ALBtelecom and EagleMobile Service provider and market evolution accelarated by integral support to rural area networking, IP MPLS network design, advanced cloud offering adoption, and Convergent Billing and CRM solution Business Challenges Albania s telecom market is very specific with penetration rate for fixed telephony lines of only 25-35%, according to various sources of statistical data. With the arrival of capitalism in late nineties, strengthening role of mobile phone usage and increased level of penetration, end users mostly converted to using mobile phones as their main preference while the development phase and accompanying increase in the fixed-line business, in the usual sense, was literally skipped. Despite of the small volume of using fixed telephony services, ALBtelecom invested considerable amount of effort and resources into fixed infrastructure development since it was a main prerequisite for the consistent development of broadband Internet. Broadband Internet penetration was, on the other hand, main precondition for enhancing customer s portfolio with advanced convergent services. ALBtelecom has about 95% of fixed lines in the country, and around 65% stake in the broadband market, while the remaining 35% are divided among 70 small operators that certainly evidenced an extreme market fragmentation. Since almost 70% of Albanians live in rural areas a great business challenge was to bring advanced Internet services into the rural areas and to simultaneously build a set of advanced services for corporate and residential users in urban areas. Offering convergent network services and an increase in customer s end-user base created a strong business need to implement sophisticated network provisioning services and convergent billing systems. Main strategic objective, beside commercialization of advanced services was to facilitate the flow of information between all business functions inside the boundaries of the organization and manage the connections to outside stakeholders.
2 It was of utmost priority for ALBtelecom to connect with a reliable partner who has the experience, expertise and offers a comprehensive and integral approach in multi-service network optimization projects, implementation of sophisticated technological solutions and network management services. Rich reference projects portfolio, as well as the ability to proactively identify and resolve user problems were crucial for selecting Verso Group as prime contractor, system integrator and project management advisor simultaneously. Project scope Project scope was modularly determined. Since broadband Internet penetration was main prerequisite for enhancing customer s portfolio with advanced convergent services, an extensive rural area-networking project preceded cloud service offering adoption and convergent billing and CRM solution implementation. Comprehensive cooperation scope was divided into separate projects: Rural area networking IP MPLS Network optimization and Cloud service offering adoption Convergent Billing solution implementation Convergent Customer Relationship Management solution
3 Rural area networking BROADBAND INTERNET AS A KEY NETWORKED SERVICE DEMAND DRIVER Since the majority of Albanian population resided in rural areas, while the fixed telephone infrastructure was not sufficiently developed to be a strong driver of growth and momentum of advanced Internet services, before any plans for introduction of converged services over IP network were done, it was necessary to bring broadband Internet to rural areas and to simultaneously bear in mind resources optimization and customer s investment rationalization. Extensive situation analysis, development of several scenarios of possible solutions and evaluation of potential costs and benefits was performed and optimal solution selected. Main goal that had to be achieved with implementation of selected solution was to simultaneously solve several problems, such as bringing broadband Internet to rural, especially mountainous regions, and the possibility of consuming advanced services over network that were previously unavailable. Socially responsible role of this project was also not to be ignored as increased Internet penetration as a public good was one of the prerequisites for development of the whole rural region. About 2,000 schools were involved in a project in which more than half that number, mainly schools in the mountainous and less developed areas, were equipped with devices used as broadband internet access point, while the rest of the schools were covered through fixed lines, ADSL lines, where ALBtelecom already had the infrastructure. Rural schools that were connected wirelessly in that way became Internet service providers for the whole village and wider area. Carrying out a comprehensive project of equipping schools and their setting in the role of Internet service provider network access point, ALBtelecom was able to additionally enhance and further consolidate its market share since it directly opened a whole new service distribution channel which did not existed before. The whole rural area welcomed Internet service and was eager to consume network services, which was a good starting point to marketer network services. The whole rural area welcomed Internet service and was eager to consume network services
