lack of customer complaints does not necessary mean that the customer is happy. The OSS system provides insight into customer service issues to CRM and enables to pro-actively contact the cus-

11 In focus: customer experience 11 tomer. The idea is that instead of waiting for customer complaints, it is better to contact the customer and inform him about a detected problem and provide him with detailed information about the action being undertaken. Someone may argue that this may be a risky strategy to contact the customer without been 100% sure that he really is experiencing problems. Leaving aside the discussion whether it is better to unnecessarily contact 10 customers than risk losing one unhappy customer, the role of OSS is to provide precise information about customer service issues while avoiding unnecessary alarms. Moreover, OSS can provide detailed information about what the technical issue is. Although customers may not understand technical details, providing precise information when contacting a customer can be appreciated by the customer as proof that contact is not purely a marketing spam. This in return proves that CSP really makes an effort to provide the customer with the possible service. The presented capabilities can be a source of significant competitive advantage over other communication service providers. Customer experience surveys show that many customers are still disappointed with service providers who are very passive, and wait for customers to complain. And even when registering a customer complaint, it is not rare that customers are asked very difficult detailed questions that are hard to answer. Yet another role of the OSS system is to provide all necessary data to CRM in order to avoid asking the customer technical questions. These detailed questions are sometimes perceived by the customer as a method to discourage him from issuing a complaint and thus avoid the cost of compensation for the poor QoS. This may seriously damage CSP s image and cause significant churn. Details on how to achieve necessary CRM-OSS integration can be found in the Comarch whitepaper entitled Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance. In a nutshell, the idea is to employ the Product-Customer Facing Service (CFS) Resource Facing Service Resource model with CFS as the uniting element between BSS and OSS systems. All issues detected by OSS systems, which have impact on the customer, are reported on Customer Facing Service (CFS) which the CRM system should have insight to. Concluding, the role of OSS in improving Customer Experience is not only limited to assuring good customer service quality but also to help traditional CRM systems be pro-active in customer interactions. By providing insight into customer issues which originate from a network problem, the OSS system enables via CRM systems to create an image of the provider who really makes an effort to improve customer satisfaction. OSS can help make communication with the customer be perceived not just as a marketing spam. Ideas in brief: CRM needs insight into all customer service issues originating from the network Pro-activeness - ability to contact the customer before he churns CRM-OSS integration is a must

12 12 In focus: BSS/OSS customer TRANSFORMATION experience Optimization of network planning processes as a key solution for increasing efficiency Jakub Załuski-Kapusta Comarch SA Telco Consulting Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit P lanning and deploying a mobile network is one of the key cost generators for operators. When an operator chooses a multi-vendor strategy, the number of platforms and systems used to transfer the need of a site into a running network element is particularly significant. In this article I will discuss the way to integrate and rearrange the IT landscape, together with corresponding business process reengineering. Introduction A typical IT landscape of multi-vendor mobile operators consists of a number of different tools: Network inventories with site lifecycle milestones Radio planning tools Configuration management tools. Such an architecture also requires a number of various internal interfaces, which can either be automatic or based on manual export/import features. Any of the business processes introduced to manage the planning and rollout of the network contain a number of steps, needed to ensure that certain data is properly recorded in a given system. Additionally, in most cases a lot of these systems (especially related to inventories and lifecycle management) are legacy, homemade tools. This is caused by the fact that many operators perceive their network management processes as unique and ones that require dedicated tools (or in the case of commercially available products, require huge customization). Configuration management systems, on the other hand, must cope with very closed and complex Network Management Systems (NMS) delivered by network vendors. Special features in the network caused these systems to be customized and, in many cases, hard to upgrade. Additionally, many of the older systems do not have an up-to-date picture of the network in their databases. All of these problems turned network planning and rollout into a very complex process, with hundreds of workarounds for simple operations, not supported by tools already in use. On the one hand, using these landscapes lowers the efficiency of network delivery departments, on the other hand, even when they produce configuration, it very often contains a number of errors and is not optimal.

13 In focus: customer experience 13 Radio Elaborate Configuration Proposal for Radio NE Comercial Order Execute Frequency Approval Radio Radio Plan Parameters Acceptance Transport Plan Transport Connection Plan Transport Connection Plan BSS Parameters Core Rollout Elaborate Technical Proposal Execute LOS Testing Negotiate Lease Contract Modify Infrastructure Build Network Element/ Antenna Send Notice Beginning of Operation SIP Operations Establish Connection to NE Figure 1. Example of a business view of a process Process Redesign In order to start thinking about lean, smooth and efficient processes, mobile operators have to stop thinking about applications. The most crucial step is to start the OSS transformation program with identifying the most important processes in a radio network, like a new site, a system swap or an integration process. At the beginning, a decent tool for process documentation should be selected. Still, it is quite common to use MS Visio diagrams, or MS Excel files to document work. Proper tools should allow to draw processes on different levels of detail, mapping them onto applications, interfaces and data models. The next step is to document the radio process, as it should be, without any applications working in the background. Such an approach allows to focus on important steps, without all the legacy steps, introduced to overcome the lack of functionalities. Fig. 1 presents a business view of a process without any application background. In order to get all the necessary operations, only the most crucial processes need to be modeled. Many other processes will just use the same business activities as crucial ones. When remodeling those processes, it is also important to remember about changes in the organization. User roles should be defined within the processes, without looking back at the existing organizational structure. Necessary mapping or changes can be carried out later, when implementing new processes in the mobile operator s organization. Reassigning users to new roles is not an easy task. Of course, existing engineers will be strongly inclined to follow the existing processes. It is therefore required to introduce a real mind change regarding process reengineering, with the use of external experts if necessary. Example of Process Reengineering the network integration process One of the most crucial processes for a mobile operator is the network integration process. Efficiency of an operator and network quality result from this process. A typical process Most operators still use the so called Turn On Cycle (TOC) process to orchestrate changes. This process defines a number Ideas in brief: Reengineering your planning and configuration processes Work and network under control - process-driven planning and execution

14 14 In focus: customer experience of changes to be executed in a defined period of time. Radio planners provide network configuration at the end of TOC. This means that it is necessary to manually update the configuration for each day and each integration in the Configuration Management (CM) systems. This creates additional potential for errors in configuration and puts an extensive load on planners to verify if the requested configuration is in place. Some of the errors can be identified only by drive tests or customer complaints. An optimized simple integration process The proposed solution is based on a simplified process for network integration and tools with capabilities that support such a process. The process identifies all integration that happens in a period of time and divides the operation into physical integration and optimization. Fig 2 presents the process. Within the first part of the process, all deletion commands are prepared and integration is executed based on default parameters. After necessary tests, the site becomes active, but locked for commercial traffic. A basket of other sites is created for a given network cluster. In the second part of the process, this basket is optimized with the final configuration and integration for all sites. Within this process sites are marked as commercially available. The process itself is executed very closely to the data, which is automatically updated based on the network reconciliation process. This is vital in order to bring the planners closer to real network configuration, so that the plan they prepared can be executed without causing problems in the network. Process-driven configuration management To support the described process a change in approach and tools is needed. In the past, configuration would have been identified via files or configuration dumps, containing changes for a given day. For new process such an approach is no longer efficient. Tools must be changed in order to support the relationship between processes and managed data. This is the beginning of the process-driven configuration management era. All changes in configuration are handled as a delta, which is assigned to a given process. With this approach, a planner receives flexibility and control over the changes carried out in the network. Such data organization is not easy. Some operators have been following this direction already, commonly with the use of tools, where planners have to manually assign changes to the process. However, real efficiency is possible, when the interface between data and processes is handled automatically. Implement Radio Dependency Deletion Files Integration Initialization Prepare Integration Assume Next Day Integration Create/Modify Measure List Reconciliation Estimate LifeNet Create Radio Dependency Deletion Files Precalculate Radio Parametrs Create Deletion Files Create and Deliver Initializing Files Estimate LiveNet, Evaluate Results Integration Finalization Realize Imlement Measures and Deletion Files Implement Initializing files Confirm Actualise Integration Date Measures List Plan Finalizing Files Create Load Files Realize Measures and Implement Finalizing Files Figure 2. Simple integration process

15 In focus: customer experience 15 Further optimization with SON capabilities The presented approach is somehow natively compatible with so called SON (Self-Organizing Networks) functionalities. This means that such a process can easily incorporate the configuration automatically created or adjusted by an external system. Two cases of the SON function implementation may occur. The first is a real SON functionality in the network elements or/and in the NMS. Such functionality could be responsible for fine tuning a neighbor relationship, power or other soft parameters of a network. In such a case, the process can understand, that certain data is automatically adjusted by the network, and that it just makes sure to reconcile and put the right information back in the network inventory. The second case is a scenario where a special application for OSS-based optimization is implemented and held responsible for providing fine-tuned configuration to the network. In both cases the process can be accelerated because it is not required to plan the configuration with a high level of detail. The algorithms that are used can be less complex or can work on data with higher resolution. Increasing efficiency Operators are currently under pressure of cost optimization. On the other hand, the smartphone revolution and related market trends require more and more capacity in the network. This generates requirements for integrating more network elements while consistently lowering costs and means that fewer human resources are used for network planning. In order to achieve this, operators must focus on the following items: Decreasing the number of achieved network configuration errors with an increased level of automation in network planning and integration processes Faster planning with a higher role of post-integration optimization. Both these items can be achieved only by transforming the OSS landscape and optimization processes that are currently in use.

16 16 In focus: customer experience Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance Łukasz Mendyk Comarch SA OSS Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit C ustomer experience (CE) has become the main battleground for communication service providers (CSPs) and a concept that defines today s BSS/OSS systems. And, as quality of service (QoS) is one of the essential factors for achieving customer satisfaction, assurance systems gain importance. This all may sound like an obvious thing to say, but what is not so obvious is how (network) assurance can be turned into a measure of CE. There are many issues on the way to achieving this goal. Many service providers have not yet implemented automatic diagnosing of customer complaints. Often, when such a complaint is issued, their network operation departments claim that the network is operating correctly and all technical metrics are in green. In these circumstances, more advanced service assurance that includes pro-active customer complaint management (the ability to prevent degradation of customer service quality) becomes mission impossible. These obstacles may result from the fact that network operation departments have been traditionally more focused on the network infrastructure than on the customer. But it s also an outcome of the increasing complexity of services, and the fact that various services may have different requirements towards the same technical parameters. This, in turn, changes the expectations towards OSS systems. The traditional network / resource perspective, typical for fault and performance management systems, needs to be shifted. Service providers need to start looking at the network from the viewpoint of the quality of services, that are delivered to the end customer. This article will describe such a transformation from network assurance to customer service assurance. Towards customer service assurance where to start? Traditional network assurance comprises of two complementary systems: Performance Management (PM) and Fault Management (FM). The first one deals with network performance metrics (KPI), and the second one with network outages. Performance metrics can have a defined threshold, which should generate an alarm feed to the FM system, once ex-