4 IP MPLS Network optimization and Cloud service offering adoption INNOVATIVE SERVICES AS A WAY TO INCREASE END-USERS COMPETITIVNESS After ensuring access to broadband Internet for many residential and business customers, successive step was to prepare the network for delivering advanced network services in the near future. Therefore Verso helped customer to strategically plan the network design in order to be able to deploy and commercialize new services. Customer s evolution as a modern service provider needed to trend towards all-ip NGN concept and building MPLS based IP core, as a widely accepted standard way of developing and deploying service provider networks, was proposed. IP MPLS network was built and served as a multi-service network to support both schools in the rural areas with basic services of Internet access but also as inevitable support to business users enabling them to consume advanced cloud based hosted or managed services, such as IP Telephony, hosted Exchange, hosted call center services, disaster recovery services, etc. Since customer s development plans for their business users service portfolio greatly rely on strengthening cloud infrastructure to support cloud services delivery, especially valuable were workshops and training sessions that Verso regularly held for sales and marketing team. Educations mainly included detailed explanations about important characteristics of the implemented solution and consuming scenarios, detailed analysis of development potentials as well as presentation of new ways of marketeering advance service offering. Workshops were extremely useful for customer employees as they provided guidance in identifying specific preferences and needs of market segments that a particular service could satisfy. Especially valuable were workshops and training sessions that Verso regularly held for sales and marketing team
5 Convergent Billing solution implementation ENABLING SEAMLESS SERVICE MONETIZATION Due to service portfolio expansion and exploding number of end-users, customer needed to implement a reliable solution to simultaneously provision end-user profiles and effectively manage the process of charging, billing and collection. Strategic decision was taken and it included an integral billing and rating platform, SAP Consume to Cash Solution (SAP C2C) to be deployed in ALBtelecom, but also in the business environment of a sister company EagleMobile, the third mobile operator in Albania. SAP C2C solution was deployed as a billing and rating platform for all services offered across customer s service and products portfolio. By implementing advanced billing and rating platform, customer was able to automate service pricing and modeling and to simplify and completely automate billing process enabling thus comprehensive real-time service monetization. Advanced functionality allowed customer to quickly roll out innovative pricing and rating strategies in response to market demands while performed analytics allowed the organization to manage comprehensive and scalable monetization of new real-time data services. By implementing advanced billing and rating platform, customer was able to automate service pricing and modeling
6 Convergent Customer Relationship Management solution ACHIEVING CENTRICITY A demand to streamline business processes was put before customer s management, along with constant requirements to reduce errors and lower cost of interaction with end-users. In order to integrate billing and invoicing and rating and charging with fulfillment processes company-wide, user needed to deploy convergent customer relationship management solution to easily manage offers, order processing and monitoring and to capture orders in an effective way. Since customer entered new markets and had extensive plans for introducing new products and services, a solid and reliable customer relationship management was a top priority. Implemented solution helped integrate sales, service and marketing through business processes and enterprise applications thus enabling customer to easily manage three important customerfocused issues: generating new growth, attaining operational excellence, and enhancing competitive agility. Deploying SAP CRM enabled holistic, disciplined approach to marketing planning that could drive growth, improve competitive agility and improve operational excellence. Advanced features allowed customer to respond to changes more faster and significantly increase service levels. Advanced features allowed customer to respond to changes more faster and significantly increase service levels
7 About ALBtelecom ALBtelecom is the largest fixed operating telephone company in the country offering it s services in all urban areas of the country, meanwhile it expands telecommunication services almost in the whole country through interconnection partnership with other rural operators. ALBtelecom operates in Albanian market with some major services such as fixed telephone, ISDN service, Dedicated Internet acc, ADSL, Dial-up, Intranet, Prepaid Cards, etc. On the other side, the company is investing to expand the services in parallel with a sensitive quality of service improvement. During the last 15 years, the company has made several investments enhancing the quality of services and number of services offered offered to the end users increased. www.albtelecom.al About Verso Verso is regional networking powerhouse, encompassing technological, organizational, business and commercial knowledge and expertise with the provisioning of products and services needed by companies transitioning into networked economy. Verso is strongly focused on service providers and enterprise market and has many years of experience in international projects implementing networking, IP telephony, IPTV and converged billing solution for service providers, enterprises and governments across EMEA region, Near East and beyond. www.verso.hr About Altima Altima, part of Verso group of companies, offers full lifecycle services, starting from consultancy, planning and design, to maintenance and proactive exploitation services, support and training. Altima is strongly focused on service providers, implementing world s leading provider s solutions for pricing, rating & charging, billing systems, and offering professional services in integration projects encompassing NGOSS integration with provisioning systems, mediation and network management. www.altima.hr Mrežne tehnologije VERSO d.o.o. Froudeova 5 HR-10000 Zagreb Croatia tel.: +385/1/6596-600 fax.: +385/1/6536-873 e-mail: info@verso.hr web: www.verso.hr Altima d.o.o. Froudeova 5 HR-10020 Zagreb Croatia tel: +385/1/6408 000 fax: +385/1/6408 001 e-mail: info@altima.hr web: www.altima.hr