17 In focus: customer experience 17 Network & Service Inventory OSS hub Service assurance CRM SQM CRM Customer complaint CRM Customer Focus Customer Facing Services Calculate Customer service impact Calculate Customer service quality What customer service complaint refers to? Resource Facing Services Identify impacted technical services Translate KPIs into KQIs What is a root cause? Network Focus Resources Identify faulty resources Measure resource KPIs Identify network resources causing the problem Figure 1. Transformation towards customer service assurance Ideas in brief: ceeded. This way PM and FM systems provide comprehensive network assurance. But, as both systems manage the network only from the resource perspective, they can t directly provide information about the impact on customer services. PM and FM can tell you if some network elements are experiencing outages or what the technical parameters of network connections are, but they will not inform you what kind of impact these network problems have on customer services. The transformation described below aims for being able to translate network faults and metrics into customer service issues and metrics (KQIs). It also means easily supporting end-to-end processes in customer service assurance as depicted in Figure 1. Transformation should be based on augmenting the PM and FM systems respectively with service quality management (SQM)and service monitoring systems. This augmentation should enable calculations of the network alarms impact on customer services and translate technical network metrics (KPIs) into customer service metrics (KQIs). The calculations should be based on service modelling (maintained in the network and service inventory), that enables capturing different types of customer services, with different requirements towards network resources. These requirements must be taken into account when performing the calculations mentioned above. A significant aspect of the transformation is that it should enable seamless integration with BSS systems. As depicted in Figure 1, a customer service assurance system should provide the CRM system with information on customer service issues. This in particular, as presented in the right most process stack in Figure 1, should enable automatic handling of customer complaints. At the least, it should be able to automatically find, what network problem is causing the issue and start the process of problem resolution. Ideally the process should be pro-active, which means network problems should be discovered and resolved (or at least the resolution process should be started) even before customer service quality degrades. This way, when a customer issues a complaint, he can at least be provided with information that the problem resolution is already in progress. * This article is an abstract of a more detailed white paper available at: Automation of customer complaint diagnosing Transforming Fault Management into a customer service monitoring tool Transforming Performance Management into Customer SQM Shifting towards Customer Service Assurance lies in augmenting, not replacing the existing Fault Management and Performance Management systems

18 18 In focus: BSS/OSS customer TRANSFORMATION experience Outsourcing network management directions and strategies Szymon Buczak Comarch SA OSS Consultant, Telecommunications Business Unit M obile and fixed operators face constant challenge to optimize cost structures. One of the approaches to realize this goal is to outsource network management. This trend already began a few years ago and seems to be growing constantly. On one hand, outsourcing may diminish network control, which is still considered by many operators as a core part of their business. On the other hand, it gives a chance to transform current relations with the network. This would give opportunity to adapt to new business design and concentrate on services delivered to a customer. The growing interest in outsourcing is caused by many factors. Mainly, financial improvement, but this is not the only reason. Next Generation Network evolution, competitive business models and new applications have forced operators to concentrate on an efficient way to use of their network resources. Another advantage of outsourcing is the possibility to increase network flexibility and adopt new technology at a lower cost. It also simplifies the ever changing nature of internal support by transferring it to the outsourcing service supplier. In other words, it relieves network topics from management agendas. Why outsourcing? Every operator has its specific rationale to introduce network outsourcing. However, the general reason depends on the size and structure of a telecom. Mature operators, especially in the EMEA region, are driven by decreasing average revenue per user (ARPU). Operators in growing markets look for a possibility to manage growth and obtain necessary assistance and knowledge. Mid-size companies will benefit from continuous network and operation optimization, as this area is usually marginalized on an everyday bases because of lack of dedicated staff serving that purpose. Independently of size or structure, outsourcing gives a possibility to improve the current network operation process. The very first step, which is a must for every operator willing to outsource a part of their network operations, is the organizational aspect. Outsourcing must follow internal improvement initiatives, especially network management process redesign. The structure of the area that is to be outsourced must be clear and transparent. This may be performed by assessing all areas that are impacted by the outsourcing scheme, so

19 In focus: customer experience 19 that all activities and responsibilities are well defined. It is also a good point to collect information about KPIs and SLA parameters that will be later agreed on with the vendor delivering the outsourced service. What is outsourced? As already mentioned, the range of the telecom industry that can be outsourced differs and is related to specific needs. In general, no operator would like to outsource its core business. So what exactly is an operator s core business? Telecoms often treated their network as a core function. But this seems to not be the case anymore. Why has this changed? Did something special happen? No. Products, services and customers have always been at the core of each telecom. In the beginning this was strictly related to network devices, but now services are much more sophisticated and do not depend directly on the network. This is why more and more telecoms are deciding to outsource at least a part of their network management. In fact, network management is not the only function that can be outsourced (others include e.g. IT services, Customer Support or Service Activation etc.). The network management function is very wide and there are a lot of possibilities of defining the outsourcing border. Full outsourcing will cover network maintenance, network monitoring, network design, network planning, configuration management or capacity management. Not all operators are eager to outsource all of these areas, because they still treat them as a way to differentiate themselves from other telecoms. Some operators define their outsourcing strategy in steps, starting from small areas that are simple to define. After that, depending on the overall result, they go further to outsource more complex areas. There are also operators that prefer to outsource a significant part of their functions and from the very beginning look for a solution that fits all their needs put together. When a telecom is prepared for outsourcing, i.e. both processes and scope are defined; there is still a variety of possibilities of realizing it. Some of the contracts may be constructed just on an out-tasking basis, this often refers to field services. Others require a more advanced approach realized as a managed service, managed infrastructure or managed capacity. Last, but not least, some requirements for outsourcing fit in line with application management and hosting. Risks Operators can win a lot by choosing the right outsourcing strategy. However, risk must always be calculated. Risk is at first related to defining processes that are to be outsourced, organizational preoperational and proper scope definition. An unsuitable approach may on one hand result in loss of strategic control, and network performance, and quality issues on the other. There are also other consequences that should be considered. General outsourcing should be based on the partnership between the operator and the vendor. Product quality and customer experience is the result of this partnership. It implies that poor partnership reflects on customers. What is the reason for such a partnership? It is not a matter of good or bad intentions. This is rather a result of understanding the scope by both sides, which is reflected in a detailed contract along with well-defined SLA and KPIs. Another potential threat is the increased dependency on the outsource service supplier. Even when outsourcing processes are defined in every detail, all KPIs are correctly outlined, even if all outsourced functions are able to provide a structured interface, there is still a big probability that the operator may become more and more dependent of the vendor. Let s take outsourcing of a network operations center (NOC) as an example. The most straightforward way is to outsource operations and maintenance to the vendor that provides the equipment. This is reasonable this vendor has the best knowledge about his equipment, monitoring issues, configuration issues, product lifecycles and so on. He is able to react to any problem and if they are caused on the equipment side, they are solved probably much quicker than before, because the vendor solves it one-hop shorter. This seems to be the perfect solution, but is it in reality? If the vendor knows his equipment better than the operator, how can the operator be sure he has complete knowledge of the network s problems? The vendor must fit into SLA and his goal is to limit the number of failures. In case of outages the vendor might not be eager to report them to the operator. Especially, if the operator cannot mark and verify the failure on his side. But even when a telecom operator does not notice the problem, a customer is likely to still experience the outage. Not solving this problem may result in the operator not having a complete picture of his customer experience, because he is not aware of all the problems that his clients are facing. Another issue is a network that is not homogenous. Here the problem of dealing with multiple equipment vendors is transferred to the outsource service supplier. Again, this does not mean that the network will be operated transparently. On one hand a vendor can easily deal both with equipment of his own and that of other vendors. On the other hand, it is in the vendor s interest to encourage an operator to switch his entire network onto his equipment. Ideas in brief: Outsourcing - a way to improve the current network operation processes Should the outsourcing border be defined? Internal improvements - the path to insourcing? As services become much more sophisticated and do not depend directly on the network, more telecoms are deciding to outsource at least a part of their network management

20 20 In focus: customer experience There are a lot of approaches on how to manage the network and there is no perfect solution that can be applied to each case. Possible Strategies Network as a Service? Alternative models of benefiting from outsourcing are still appearing. One example is network sharing - both passive and active infrastructure. Such an approach is evidently closely related to sharing maintenance staff, which might be the second step. The next, almost self-suggesting, step is sharing operations. Taking everything into consideration in which direction will the next step go? It is easy to imagine a new business model related to telecoms. One where are operators concentrate on designing and developing their products and services, whereas outsourcing service suppliers focus on network, technology, tools and applications. Imagine a place where all mobile operators share the same network and the same maintenance and operations centers - could this become reality? Probably yes. Though, the answer is not so obvious, even when looking at competition issues. Nevertheless, this does not mean that operators will not compete between each other. Actually it is quite the opposite. Following this model we see that it is very likely that telecoms will base their business strategy on the customer facing level. In fact, the customers and products served to them are the real area of competition. The resource level is becoming less and less important to operators. This is why these two parts network and products may become separated on an organizational level and the network will serve as a service for telecom operators. Service suppliers will be able to develop the network and applications level so that it can serve multiple operators. Yet, it is not possible to predict what the forthcoming map of telecom business will be, one of the scenarios is that the network will get separated from operators and in future it will be considered as a cloud. Internal improvements the path to insourcing? Let us bear in mind that outsourcing is not the only possible way to follow. Many operators see a totally different future for network management optimization leading to a similar result insourcing. They see great potential in leaving network operations inside their business. This is why they concentrate on optimizing and redefining operations processes. This may be achieved either internally or with the help of external consulting. In order to optimize network management processes one needs to have reliable applications that can be tuned to meet specific requirements. The application should be independent of vendor equipment and also give insight not only to the network, but also to services, which are at the core of each operator. This has one very big advantage over the outsourced network. Service-aware network management operators are able to react to network failures much more accurately, because they know exactly which issues in the network are impacting the customers and how they impact them. Such awareness in the outsourcing structure is harder to achieve. Summary Operators are constantly improving their business models because they have to deal with changing network technologies and the growing complexity of products that they are delivering. There are a lot of approaches on how to manage the network and there is no perfect solution that can be applied to each case. Outsourcing is one possible solution. However, selecting an outsource service supplier is much more complex than selecting an equipment supplier and so this needs to be done very carefully. For many operators insourcing may be the appropriate solution. But is insourcing not just a step towards outsourcing?

21 In focus: customer experience 21

22 22 In focus: customer experience Infrastructure sharing ServCo vs. NetCo the competition shift Łukasz Mendyk Comarch SA OSS Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit V ery interesting changes on the telecommunication market can be currently observed. Telecommunication operators (telcos), who have been very bitter competitors in the field of the infrastructure, are starting to cooperate with each other, going even as to creating a joint venture to realize the idea of infrastructure sharing. This idea is driven by the need to reduce huge expenses on infrastructure, that result from the fact, that capacity data services demand more and more capacity. This is also boosted by market regulators who perceive this as a natural path from local loop unbounding (known in the fixed network market) to network unbounding and network neutrality ideas. Infrastructure sharing can be described as dividing traditional telco into so called servco and netco. To get an even more complete view of the idea, it can be said that the complete model consists of Salesco, ServCo and NetCo, where Salesco is probably only a new name for the role of e.g. MVNO. Infrastructure sharing means that for example two collaborating telcos decide to create one netco which is to serve two ServCos on an equal basis. The best way to explain the roles of SalesCo, ServCo and Net- Co is to employ a TMF SID model. Starting from the bottom: NetCo is to manage resources and provide fine grained Resource Facing Services (RFS) to ServCo ServCo s role is to manage services, which means using fine-grained RFS to create a Customer Facing Service (CFS) and fine-grained products that are to be provided to SalesCo SalesCo is to create final end customer products, product bundling and products offerings based on CFSes and fine grained products delivered by ServCo Infrastructure sharing relates to a very interesting business model and redefining competition between collaborating telcos. In this model telcos collaborate at the Net- Co level, becoming in fact one company which is to serve the still competing servcos at an equal basis. So what is the domain of competition between ServCos? It is definitely not infrastructure (network resource management). If we leave competition on the customer targeting and the pricing level to SalesCos, then the competition between Serv- Cos is all about how to create and manage customer services CFS better while using the same network resources. In other words, this means a competition shift from the network (resource) level to service competition. The word better can be understood as better usage of the same network resources to create cheaper and more interesting Customer Facing Services of higher quality and thus providing better Customer Experience.

23 In focus: customer experience 23 ServCos will compete by creating better CFSs, using the same building blocks - fine grained RFSs provided by the same NetCo. The key tool needed by ServCos is the service catalog which enables to define CFS, built from fine-grained RFSs, and to drive both fulfilment and assurance processes. This means employing next generation OSS which supports the service domain. The service fulfilment solution role is to be able to orchestrate NetCo by ordering low level RFSes and then assemble the customer facing service according to the service catalog s definition of CFS. Service assurance along with the SQM system is responsible for translating network related alarms and resource centric KPIs provided by telco into CFS alarms and CFS Key Quality Indicators (KQI). Translation is to be done along the same service model as fulfilment defined in the service catalog. Concluding: competition between ServCos resembles creating the best possible structure using the same Lego blocks. Details concerning the Service Fulfilment solution can be found in Comarch s whitepaper entitled Fulfilling the Promise of Component-Based Service Creation, and details about Service Assurance in the whitepaper Moving from network assurance to customer service assurance. Specifics on service management as a whole can be found in Comarch s whitepaper entitled Comarch Next Generation Service Management. But what about NetCo? In the description provided above, the role of NetCo was network resource management and providing fine-grained RFS services for ServCos. But as NetCo is to be a separate company which needs to earn money. And what is better is, it does not clash with the previous description based on TMF SID. The previous description was based on a global perspective, and on the value chain model. When looking from the local perspective, the NetCo apart of network resources needs to manage CFS and products which are offered to ServCos. This might sound confusing when bearing in mind the previous description, but it simply means that NetCo s CFSs and products are just RFSs from the perspective of ServCo. It proves that the TMF SID model is useful in describing all kinds of business and what is extremely important enables to provide both a local and global perspective. As NetCo does sell products, this means that the NetCo apart of OSS systems, which manages network resources, also needs a service layer and even a BSS system. The latter part is a natural consequence of separating NetCo from ServCo and establishing it as a separate business entity. What is important is that the role of a BSS system at NetCo has a significant part to play and is to be used as a control point that checks whether NetCo serves all ServCos at an equal basis. Ideas in brief: Splitting Telco into ServCo and NetCo (and SalesCo) Infrastructure sharing = common Netco + competition at ServCo (and SalesCo) Competition: who creates better customer services based on the same network resources (Lego blocks) OSS for ServCo managing the service layer (CFS and RFS) in assurance and fulfilment areas The competition winner among ServCos will be one who can create a better CFS model. Better means choosing the right RFS type provided by telco for the right type of CFS. The right type of RFS can refer to: less fault prone, delivered faster.

24 24 In focus: BSS/OSS customer TRANSFORMATION experience Win customer experience and transform techs from regular employees to customer advisors A fter the Service Management Expo 2011 conference, held in Birmingham, I realized that currently there are 3 most important aspects in field service management (mobile workforce management): field forces mobilization, scheduling optimization and human resources. Scheduling optimization and technicians mobilization (understood as mobile access to information in the field) are crucial for the optimal utilization of resources and increase of customer satisfaction. The human aspect is also substantial but very often not noticed by operations or field service management and is not considered in operations transformation projects. I have the opportunity to be involved in field force transformation projects in which at the beginning the program manager tried to hide all information from the technicians and assumed that they would simply start working Measured engagement of techs in daily work Influenced KPI Average value of KPIs in context of engagement metric < 0,7 Customer retention 72 % Szymon Uczciwek Comarch SA FSM Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit > 0,7 Customer retention 87 % < 0,7 Workforce utilization 56 % > 0,7 Workforce utilization 69 % < 0,7 Revenue increase 7% > 0,7 Revenue increase 8% Figure 1. Correlation between technicians engagement and selected KPIs

25 In focus: customer experience 25 in a new way after the project began its Live stage. But this is a typical example of wrong thinking, because this is not an area where Taylor s theories of turning men into automats (F.W. Taylor Principles of Scientific Management 1911), can be applied. The human aspect may sometimes be the most important in efficient customer field service. One may ask why? Because a technician himself is very often a customer s first contact with the service provider and the only person from the telecommunications company who spends more than one hour in the customers house, because customers will more likely trust a technician than the salesperson and because of human nature and its complexity, it can t be treated instrumentally. Fortunately field services have been around forever. Telecommunication Service Providers (TSP) field services also have a long history. This means that a lot of experience may be used and introduced to the service company without the need to improve on faults. Field Forces Engagement The first element of proper field force management is winning its engagement. It is kind of a truism that an engaged team can be more productive and satisfied with their daily work. When measuring their engagement I noticed something new. I made a few notes concerning aspects of technician engagement impact on a service provider s business, during my friend s Sumair Dutta s (Aberdeen Group) presentation at a conference. The table below presents the correlation between measured engagement of techs and KPIs important for services providers. Introduce unified uniforms If you ask me what a DHL employee looks like, I am able to answer that question without hesitation. This is a very good example of how standardized uniforms may be recognized and matched with the service provider s brand. But there is much more to it. Companies which perform soft training for techs convince us that it shows the customer that the company is trustful and organized and may affect customer experience from the tech visit. What s more, a nice and properly selected uniform builds up the relationship between the tech and the company which is really important when being on site. Perform technician surveys as often as possible As mentioned in the previous paragraph, uniforms should be properly selected. Generally, if TSP wants to win a techs engagement then all management has to be followed through properly (from the technician s point of view). The solution - surveys. If you want to introduce a new uniform, mobile device in the field, new system, changes in working hours, services etc. let the technicians say what they think about the changes. Surveys are a powerful tool and should be performed as often as possible and what s most important - their results should be used. Use the right motivation methods I will highlight only the Ideas in brief: Engaged field staff may improve customer retention up to 87% A field tech is not a salesman but should be a customer advisor The result proves that investing in techs engagement pays off. Additionally my experience shows that field force automation projects follow through a lot better when techs are involved. They are familiar of situations that occur on the battlefield, how the process really works, and they can adapt really fast to new field technologies which improve their performance. Below you can find the most important advice concerning human aspects in field service management. Your brand what to do in the field A customer survey after on-site work execution is a powerful tool which not only provides real data about customers but also automatically persuades techs to do their job better. It is important to assess technician work and make customers more satisfied. But it is not enough to achieve strategy goals like brand recognition and increased market share. Some activities related to field techs may help TSP engage techs in the process and build a top brand on the market. Figure 2: Simple method of motivation used by field services of one of MSOs main principals of proper motivation for techs. Having an engaged team in the project is easier than in processes. To achieve continuous improvement in the field TSP has to find a proper way of incentives and commission management. This is of unique character for every company and it is worth remembering that the incentive has to be, from the viewpoint of a tech, worth his work as well as awarded individually. Sometimes competition between techs will be enough. Even simple methods work a motivation board used by field services of one of MSOs who meets customer field service SLAs on the level of 95%.

26 26 In focus: customer experience Even if field work order is executed perfectly, a complaining technician may ruin the service provider s brand Hire only the BEST people in field services TSP has to achieve some level of staff turnover. This is not a demanding situation when there is no new recruiting in field services for several years. Of course, investing in trainings is an important aspect, but TSP should cooperate only with the BEST techs. BEST - Behavior, Education, Skills, Traits. It means that not only technical skills are important, but also soft skills are essential when techs work with customers. Prevention is better than cure There are also some very often occurring situations in the field that should be avoided by TSP even if service is excellent and the customer really satisfied. Unattended, in the long term, they could lead to problems in field operations. The first thing which should be explained to techs is that the company is a team and even if he is a really good specialist he should avoid complaining or assessing his colleagues work in a negative way. Why? Because in the long term, a customer generally remembers his opinion about the company and not the perfectly executed work. The second most important thing is to know that in case of a repair or service call it is crucial to resolve the problem not execute the task. Technicians usually know the reason of the problem and may suggest the customer a solution which is the best in his unique situation: hardware upgrade, changing the service etc. Very often, however, they limit their work to activities which are in the scope of the work order, because they don t feel that it is their role to do anything more. This could lead to a situation where the customer is still left with bad customer quality service, which is most important. Finally, the last thing is the risk related to technicians independency. The best situation is when a tech can start his work from home, get paid only for the work done, and doesn t have to spend idle hours in the office. Unfortunately overdoing it in this case may result in loosing important data from the field. Do not resign from meetings between technicians and direct management. During those meetings field employees are able to discuss situations which occurred in the field that are the base for improvement and proactive actions in operation departments. Tech extension to sales person In last few years, how to use technician intervention for sales purposes was widely discussed. There are two popular opinions: Techs are not salesmen and should be focused only on their task TSP should use the opportunity when being on site and increase sales The first opinion is still more popular in telecommunications. Fortunately this is a good compromise which should be applied in the field. It is true that techs are the people responsible for executing the work order. But it is also true that field intervention may be a chance for additional sale. The solution is that when a technician is responsible for resolving a customer problem, he is to become a customer advisor and be able to suggest customer service extension, but this should not be a typical sales activity. Offering up or cross selling should be an individual choice of the tech. Summary From the beginning the field force optimization processes should involve technicians as the main clients of project results. Continuous improvement of resources performance and customer experience is achieved thanks to technicians and their engagement in the process. Service providers shouldn t forget that the main asset of the organization are still people and that they build the company s brand and allow for revenue increase. Because of this they cannot be treated as the main risk of the telecom transformation process but as enablers.

27 In focus: BSS/OSS TRANSFORMATION BeyonD BSS/OSS 27

28 28 Chicago voice Building Customer Loyalty in the Telecom Market Alina Pyzowski Comarch Inc. Solutions Manager Enterprise Marketing Management Loyalty Business Unit IN the wireless industry, a new phone with a 2 year contract has been the definitive incentive program for years. The telecom industry, like others is plagued by churn; in fact the majority of new customers are churn customers. It is difficult to understand why most companies have not moved beyond this weak approach. The consumer has to choose between a huge amount of competitive products and services all offering similar incentive packages. Brands need to move beyond this antiquated method. Through the proper use of a pervasive loyalty solution, telecoms can begin to provide a memorable experience in order differentiate their product and attract and retain loyal consumers. The path of the past In the past, telecom providers have dedicated tremendous energy and resources to customer and company acquisition to develop and grow their businesses; this was a successful business model at the time. Currently the developed telecom market must face low GDP growth, stagnating population and high service-saturation levels. Years of pursuing the same strategy by growing in numbers and acquiring new companies is no longer a sustainable business model. The necessity to focus on understanding the customer experience has proved daunting as most telecoms strategy and information is siloed in unique lines of business; fragmenting one customer into many different views. Data, data and more data As telecoms began pursuing growth through mergers and acquisitions, the consequences of such cannibalistic perusal led them down a path to multiple disparate technologies. This has caused customer data to be scattered across multiple customer databases, where data is often duplicated and inconsistent. Typically, customer information is divided in data silos across lines of business with little integration or transparency amongst them; resulting in a single facet of the overall customer profile. For example, the wireless division collects informa tion but often doesn t share it with the TV cable division. There is no complete view of a cus tomer across different channels stores, websites, call centers. This means that a customer calling in to speak with a representative may have a completely different experience depend ing on the department they speak with. They may receive different information, offers, or advice. As a result, telecoms at any given moment have had a fragmented and inconsistent view of an individual customer. A unified view Building an integrated customer data set is the first step toward developing a more detailed and nuanced understanding of customers. The technology and concepts to create a single, integrated view of the customer have been available for many years, but very few telecoms have adopted these methods effectively. Most telecoms have a CRM system with a 360 degree view of the customer; however due to data silos across lines of business and inconsistent sales and marketing strategies and actions and the customer view is not truly integrated. Airlines, retailers, hotels, and many other industries have already recognized the importance of integrating data from every customer interaction and are continuously working to improve in the area.

29 chicago voice 29 Loyalty the next frontier Building a loyal customer starts by creating the holistic customer profile, but continues by embracing an innovative loyalty and incentive structure that encourages and rewards customers for their continuous business. How do companies decide who is a loyal customer? Typically telecoms focus on increasing ARPU or cutting churn. In fact 90% measure customer loyalty by churn rates. This measurement is ineffectual because it is a determination based upon the potential to churn or churned customers. A loyalty solution allows for a more mature plan where customer loyalty is determined by satisfaction, retention and loyal activity resulting in the ultimate goal of lowering churn and increasing ARPU. There are many options for loyalty solutions points, discounts, rewards, free services, upgrades, etc. The specific form of the reward is not as important as providing relevant, attainable, and economically valuable rewards or services to customers based upon their unique behaviors. It creates an open dialog between the customer and the telecom by providing the customer consistent and meaningful contacts through marketing communications and loyalty promotional offers. But what differentiates a loyalty program from traditional CRM is that a loyalty programs aim at proactively and continuously rewarding the customer for loyal behaviors and activity. Currently, sixty-five percent of service providers only initiate a retention process when the customer has started the process of leaving. Loyalty solutions take traditional data provided in CRM, Billing, and Order Management systems such as simple profile information and customer purchases and enrich it by a vast amount of customer experiential data gathered by reactions to loyalty activity. The customer feels appreciated because the telecom is able to offer specific and enticing loyalty promotions. And the telecom is able to use the customer s preferences and behaviors to hone their offers and target their customers more effectively. While CRM systems are able to track some customer behaviors, loyalty systems are designed to further uniquely incentivize and reward customers. Loyalty technologies should promote the following activities: Using insights into customer behaviors, lifestyles, and interests across all lines of business to deliver loyalty promotions and other offers that increase loyalty and break the cycle of price comparison and deal-driven churn Offer attainable and meaning rewards which will provide the customer with additional value Realizing the differences between customer segments and that varied loyalty promotions and rewards is crucial to the customer experience. Every customer has a different expectation of what is meaningful and valuable to them. In general the higher the ARPU the lower interest in material benefits. These customers may find more value in a benefit such as a customized customer service experience. For customers with a lower ARPU, direct and immediate benefits are more valuable such as discounts, products from a reward catalog or additional minutes Understanding what makes customers loyal and nurture that behavior in the non-loyal group through improvement of the program. The real ROI value of a loyalty program is cloning more loyal customers from the overall customer population Creating a personalized and specialized dialog with the customer by improving targeted marketing and communications. A loyalty program should communicate both the benefits a customer receives by simply being a member of the program, but should also communicate unique and specific promotions which may engage customers in behavior which can earn them additional rewards Utilizing customer recognition tiers to identify and reward the most loyalty and profitable customers accordingly. Investing in rewarding loyal and profitable customer is more effective both on cost and retention versus customers in lower tiers who are more apt to churn and are less profitable Leveraging data on pref erences to loyalty promotions and reward redemptions Generating secondary revenue by selling aggregated insights to other consumer organizations, such as retailers or consumer goods companies By implementing a loyalty solution telecoms can create a strategy where the customer experience and satisfaction is paramount ensuring that their busy lifestyles are supported and enriched. Conclusion Consumers demanding expectations for the newest technologies, personalized services, and a memorable experience require telecom providers to start understanding and approaching their customers in a holistic way. Telecom organizations should overhaul their approach to their customers and customer data. They must reach out to custom ers proactively to prevent churn and increase loyalty, using a wide variety of customer incentives and rewards. Ideas in brief: Embracing loyalty programs to understand the whole customer experience How do companies decide who is a loyal customer? What activities should loyalty technologies promote? The specific form of the reward is not as important as providing relevant, attainable, and economically valuable rewards or services to customers based upon their unique responses to their behaviors.

30 30 BeyonD BSS/OSS OSS/BSS Integration The Building Block of the Era of Big Data Fundamental Challenges Faced by CSPs

31 Intesifing com Figure 1: K BeyonD BSS/OSS 31 F rost & Sullivan has witnessed the telecommunications world change significantly over the last ten years. The evolution of customer demand, supported by the broadband development, has led to the emergence of new services such as internet television, video on demand and voice over IP. Customers require more complex, tailored packages with high service quality. As a result, communication service providers (CSPs) need to place greater focus on the overall customer experience and - given intensifying competition - the speed of bringing new services to market. At the end of 2010, Frost & Sullivan conducted a survey of global Tier 1 CSPs. Based on the results of this research, Figure 1 illustrates the most significant challenges currently faced by leading service providers. Dealing with regulatory issues 7% Network congestion 13% Sustaining profitable growth Keeping pace with new technology trends 20% 20% Reducing complexity of the company s structure Reduced time-to-market 30% 30% Growing customer expectations Efficiency improvement 37% 40% intesifing competition 57% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% Figure 1: Key CSP Challenges, Source: Frost & Sullivan, 2010 Dealing with regulator In order to keep pace with market evolution, CSPs have been prompted to redefine their strategies. The majority have transformed themselves from basic network access providers to service aggregators, providing network access as a medium for delivering content and other value-added services. The implementation of new strategies is a lengthy process, requiring the engagement of a broad range of a service provider s resources as well as a change of mindset and technical improvements: CSPs need to ensure comprehensive integration of their operational support systems (OSS) and their business support systems (BSS). OSS/BSS Convergence as an Answer to Operator Challenges Historically, CSPs tend to purchase best-of-breed applications for specific functional areas and they have a long tradition for in-house software development. In consequence, many proprietary or highly customized OSS/BSS systems remain in operation. This strategy was justified when their portfolios only contained a few services. However, with multiple new services and growing complexity of the CSP architecture, this approach has become untenable. Mergers and acquisitions have further complicated the back office of many CSPs. Many providers have added new systems to their IT architecture from companies that they had acquired, with Network con Sustaining profitable Frost & Sullivan is actively engaged in identifying, researching, and developing opportunities, growth Keeping pace with new technolog Reducing complexity models, of and the strategies company s s that enable clients to accelerate growth. Reduced time-to For more info please visit: Growing customer expe Efficiency impr

32 Figure 1: Key CSP Challenges, Source: Frost & Sullivan, BeyonD BSS/OSS General Solutions for Multiple Providers Best-of-Breed End-to-End Solutions Common Processes Point Solutions Customized Solutions for Single Provider In-house Development Customized Processes Customized Processes Best-of-Platform No Integration After-Market Integration Pre-Integration Figure 2. OSS/BSS Progression. Source: Frost & Sullivan only limited adjustments made. As a consequence, similar services often rely on very separate IT systems within a single organization, unnecessarily complicating service fulfillment and increasing costs. Changing market conditions require the breaking down of isolated silos of software designed around separate technologies or services into horizontally integrated blocks of operational and business support systems that are compatible and able to communicate with each other. Additionally, in order to optimize IT costs consolidation of systems used for the same activities for similar services is needed. Horizontally integrated OSS/BSS has become a desired solution among CSPs. It is an answer to CSPs need of end-toend solutions and common processes (see Figure 3). 85% of operators interviewed by Frost & Sullivan prefer commercial off-the-shelf solutions (COTS) as opposed to those built inhouse or requiring significant customization. However, many in this group insist on systems that are preintegrated with other COTS solutions and that require no special customization for operation within their own architecture. The lack of integration of OSS and BSS results in limited possibilities for coordination between the service design and the technical requirements of delivering a service. In consequence, the implementation of a new service is a long, often manual, process, requiring many operational and human resources. All CSP representatives interviewed by Frost & Sullivan admitted that existing fulfillment processes involve too many manual tasks and that, in turn, create too many opportunities for error. The OSS/BSS gap also causes problems with regards to appropriate service fulfillment and fault management. The lack of proper communication between network facing and customer facing layers gives the CSPs difficulties with providing information about the service availability, tracking orders and identifying customers affected by network failures.by bridging the gap between OSS and BSS, CSPs can achieve higher process automation, eliminating the need to involve large numbers of engineers during implementation and service fulfillment. This reduces time-to-market and significantly decreases costs. Facilitated communication between OSS and BSS also supports the creation of new business and payment models and considerably improves the flow of information.

33 BeyonD BSS/OSS 33 Conclusion Most CSPs have already gone through tough transformation programs, streamlining their organizations and reducing both operational and capital expenditure. There is no arguing that cost control does not continue to be important, but the truth is that most CSPs are not able to meet the challenges of the future by cutting cuts. Instead, they need to carefully manage (and increase) revenue, and this is why the integration between the Business Support Systems and the Operational Support Systems becomes so important. Creating a consistent link between BSS and OSS decreases the time needed to bring new services to market. It also supports service assurance and fault management. Convergent BSS and OSS plays an important role in facilitating information flows and in enhancing the customer experience. Finally, convergent OSS and BSS supports the creation of new business models that can maximize revenues and guarantee the service levels the high-end subscribers who decide to pay a premium (e.g. to not suffer due to network congestion). In other words, bridging the gap between BSS and OSS will enable CSPs to successfully deal with a large share of the challenges we have identified. Frost & Sullivan recommends partnering with an OSS/BSS vendor with many years of experience of designing and implementing integrated OSS/BSS solutions. We also believe that vendors with a coherent portfolio of pre-integrated OSS and BSS elements are best placed to deliver tangible benefits to customers. Comarch is one such vendor. Frost & Sullivan has analysed Comarch s OSS and BSS offering, and we are satisfied that it is one of the most complete and versatile solutions on the market today which will provide value for money for most CSPs and help them meet their challenges. In Frost & Sullivan s opinion, Comarch s strategy to develop all elements of its solution in house does give it a competitive advantage, because it retains the in-house capabilities to provide complete, customized solutions without relying on third-party integration. CSPs looking to select an OSS/BSS vendor should consider the long-term implications of their choices. Frost & Sullivan recommends working with specialized vendors that are committed to long-term relationships and support and have broad understanding of their customers business. As a mid-sized vendor, Comarch is big enough to be competent and innovative and small enough to react quickly to market changes and customer update requirements. Ideas in brief: What challenges do operators have to tackle in a Data-Driven Market? How OSS/BSS Integration helps CPS overcome these challenges? Why vendors with a full BSS/OSS portfolio become the preferred choice for CSPs? What is Comarch s innovative approach to bridging the OSS/ BSS gap? * This article is an abstract of a more detailed white paper available at bss-transformation.comarch.com

34 34 Hot Beyond topic: BSS/oSS Aiming for Perfect Customer Experience Challenges and Opportunities of Multi-Market Transformations Tomasz omieciński Comarch SA Senior Manager, Convergent BSS/OSS Solutions, Telecommunications Business Unit A practitioner s view in three short acts In one of the previous releases of the Technology Review Magazine I introduced the principles of business transformation that go one or two steps further than standard transformations which in the telecom world typically mean OSS or BSS transformations. This article will address one of the challenges related to a multi-market business transformation from a practical point of view delivering similar products to different markets via different OSS systems and infrastructure of own and third party networks. The Scene Like in the classics. A drama scene is sketched by actors to the all-expecting audience. Our scene spans three countries. Countries in a similar geographical region that makes them appear similar (at least from a distance). At the same time, when one looks closer at the scene, one will notice that different infrastructure is in place in those countries. Whereas some operate mostly based on their own infrastructure others tend to provide services through third party networks. The similarities of social behavior and legal or regulatory frameworks in those countries mean that the catalogs of products delivered in those markets have a lot in common and often provide similar services in a slightly different box. Of course various minor differences like currencies, tax regimes or subtle differences in regulatory processes (e.g. portability) also exist, however, good quality IT systems handle such differences with relative ease and so these will not be discussed further in this article. On the other hand, the diversity of network infrastructure in those three countries and the mixture of products based on own and third party lines means that the method for delivering products and services vary significantly between these markets. These differences are often far from subtle and thus require more than quality IT setup to address them effectively. Thus, our scene largely spans similar markets which operate in significantly different ways. The Actors Within the scene a number of forces operate. The most important force is the transformation itself. As mentioned in the previous article, business transformation is the force that requires tireless efforts of many people and commitment at the highest level of management if it is to be put and maintained in motion. Actors include business, operations and IT people that have been drafted from various organizations with only one goal in mind to make the transformation happen. They come from three different markets and many more organizations. They bring hundreds of years of combined experience, in-depth knowledge and understanding of the business, skills that they have accumulated throughout the years of their professional carriers and their habits - good and bad. These habits and market / experience particularisms render some of the actors as systemic challengers, making sure that objections are raised and firmly argued. There is noth-

35 Hot topic: Aiming for Perfect Customer Beyond Experience BSS/oSS 35 ing wrong with this either people who start working on the new tend to see it through or reflect on the old (how it was, how it worked etc.). Challenges are inevitable (not all people adapt easily) and to a large extent they are in fact needed to ensure quality outcome of the game. Prolog The transformation had been prepared. The decision had been made. Three markets are involved. Many people are now more than busy and their objectives are: Make it common look for similarities or commonalities across the markets and overcome the differences Make it better look for new optimized ways and forget old habits and old ways Make it smart standardize, re-use, optimize Act 1 The plot unwinds How does one combine and communalize mature businesses that are operated in different countries by different people and have years of history independent from one another? To answer this question, one needs to make just one but very key observation those organizations, those people, they actually all do the same. They have similar (if not the same) goals, they provide similar (if not the same) services, they operate telecommunication businesses. Now, where does one find a standard-like approach to organizing telecoms irrespectively of what and where they operate? The most popular de facto set of standards that springs to mind when looking for a comprehensive answer is TMF and its Frameworx. So Act One of this story was really to look into etom and Business Process Framework to find the common denominator for all three businesses, i.e. to look for a standard way of doing business. One should not confuse the standard way of doing business with the definition of how to do business. TMF s Frameworx are recommended methods and not businesses definitions themselves, e.g. TMF can provide a good model for defining product catalogs (namely SID), but TMF will not provide the definitive wining product catalog of a successful broadband operator. Act 2 The Challenge Standard processes were drafted and based on de facto industry standards of the TMF. Unlike government driven bodies or academic based groups (which tend to look for solutions which on the one hand hardly match practice and on the other end tend to perfectize the solution) TMF is driven by the industry and it is the industry that designs the answers based on practical experience rather than academic merit. Yet, as soon as the answer was devised in the quest for the ultimate goals ( make it common, make it better and make it smart) a challenge arose. Considering the context of the multi-market transformation, it is natural and was expected from the very beginning. Some people involved started to chal- Ideas in brief: Common product catalogs shared between many group members in different countries require new approach to service fulfillment Traditional process based fulfillment gets invalidates whenever similar doesn't mean nearly identical when it comes to infrastructure Next generation fulfillment with service catalog based processes composition neutralizes network differences

36 36 BeyonD BSS/OSS Within the scene a number of forces operate. The most important force is the transformation itself. BSS Product Customer Facing Service S RFS S RFS S RFS S S CFS S CFS S CFS S RFS S S S S R R R R R R R OSS Figure 1. Combining multiple networks and disparate services into common products lenge the approach by pointing out the fact that their products and services are delivered and managed unlike any other. This is an absolutely valid point! The same type of service was now to be delivered across different technologies. Furthermore, in one place it was based on an own network in others it required renting a line from another provider. In such a case, product (service) delivery (fulfillment) processes vary between markets to an extent that seems prohibitive to common execution (when looking at the old/existing process flows and interaction diagrams they seem to share very little if anything). Therefore, challengers argued that what is good and works for one country does not necessarily work for another and that this should have been pin-pointed months before the quest was funded and launched. Act 3 The Opportunity At the very beginning of this story, we mentioned various forces driving the transformation process, yet an important part of the equation has not really been addressed in any way The Tools. When it comes to the transformation in question, Next Generation Service Fulfillment was chosen to support delivery processes and approached the challenge in a unique way - instead of defining end to end processes it defines means to get them dynamically constructed and assembled based on product and service models. Unlike the traditional approach where fulfillment processes are devised as sequences of actions and decisions, in Comarch NGSF the process of delivering a product emerges from Customer Facing Services (CFS), their decomposition into Resource Facing Services (RFS) and their Resources (R). In this approach a product is mapped to CFSs which are decomposed into RFSs which in turn may require a number of resources (R). In the due course of service decomposition, during each step the service or resource node internally defines the actions that are required when delivering itself. In this approach the fulfillment system does not have to pre-define the process of providing a product to a cus-

37 BeyonD BSS/OSS 37 NGSF User Service Factories Service Layer Program TV CFS IP TV CFS IF CFS TV CFS TV Channel RFS IP RFS TV RFS Content Other Business Unit Service Layer CFS IP Third Party Component CFS IP RFS FFTH RFS IP Figure 2. Service catalog driven composition of fulfillment processes tomer. Instead, fulfillment processes are constructed as the products are decomposed into services. Should it decompose into services based on third party lines in one of the markets the process will follow the suite. Will it be decomposed into services delivered over own infrastructure again the CFS RFS relations will drive the process to account just for that. Thus, what appeared to be the Challenge had become an Opportunity to observe this new and powerful concept at work. Furthermore, once the vendor s market-neutral analysts joined the team to define the service catalog and related service factories (for simplicity we can assume that these are service level process chunks that are used to compose end to end flows) they quickly realized that even though those countries differ they indeed share a lot in common and the challenge of having to combat different ways of delivering similar services turned into a real opportunity of actually defining consistent and robust delivery means which go through common phases and follow similar principles. Epilog Should this be a classical drama, one would expect to have Deus ex Machina come and solve the insolvably thickened plot. Yet it is a Business Transformation story with a supporting IT project, so higher management (Deus) is only involved when one has to make sure that the company s commitment to the new way remains firm and that any attempts to derail the process will not entertain their favorable attention. With the firm commitment of the Management and the tireless efforts of all the involved people the story continues and perhaps this fourth Act shall not be entitled Epilog. The transformation story continues.

38 38 Hot Beyond topic: BSS/oSS Aiming for Perfect Customer Experience M2M Multilevel Communication Wojciech Martyniak Comarch SA BSS Solution Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit C an you think of a logistic enterprise with a fleet of vehicles going around the globe with a single control center for checking locations, engine parameters, statistics of kilometers made, sending locations for the cheapest fuel prices etc. Now try to imagine a solution that supports all of the above. It could be covered only by a multi-level platform with a huge set of complex automated processes. Surely, it cannot be described in one short sentence. Software suppliers proposing solutions for the M2M business can be grouped depending on the level they want to cover: Device management level supporting operations and stock of all the machines and devices in which a SIM card is present Application management level with services supporting different sectors (also called verticals), as in our example a fleet enterprise Connectivity level supporting SIM management, rating, billing, selling and even self-service for M2M enterprises Before going into details of M2M communication, it is worth mentioning that this technology grew from telemetry but the difference is very significant. Both standards were based on data transmission through a network but in the older standard radio network this was rather random, not secure and not wide enough. New technology uses the already existing infrastructure with huge widespread coverage and high effectiveness. It was just a matter of time when this huge coverage advantage would be used. Communication of different actors of the M2M business When describing M2M business we usually tend to present only the basic actors in this domain. There is always the Net-

39 Beyond BSS/oSS 39 work Provider - MNO which provides access to the network, the M2M Enabler which proposes the offer of M2M services and the M2M Customer that uses SIM cards in his devices. In fact, this scenario is quite unusual in the real world. For instance where the operator is also the M2M Enabler, we can distinguish the following levels: Group level for managing all the actors and their hierarchy Operating Company (also called the Service Provider) level usually this can be a division or department related to the M2M business or a company branch in a different country Reseller level usually with a smaller subset of functionalities enabled to the Operating Company The M2M Customer should be considered a business customer with a complex hierarchy of accounts (business departments, divisions, sectors, cost centers, etc.) and a vast amount of SIM cards. Communication with users of the platform In this area, the M2M platform seems to be very similar to other business scenarios. There are several different groups of users with appropriate rights, profiles, permissions. Nevertheless, these users demand strong customizations, different modules, different functionalities and of course data visibility. They will require access to their actions and tasks with simple indication as to what has to be done. Communication with customers What is crucial in this business customers require an important set of functionalities from the M2M Enabler. In con- Ideas in brief: Customer - how to stay operational throughout the whole SIM lifecycle M2M business has many aspects, levels and actors What are the demands of M2M platform users

40 40 BeyonD BSS/OSS operator (network Provider) M2M Group operating Company (service Provder) service Provider 1 service Provider 2 service Provider 3 service Provider n Reseller Reseller 2.1 Reseller 2.2 M2M Customer fleet Company Account - level 1 south departament north departament Account - level 2 south-east division north-east division Grouping level trucks - Group 1 trucks - Group 2 small trucks Executive cars subscription sim with profile 1 sim with profile 2 sim with profile 3 sim with profile 4 Figure 1. Example hierarchy of actors in M2M business Even the vast amount of traffic in M2M can be easily processed. trast to mobile or fixed business, here the customer has access to a fully operational platform and can perform several actions related to his services. How to communicate with customers? The answer is through a simple, intuitive, graphically advanced Web portal a portal with full access to SIMs, diagnostic and statistics tools, Trouble Ticketing and advanced reports in online and exportable form. The M2M Customer often does not understand telecommunication processes, charging and provisioning details but all he really needs is to stay operational through the whole SIM lifecycle without having to know what stands behind it. Communication with SIM cards This level should be considered most valuable and most crucial for the Connectivity level. Communication should be conducted through one view an all actions panel, also called the heart of the platform, SIM dashboard, inventory panel or SIM management tool. Some of the key requirements include: Personalization of the view on SIMs - different SIM cards, custom set of possible actions SIM lifecycles assignment and modifications Pricing assignment and modifications Bulk, batch or one-by-one actions Search criteria definition Online usage and status data display Alarming Tagging possibilities leading to grouping of SIMs And many more...

41 BeyonD BSS/OSS 41 Administrator Logistic Managers Account Manager Service Center Customer Service Agent Acount Management Customer Management SIM Management SIM Ordering Invocing Reporting Offerings Contracting Pricing Management Triggers and alarms definition Trouble Tickets Product Catalog Marketing Campaigns Sales Campaigns Billing Managers Marketing Pricing Manager Figure 2. Differentiation of access to functionalities in the M2M Platform Communication with devices As the market grows, new functionalities, services, integrations and standards develop. At the beginning, communication was established between machines from many different vendors and using many different protocols. M2M imposed creating new communication protocols in order to establish an open standard that would be adopted by any device manufacturer (i.e. M2MXML, BITXml). The idea was to entirely unify different sectors into one communication channel that would work for industry, monitoring and security services, fleet and traffic management, healthcare and even personal devices. M2M also offers a concept of using the existing possibilities why communicate with complex protocols when a short message service can be used. Wake up, configuration or checking SMS can be easily sent from the platform, even delivery reports or appropriate statistics can be displayed. Conclusion M2M technology can be analyzed and described from many levels and many aspects. Different actors involved, many unconnected sectors, different types of machines and a huge set of functionalities is just a short summary. And in this complex world it appears that the already existing standards and infrastructure with huge coverage and effectiveness can be reused with all of its advantages. Even the vast amount of traffic in M2M can be easily processed. The world becomes geographically unlimited, without boundaries of access. Is the M2M business really the future of the IT world? Based on the popularity and growth of the mobile business and telemetry we can surely say that it will develop significantly.

42 42 Beyond BSS/oSS What makes a good user interface for a mobile application Grzegorz wąchocki Comarch SA R&D Department Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit T he User Interface (UI) of a technical device of any kind, including computer applications, is the only way a human can tell a device what to do, provide data and get feedback from the device. In a nutshell, it is the only way to speak to soulless machinery. There is, however, a huge difference between an interface allowing a person just to communicate with a device and one which makes communication convenient and effective. So how to achieve the latter? One thing that comes to mind is data bandwidth. A good user interface must enable parties to transfer a number of messages big enough not to introduce any unnecessary delays in the performed operation. Thus, the faster the messages pass through the interface, the better it is usually considered to be. Another feature which contributes to the quality of a user interface is the time an inexperienced user must spend to learn how to get the machine to do what he wants it to do. Unsurprising is the fact that the shortest possible time for learning a new interface is the one most optimally desired in this case. Ideally, a user interface should be so intuitive that anyone can make the device work right away without the necessity to read a manual or learn beforehand. Before we begin discussing mobile applications let us briefly consider PC (Personal Computer) applications, which first brought user interfaces, and have shaped our thinking about them. A typical computer cannot understand what people think, recognize gestures nor read human moods. The first computers could not be communicated to through the same senses people communicate, so new methods had to be invented. This is why today we have the keyboard, the mouse and the monitor. But let s not go too deep into history, this is not the point here. These means enabled people to cooperate with a computer application but in terms of our UI quality criteria, would not be highly graded. For a newbie, a keyboard and a mouse were not very natural means of thought expression, which led to a very limited amount of data people could send to an application in a unit of time. There can also be no doubt that a PC interface was not intuitive for someone who didn t use computers before and it required a lot of learning in order to be used efficiently. In terms of today s criteria the UI of an ordinary PC was far from being convenient and effective. There were not too many alternatives in those times so people had to accept the fact that they have to spend a significant amount of time in order to efficiently use computers. As a result, more and more people got used to PC interface tools and in result they became quite popular over time, and currently most people can use them efficiently. However, this was not the case with mobile devices because, nowadays, people do not want to take on the burden of interface limitations and spend time to learn how to use it. In comparison to PC beginnings, expectations regarding the intuitiveness and easiness of the device interfaces are much higher now especially that mobile solutions are entering virtually all areas of our private and business lives.

43 Beyond BSS/oSS 43 There is one additional thing that makes the lives of PC UI designers easier than those of mobile applications - the environment a PC is used in. When using a PC application people usually sit comfortably at their desk (which does not shake or bump), their hands are not occupied (as they do not need to simultaneously carry their bags), the huge and stable screen is placed in front of them, and they can clearly hear through the speakers. All of the above rarely apply to mobile users. In addition to the huge keyboard with palpable keys allowing people to type without watching. The usual circumstances a mobile application is used in are far more unfavorable. The screen on the device is small (as it must fit in a pocket), the application is more often than not used when travelling (very likely in a shaky vehicle) and in noisy places, the phone is usually handled with only one hand and the extremely small keyboard provides small keys which cannot be felt, this makes it necessary to constantly look at the screen when typing. There are of course some elaborated (sometimes weird) input methods and super-efficient-keyboard proposals but they almost always require considerable time for practice in order to be used, which disqualifies them from becoming widely used. As I said, nowadays people simple reject everything which, in order to be used freely, requires more practice than that which is required to use e.g. a lighter. A common mistake when designing mobile applications for mobile devices is copying PC functionalities but also user interfaces, which makes the applications very inconvenient to use and as a result people are reluctant to use it complaining that it does not improve their work and only brings an additional burden. This leads to a misleading conclusion that mobility is overestimated and it does not work in real case business solutions. The point is that in order for a mobile application to become as efficient as similar PC applications it is necessary to provide an interface as good as in the case of a PC version. This is not an easy task and I must admit that not all features can be successfully transferred to a mobile application. Each activity can be improved through the use of mobile applications if they are properly designed to use all possible techniques for user interaction. The developer has the ability to use many different ways to transfer commands to the application. Mobile applications can use a much wider variety of input methods than PC versions. Let s take for example a phone book application, a simple action such as calling a friend. The actions the user has to take are quite simple: first he needs to find the friend s contact data in the phone book list, and then click the call button. Sounds like piece of cake but might not be too easy to complete when driving a car at the same time. For this reason voice commands were invented and now the phonebooks of all advanced mobile devices can, aside from the standard method, find the number of any person only with the help of the user s voice. Similarly, when designing an application we should always provide several ways of access to one feature so that the end user can choose the one most convenient to him at that very moment: either by touching the screen, voice command or gestures which enable him to control the application by moving the entire phone because modern devices can recognize when and how they are moved. There is one more important thing. Although already mentioned in this article, it needs to be mentioned explicitly the context in which the application is used in. It is usually possible to infer a lot of information from the contextual data of an action such as phone location, the current time, the application which is being used on the screen, the last action taken, etc. Let us use the phonebook example once again. When one, for instance, adds a new contact element to the phonebook on Tuesday at 11am, it is very likely that the new contact is of business type and the application should automatically suggest adding it to the proper contact group. So, the application should be adjusted to the environment it is most likely used in. It obviously makes a huge difference for the user interface whether the application is used when taking public transportation and mainly intended for browsing information or if it s used by a salesman traveling from customer to customer and mainly operated to input data to the system. While for the former the UI may be conveniently created based on standard UI widgets, the latter would definitely require more sophisticated input methods such as voice recognition or notes recording in order to make the salesman s work easier to complete with the help of the provided solution than without it. To summarize, a good user interface is something more than just a means to control the application. A favorable user interface enable users to communicate with a device in a convenient and efficient way. The speed of the user s intentions passed down through the interface and its intuitiveness are in turn the characteristics of such an UI. This may be achieved through design approaches that involve various data inputs and presentation methods available in today s devices. In order to create a friendly UI it is also important that a designer always keeps in mind that the ultimate goal of every UI is always the convenience of the application user. It is essential that the application makes work easier to do and is not an additional burden, which is usually the case when created by people who do not possess enough experience in UI designing. Ideas in brief: Copying PC interfaces - a common mistake when designing mobile applications for mobile devices Final user preferences - important part of interface design It is essential that the application makes work easier to do and is not an additional burden, which is usually the case when created by people who do not possess enough experience in UI designing.

44 44 Beyond BSS/oSS Enhancement of roaming call back user experience The application enabled 6GMobile to introduce a new strategy of roaming call support and, therefore, provide its customers with more cost-effective and completely transparent roaming voice services, without the loss of user experience and usability. D ue to the increasing amount of players on the telecommunications market, operators must look for new strategies for cost reduction in order to retain their competitiveness and provide attractive services to their (potential) clients. The attractiveness of a service, however, is not only measured in terms of its price and functionality, but also in relation to the usability and user experience, which are major ingredients of how lucrative a service is to customers in the present-day market. The Business Need 6GMobile changed the way in which roaming calls were performed within the network. Instead of traditional roaming connections within 6GMobile, the call direction is swapped to decrease its cost and enrich the calling experience. On the phone side, the call set up process is mainly controlled by the SIM card. When a user triggers a call and the phone is in roaming mode, the SIM breaks the outgoing call and asks the network (by means of a USSD/SMS/SS message) to set up the connection between the caller and receiver. Fundamentally, the network does this by calling both parties and pairing these connections together when they are ready (Figure 1). The problem, is that from a user s point of view the behaviour, described above, is very confusing and renders fairly poor user experience when making a phone call firstly, the user is displayed information that the call has ended, and is then asked to authorize the sending of a message to the network, followed by confirmation that the message has been sent. Finally there is an incoming call from an unknown number, which is intended to be answered. Moreover, the call history has an unorthodox format following this process, as in addition to the outgoing calls there are also incoming. Users would need to be taught how to handle this solution, in order to be able to perform roaming calls. It is obvious, however, that such unusual and unintuitive solutions, even if more cost-effective, will not be welcomed by customers with open arms. The aim of the project in question was to improve the userfriendliness of the solution by concealing all phone indications of events occurring during the connection set up, and through answering the incoming call automatically. This would enable users to make call-back roaming calls in exactly the same manner as standard types, and would significantly improve the user experience of the solution. At the end of the process, users should be provided with a transparent solution enabling them to use their phones during roaming, in the same way as they do in their mother network, without having to be aware of the operations performed behind the scenes. The Approach As there is no possibility to directly control the system messages in the Symbian OS, Comarch suggested implementation of an EZROAM application overlying the screen and serving as a controlling interface of the telephony system during roaming. EZROAM is a lightweight application started at system boot up, and which is completely invisible to users in the mother network. This application is only activated when a phone leaves its mother network and enters roaming. It then begins to observe the telephony system within the phone, and each time a user

45 Beyond BSS/oSS 45 6GMOBILE (formerly BT inmo BV) is an MVNE in the Netherlands, which has been cooperating with Comarch since 2006 in the area of software development. The quality of services provided by Comarch has always been excellent, and the cooperation seamless. This, taken together with its vast experience in providing mobile solutions and unique expertise in mobile platform insights, makes Comarch the perfect partner for accomplishing the project s objectives. makes a call, the application takes control of the calling process. First of all, the screen is overlaid by a UI prepared for this purpose. Technically, this is implemented by means of manipulating the order of views on the window stack, and through continuous monitoring of the displayed views and messages. As soon as an unwanted window wants to present itself on the screen, it is sent back so that the user is not disturbed by it or the operations in the background. In addition, the application also suppresses other indications of call-set-up-related activities, such as vibrations and sounds. Moreover, EZROAM automatically confirms the messages to be sent to the networks, in order to set up the connection. Finally, the incoming call-back call is automatically answered. In the meantime, an appropriate audio message, stating that the connection is being set up, is played to the user. When the call is ongoing, the EZROAM application takes over full control of the telephony system within the phone, and provides exactly the same functionality as the standard telephony interface. Among others, these contain simultaneous calls, conference calls, switching on/off loudspeaker mode, mute, hold, switching between calls, DTMF options and call termination. When the call is ended, the system logger (call history) is updated so that it contains the relevant information. 1. Orginal voice call is dropped and replaced by USSD/SMS/SS request 3. Low coast call back Eildert-Jan Boekholt, Director, Development and Operations, 6GMOBILE The solution was created for the Symbian S60 3.x and 5.0 devices. The Result USSD CB server SSP The application enabled 6GMobile to introduce a new strategy of roaming call support and, therefore, provide its customers with more cost-effective and completely transparent roaming voice services, without the loss of user experience and usability. The aspects of the project which were most appealing to 6GMobile were the agile methodology used, which enabled a gradual approach to the desired solution and flexibility in tackling the problems encountered. The rhythm of application development, enabled by this methodology, together with the clear reporting of work progress (which was rated very highly by the client), meant that the project results were easy to forecast in terms of both quality and time/schedule. Finally, 6GMobile attached particular value to the team s exceptional performance, its ability to understand the requirements, and especially to the fact that Comarch acted as the propeller of solution development through taking responsibility for tackling the encountered issues/problems and finding the best possible solutions for them. 2. A regular voice call to B-party When in roaming Figure 1. Call set-up process USSD CB server USSD Call Back server; SSP Service Switching Point Customer 6GMOBILE, Netherlands Industry Communications 6GMOBILE is a next generation MVNE/ MVNO, fully licensed and operational in the Netherlands. 6GMOBILE offers a range of mobile communication services that combine the strengths and structures of GSM with the agility and flexibility of the Internet. 6GMOBILE offers turnkey services, ranging from prepaid consumer oriented mobile services to integrated converged mobility solutions for corporate customers. 6GMOBILE is a pioneer in the development and deployment of integrated Mobile Internet services, turning customer handsets into mobile communication devices for voice, audio and data oriented communication services. 6GMOBILE has deployed state-of-theart back-office systems enabling extremely rapid service deployment at attractive unit costs. Comarch products & services: Comarch Mobile Solutions

46 46 Beyond BSS/oSS Comarch Private Cloud Computing Piotr Piątkowski Comarch SA Business Solution Manager, Data Center Business Unit Paweł dyl Comarch SA Business Solution Manager, Data Center Business Unit C loud Computing In its broadest usage, the term refers to the delivery of scalable IT services over the Internet. Those resources include application services and the infrastructure on which they operate. An organization can purchase these resources on an as-needed basis and avoid capital costs of software and hardware. The Comarch Data Center experience in hosting services shows that the most important element for clients is a service which fulfills business requirements (KPI parameters, i.e. number of users, transactions, etc.) with needed availability (defined in SLA, i.e. 99.9% at 24/7/365 mode), security and scalability (warranty of fast upgrades in case of business growth). The service provider is fully responsible for ensuring and maintaining proper hardware configuration. These client demands are fulfilled by CDC Private Cloud dedicated to Comarch s and third party applications. A shared environment in the PaaS model decreases installation costs and shortens service delivery time (eliminating problems with hardware delivery). Why Cloud Computing? It s about economics: Faster applications are ready to use a lot faster than in the standard way of implementation Simpler applications can be accessed from anywhere, anytime and are maintained by the outsourcing company Cheaper to use cloud apps, it s easier for application vendors to reach new customers and reduce the cost of delivery and of the supporting applications. Ability to drive down data center operational costs. There is no upfront capital required for servers and storage because applications are installed on the shared hardware (storage and server). There are no ongoing operational expenses for running a data center Cloud computing models Software as a Service (SaaS) organizations do not buy software, they simply use their browser to access the software as it is provided over the Internet (software provided as a service). More and more organizations are consciously going for selected applications to be operated on Software as a Service. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) was one of the first areas where SaaS became a common solution due to software utilization without extended implementation time frames, software modification without IT bottlenecks, world class infrastructure without capital expenditures and 24 by 7 uptime without round-the-clock staffing Platform as a Service (PaaS) is a software development environment that allows developers to create software applications they can offer as a service to their customers or users. The PaaS provider takes care of hosting the created services, for an agreed price. Because PaaS providers can share data center expenses between their clients and offer a better price for the same standalone solution

47 Beyond BSS/oSS 47 Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) an organization s source infrastructure capacity over the Web as a service. Allocating storage or processing capacity over the Web is of course much faster than bringing and installing new hardware. IaaS is a common solution for many IT operation departments. Thanks to IaaS, IT departments increase utilization with reduced capacity requirements, lower costs and lower energy consumption, and also greater scalability and flexibility Cloud computing models and characteristics Private cloud the cloud infrastructure is operated only for one organization. It may be managed by the organization or a third party and may exist on or off site Community cloud the cloud infrastructure is shared by several organizations and supports a specific community that has shared goals (mission, security requirements, and policy); it may be managed by the organization or a third party and may exist on or off site Public cloud the cloud infrastructure is available to the general public or a large industry group. It is owned by an organization selling cloud services Hybrid cloud the cloud infrastructure is a composition of two or more clouds (private, community, or public) Comarch Private Cloud Computing Comarch s Cloud Computing service is targeted for business-critical applications. This kind of private cloud model is designed to achieve best security and availability parameters. Accordingly to this, this model is rather more similar to a dedicated infrastructure than the classical cloud model. The goal is to fully isolate environments from each other. However our service utilizes as much as possible shared hardware resources which brings benefits known from cloud implementations. The management process is responsible for assuring proper performance for every environment installed. Ideas in brief: Faster implementation and deployment process Service exactly matched to business needs Reduced TCO and lower investment costs Deployment Models Private Cloud Hybrid Clouds Community Cloud Public Cloud Service Models Infrastructure as a Service (lass) Platform as a Service (PaaS) Software as a Service (SaaS) Essential Characteristics On-Demand Self Service Broad Network Acces Resource Pooling Rapid Elasticity Measure Service Common Characteristics Massive Scale Homogeneity Virtualization Low Cost Software Resilient Computing Geographic Distribution Service Orientation Advanced Security

48 48 Beyond BSS/oSS The technical and financial point of view Comarch s dynamic expansion into Western European markets established a need of simplifying the implementation process, making it more flexible and allowing for cost decrease. The new pattern was developed in the cloud computing model which allows to give the client only a part of the big system suited to his business size. One big environment for multiple clients ensures sufficient stability and enables performance of much bigger business process peaks than a dedicated architecture (with defined KPIs). It also delivers higher availability, and a better level of security. Fast server and virtualization technologies progress is helpful and enables wider and wider usage of the private cloud, even in regard to business-critical applications. Today we can utilize the Intel Xeon Nehalem architecture which provides performance that is even too big for some applications. Typical utilization of dedicated hardware is less than 30% which is very painful especially due to the overscaled number of licenses. Much better quantization of hardware means allowing to utilize over 80% of hardware and licenses. New virtualization technologies have little influence on performance, which is why it is possible to decrease external costs by 10-20% (in the case of large projects) and up to a few times (in smaller projects).. Comarch Cloud Computing delivers high utilization hardware which requires eliminating all performance bottlenecks: Connection between multiple layers of application by HP BladeCenter c7000 with Virtual Connect technology providing 10 Gb/s bandwidth Storage bandwidth by low latency SAN fiber channel network at 8 Gb/s configured with many ports for parallel access Storage IOPS (I/O operations per second) by large number of SAS disks mixed with SSD and Easy Tier technology enabling automatic balancing for best performance Network traffic by distributing evenly by hardware loadbalancing farm of Cisco Content Switches Virtual Connect additionally simplifies LAN and SAN network management and gives much more flexibility and scalability. High availability and scalability are ensured thanks to the load-balancing configuration of Apache servers (Linux) or NLB (Windows), application clusters (i.e. WebLogic, jboss) and HA clusters (i.e. Symantec Storage Foundation HA, Windows MSCS, Oracle RAC One node) or performance DB clusters (i.e. Oracle RAC). Such configuration is ready for multiple client services. Multiple hardware nodes provide a possibility of online services migration and maintaining the system without a maintenance window (less maintenance windows are necessary). Security policies assume the same scenario for a dedicated system split into minimum two access layers which suite CDC security zones. Web access and application servers are isolated through virtualization and dedicated vlans networks. Each client has his own virtual server with a dedicated OS system (Windows, Linux or Unix). Virtualization is used not only for security but also to isolate warranted performance. Potential problems with any system will not impact others. The high addition of virtualization for I/O operations will lead to using different separation methods for the database layer as database charts, instances and reserved resources. Only authorized users will have access to their database. The whole system is compliant with the highly restrictive ISAE 3402 security report. It also requires a dedicated test / acceptance environment all changes have to be developed and tested before implementation in the production system (according to change management policy). Every project must have its own acceptance environment separated from other environments. Access to the production system is limited only to system engineers maintaining the system (developers have access only to preproduction systems). The cloud model can also involve implementing an additional Disaster Recovery Center with a Business Continuity Plan securing business from a total disaster in the primary DC. Asynchronous replication realized by Oracle Data- Guard, SQL Log Shipping or disk array block replication do not overload production systems and allow to bring up the system in less than 15min if the primary fails. All production systems are connected to the Comarch Central Backup system. Clients benefit from a shared high performance LTO-5 tape library and a very fast backup network which utilizes various technologies such as LAN (both 1 Gb/s and 10 Gb/s) and SAN 8 Gb/s ( LAN free backup ). This sharing of resources allows decreasing hardware and third party license costs ensuring a sufficient level of performance, scalability and data security. The ready, prepared and preconfigured environment significantly decreases investment costs and speeds up the time of service delivery (faster time for hardware delivery). The shared environment allows to provide these advantages to clients in a simple way.

49 Beyond BSS/oSS 49

50 50 Beyond BSS/oSS The Comarch Billing Cloud enabled fringout to grow from zero to millions of users Comarch s flexibility, both technical and commercial was exactly what we were looking for in our billing provider. The Comarch Billing Cloud enabled fringout to grow from zero to millions of users, without compromising the quality of service. Thanks to Comarch we were able to launch the service very fast and can easily adjust it as the business evolves. Alex Nerst CTO, fring B eing that the mobile VoIP services market has advanced, fring designed an innovative product that allows making phone calls from their application to mobile and landline phone networks. The Comarch Billing Cloud solution was selected in order to provide rating, charging and billing of services of this revolutionary business idea in real-time. Business needs fring already provides a smartphone application that enables users to make voice/video calls and text chat for free in the fring network. As the next step it was decided to allow to make calls to mobile and landline phone users the new service was called fringout. fring planned to enable its subscribers to make phone calls from 1 /minute to any country. To launch this service, fring needed a billing software for support. fringout was to be built from scratch, with no guaranteed success, yet with a solid potential customer base of 10 s of millions of fringsters. The supporting software was expected to be flexible start small and then grow with business while maintaining telcograde robustness. After reviewing several vendors, Comarch Billing Cloud was chosen as the solution that best fits fring needs. The solution Comarch Billing Cloud is a modern solution, perfectly suited for start-ups because of its flexibility and short deployment time. It comes in a variety of business and licensing models including pay-as-you-grow. The final solution can be developed in an agile way, allowing required customizations to be delivered dynamically. The service provides real-time charging, balance control and replenishment functionalities. The customer care module supports system operations, such as product catalog, user management or report generation. Every user can review their account history, credit and settings, using Web or a mobile self-care interface. The highly available Comarch Billing Cloud ensures expected performance and scalability. Real-time session control, necessary in the prepaid business model, is supported by a RADIUS server. User registration is carried out online. The solution also provides integration with external business partners such as PayPal and G2S (gate2shop). Comarch Billing Cloud is hosted in the Comarch Data Center and is made available to fring via a Virtual Private Network (VPN), connecting over 20 fring data centers around the world.

51 Beyond BSS/oSS 51 Why Comarch? As fringout was a completely new service, fring was looking for a solution that would not only require little investment at the beginning, but one that would also be possible to extend in the future if the service was to prove successful. In this case, by choosing Comarch Cloud Billing, investing in hardware or technology was not necessary. Because the solution is based on the Comarch BSS Suite of COTS products, it offers a combination of a low-cost approach and product maturity. This unique mixture together with the stability and scalability (both technical and commercial) of Comarch Billing Cloud made Comarch an ideal partner for fring s project. The Result Comarch Billing Cloud was deployed in the Comarch Data Center in Krakow within a very short time it took only 2 months to launch the all-in-one business solution and perform all the necessary integrations Fast and effective integration was executed with fring s infrastructure and external services such as PayPal and G2S (gate2shop) using Web services API Thanks to the flexibility of the service, fring is now able to rapidly introduce changes in their service and maintain the leading position in the mobile VoIP market Comarch Billing Cloud has scaled seamlessly and efficiently from zero at launch to 10 s of millions of requests served daily The number of fringout users is growing aggressively - adding more than a million fringsters monthly, reaching 10 s and 10 s of millions of fring users Customer fring Industry Mobile VoIP Communications fring is the mobile communication service that pioneered mobile video over internet calls in 2009 and announced the world s first mobile group video calls for iphone & Android devices. fring is growing exponentially with tens of millions of users in more than 200 countries. Their services are available on all leading smartphones (including iphone, ipod touch, Android and Symbian), through any mobile operator, and any mobile internet connection (3G/4G, Wi-Fi, GPRS, EDGE). Figure 1. Comarch applications (Self Care, Mobile) implemented for fring fring users make free group video calls, voice calls and live chat. With fringout, users can make cheap calls to any regular landline and mobile phone number worldwide from the starting price of 1 /min. fring adds internet features to cell phones. You just download this one little thin app to your phone and it just does it, it works, CNBC If you don t have a landline and are on the go with your mobile then use fring to make cheaper calls through Wi-Fi, The Guardian Comarch products & services: Comarch 3arts Comarch Billing Cloud Comarch Data Center

52 52 Telcosphere blog 4 Facts about Telco field services Szymon Uczciwek Comarch SA FSM Product Manager, Telecommunications Business Unit W hen it comes to field service management, the main trends and facts describing the current situation of telecom service providers are generally described in research delivered by analytical companies such as Frost & Sullivan (i.e. a report on OSS/BSS Global Competitive Strategies dedicated to Workforce Management (WFM) Strategies for Changing Markets and Challenging Economics). In order to give service providers a better idea of how much they can gain with a modern FSM solution, in May this year I developed an application called FSM ROI calculator. The website visitors fill in data about their current business parameters and in return they get an estimated calculation of return on investment (RoI) if they would implement the Comarch FSM solution. The visitors feed the calculator with 7 numbers describing their field services: Number of technicians; Number of dispatchers; Annual cost of Technician; Annual cost of Dispatcher; Number of work orders completed daily; % of work orders complaints with SLA; First visit fix rate and Annual cost of SLA violations. After having filtered the data from the past 4 months and having chosen only the data that made sense, I selected a group of about 20 percent of all records gathered through the calculator. This gives about 100 unique data sets not a large group, but enough to draw some conclusions. Additionally I compared this information with the data we estimated earlier (based on our experience) and on-site analyses of field service processes at various telecom companies. Conclusion 1 Technicians in mid-sized enterprises are more efficient than in large organizations As controversial as this conclusion may be, this is what the calculator numbers say. An average number of work orders executed daily in companies employing more than 200 technicians is 4,3 (median is 2,5!), whereas service providers employing less than 200 technicians are able to achieve 4,8 tasks executed daily (median is 3,2). The result of course depends on the specific character of work, but the numbers sound quite reasonable when you consider, that it is more

53 Telcosphere blog 53 complicated to monitor the work of over 200 techs and control bad habits which occur in the large telecoms (i.e. execution of tasks by crews of more techs than the task requires). Conclusion 2 Number of dispatchers doesn t result in better service Before checking the numbers, I thought that companies with a large number of back office employees, supporting techs in the field, will have better results in the First- Time Fix Rate or meeting SLA KPIs. However, the calculator data proves me wrong. The median for companies with low and high level of SLA compliancy and First Time Fix Rate is (surprisingly) on the same level 10 techs per dispatcher. And, what is even more interesting, the average for companies with highly customer experience related KPIs will be 17 techs per dispatcher, when for companies with a really low KPIs it was 11. It means that the mismanagement of field service departments results in overstaffed back offices and bad scores in customer satisfaction related ranks. If a problem with KPIs occurs, it s better not to employ new supporting back office employees, but to think about restructuring field service departments. Conclusion 3 Meeting SLA is a challenge but enables to avoid penalties For most telecoms meeting SLAs are very important, and they get measured consistently. But most companies don t pay any penalties related to violated SLAs (at least not directly). Companies with better SLA KPIs pay penalties in only 30% of cases, whereas companies with SLA KPIs below 70% pay in about 50% cases. What s more, average penalties are 20% lower in the group with better KPIs, than in the group with lower KPIs. Another thing is that meeting SLA is highly correlated with First Time Fix Rate (KPIs in 95% of cases are more or less on the same level). Simply said, if techs don t have to visit the customer location several times, it is easier to carry out tasks according to the plan and meet the SLAs. Conclusion 4 Dispatchers are specialists but their skills are not properly used The number for Cost of Dispatcher and Cost for Technician proved to be comparable. A technician is a resource responsible for task execution in the field, and it is very easy to count his participation in generating the company s income. More techs and more installations result in better financial results. A dispatcher is also a specialist and is an essential link in the process. But his role, although significant, can t be directly assessed. In the case of our research, the median was 1 dispatcher per 10 techs. So it means that 10% of costs of every work order execution is consumed by dispatchers. In comparison to the results shown in commercially available research, this is a really high rate. To summarize, in comparison to general research reports in this area, our statistics look as follows: This is a post from the Comarch Telcosphere Blog. To post a comment and read more entries about various communication issues, please visit: KPI Value of mine research (average) Commercially available research (average for best in class)* Number of techs per dispatcher 15 (median 10) 30 Number of work orders completed daily per dispatcher 4,6 (median 3) 5 SLA compilance 70% 92% First Time Fix Rate 70% 87% *Source: Aberdeen Group Figure 1. Internal results vs. published researches comparison of selected KPIs

54 54 Telcosphere blog Customer experience through the eyes of an average subscriber małgorzata siwiec Comarch SA Marketing Manager Telecommunications Business Unit C ustomer experience has been a buzzword for a while now. When I started doing some research on the subject I came across articles as old as 2007 (!). However, the topic is evolving and it still seems to be generating a lot of discussion in the telecom industry. Various polls and surveys conducted by analysts from companies such as Frost & Sullivan or Yankee Group all confirm that now more than ever operators are seeing the importance of customer experience as their differentiator on the market. There are however some differences in the ways, in which customer experience is understood by both telecom operators and their software providers. I recently tried to make a call on a weekday, during off-peak hours and experienced a lack of connectivity. Despite the fact that I had reception, I was not able to make a call, or send a text message, even after I reset my mobile phone. Did this affect my customer experience? Yes. But it was a one-off situation and I was also using my business mobile phone, so in this case I was not considering to call my service provider and end my contract. But should this have been my private mobile and the situation would reoccur, I would have definitely started looking around for an alternative service provider. Imagine what would happen if I was in an emergency situation and really in need to contact someone Another example is from a completely different domain as it is associated with my cable TV and Internet provider. Once I was late with a payment, because I simply forgot about the deadline. One day past the due date, my Internet and cable TV was disconnected by the service provider without any notice in any form. I called customer service with a complaint and after a long discussion managed to convince the person I was speaking to, that a mere or text message informing me of the approaching deadline would help me to remember to pay the bill in time. Given I am a long-time customer, it was not appropriate to switch the Internet and cable TV off without notice. I guess I was not the only one who Comarch Technology Review 02/ /2012

55 Telcosphere blog 55 had this experience, as some time later my service provider started sending out s to its customers, informing about the approaching payment deadlines. And recently, when my service was down once I called the helpdesk, I received an automatic (!) message that the Internet and cable TV service in my area is temporarily down and they are working on fixing it. Now, this is what I call customer experience! Based on these two situations, it is quite easy to demonstrate two areas in a telecom operator s business that can significantly influence customer experience. The example of my mobile service outage points to increased efficiency of network congestion management as a potential field for improvement. The story about my cable TV provider clearly shows, that service assurance and service quality management are important domains to be transformed. As is also assuring swift communication between the resource- and the customer-facing layers, which facilitates tracking a customer complaint down to the underlying network failure. Since I have outlined the areas that are first in line to transform in a communications service provider s business, now it is time to describe how to approach such a transformation? Which OSS investments will bring direct results in the form of improved customer experience? How can operators refocus their OSS systems so that they are fed and driven by customer service metrics? This is a post from the Comarch Telcosphere Blog. To post a comment and read more entries about various communication issues, please visit: To find out about Comarch s vision on how to approach these challenges, go to our newly launched website: refocusoss.comarch.com

56 56 Telcosphere blog The eternal question repair or replace? krzysztof kwiatkowski Comarch SA Product Manager, BSS Telecommunications Business Unit A lot of projects currently operated by service providers are related to organization and IT transformations, especially Business Supporting Systems transformations. Before trying to answer the question set out in the title let s take a look at why operators started to think about transforming the existing sensitive systems which control their business? Why do we have so many BSS transformation project initiatives? There are a lot of reasons The first reason is the growing obsession with time-to-market. Rising differentiation demands are a result of rising competition. To cope with these requirements marketing and business departments introduce new products and new bundles based on cross-technology convergent products and do so (or want to do this) in a short period of time. Additionally, they want to do this without the IT department s support each time they introduce a new product or promotion. So one reason for BSS transformation is to provide a tool to innovate which will allow marketing and business departments to easily create new product offerings on their own. So if marketing works well and we have customers interested in our current offerings then sales can no longer function based on an outdated model. Selling communication products to customers is more often connected with personalization, e.g. customers decide for what and how much they pay (e.g. which parts of the fee will be tied to SMSs, voice and data), they may also need special discounts for particular services (e.g. special discounts for international connections) or in some regions you may have to give customers better prices based on local competition (like in cable TV business). Once you sign an agreement with the customer, it is essential to have the ability to quickly deliver what was agreed upon. In case such customers are international enterprise customers this can be very challenging, because services offered to them are often very complex. If sales processes are not modern and efficient enough then hard work of marketing may be lost. Improving the sales process is a second important reason of BSS transformations. We mustn t forget that at the end of the long chain there are IT people who must fulfill all of the above requirements of various departments and deliver proper tools. BSS architec-

57 Telcosphere blog 57 Market competition Differentiation, personalized offers Short time to market Shorter life of the product portfolio Business / marketing demands We need to have tools to innovate Cross-technology, convergent products Complicated definitions of offers Sales requirements Ability to reach target groups with special offers Ability to quickly deliver what was sold Management directions Better results Cost control Reduction in OPEX IT / service delivery drivers Complex and ineffective management of the product portfolio Less manual work, more automation expected A need for standardized systems and processes Figure 1. Drivers for BSS transformation tures which were created many years ago are capable of fulfilling these requirements, nevertheless it is also very common that all innovative ideas bounce back from the wall of costs and time necessary to implement them. For example, defining new product offerings is too complicated and inefficient, e.g. some manual activities must be repeated many times in various ways and in various places, only to introduce a simple new promotion. Less manual work and more automation is not only expected. It is a must. Also usage of standards seems to be helpful in preventing from falling for the same traps again in the future. All of the above requirements and problems put together resulted in operators deciding to start difficult transformation projects, not only connected with BSS systems but also with the organization. After being fully convinced that changes must be made a new question arises repair or destroy it and build from scratch? At first glance the safest solution is the simplest, repair the existing architecture and transform it securely in various stages until it reaches its final form. This seems to be possible at the beginning, especially in terms of transforming BSS systems. Such a solution also seems to be the best from the perspective of risk analysis. But finally it is necessary to perform a deeper technical analysis of a transformation and plan all stages in details. Unfortunately, usually at this point the majority of transformation projects fall through or are cancelled before they even start. This is because after such a deep analysis, step by step, repairing simple becomes replacing. For many architects such a replacement process has seemed to be the best approach from the very beginning, this meant building BSS from the ground up, bit by bit with the use of the latest standards and modern technologies fitting the ideal concept. Unfortunately, such projects also fail very often immediately after deeper analysis and first cost estimations which may never meet the possible return of investment. So the final question is is it possible to find a compromise and a solution which will fulfill the necessary requirements and one that will be possible to execute? It seems possible but I will address this question in more detail and try to answer it in my next blog posts. This is a post from the Comarch Telcosphere Blog. To post a comment and read more entries about various communication issues, please visit:

58 58 Telcosphere blog Escape from frequency migration havoc A s you may know quick and wide changes applied in a big, well established organization can be very creative however, usually turn out to be destructive. Sometimes even small modifications implemented on a large scale result in quite astonishing changes. So here we are doing frequency modifications triggered by frequency rehoming exercises. Redeploying channels previously used by older radio technologies This means we might bring havoc into the previously well-tuned network. Not to mention the need for coordinating various activities related to removing old transmitters, commissioning new ones, getting all the leases and permits in place. Andrzej Ambrożewicz Comarch SA OSS Consultant Telecommunications Business Unit This is a post from the Comarch Telcosphere Blog. To post a comment and read more entries about various communication issues, please visit: Let s look at this phenomenon from a mobile operator s perspective: What about introducing modifications into tens of thousands of network elements serving customer traffic? Sounds like a recipe for disaster? Quite possible if the quality or availability of the service offered to the customer depends on parameters that are subject to the applied modifications. Potentially, there s a lot of room for a mistake. Isn t there? Luckily a system conducting end-to-end processing of the spectrum migration task can serve as a life raft. It features all the necessary engineering tools, generates / collects all the required certifications / approvals and coordinates external subcontractors. Yep someone thought about that. Even more we actually can present a detailed architecture of such a tool. To learn more about Comarch's vision of simplifying the process of spectrum migration and learn about our proposed solution visit: spectrum.comarch.com Comarch Technology Review 02/ /2012

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60 Thought Leadership The ideas and insights of Comarch experts that make us one of the industry s thought leaders. Browse online the recent white papers, watch the webcasts and tune to our blog. telecoms.comarch.com