Editor’s Note: With 2014 now upon us, RCR Wireless News has gathered predictions from leading industry analysts and executives on what they expect to see in the new year.
1. Fiber-to-the-home is a utility: With the emergence of next-generation access networks soon being on a global scale, different strategies and business models are continuously developing. High-speed Internet connectivity is nowadays often regarded as a must-have for households and businesses alike. Many players are now regarding FTTH more as a utility and encourage the local community to co-invest in the future telecom infrastructure. With a long-term approach, investment in new NGA infrastructure such as FTTH becomes increasingly interesting for investors. FTTH is more than just a commodity service – it’s a utility.
2. The Internet of things: More and more people are getting access to high-speed broadband. It is clear that we are moving towards a scenario where close to everybody is connected with broadband. Traditionally operators have regarded their subscriber base as directly related to the number of connected consumers. The next big step will be the application of ICT in a range of different industries where machine-to-machine interaction will play a big role. Estimates point at a 30-to-one ratio between devices and people which can be connected, thus enabling huge opportunities in what is often referred to as the “Internet of things.” With home networking, e-health and other M2M-dependent markets emerging the playfield is changed again.
3. Operational cost efficiency: These are challenging times for telecom operators, and driving operational cost efficiency will be one of the primary goals for the operators both today and tomorrow. With new, and innovative NGA players entering more and more markets we see a higher competition for market shares as well as shrinking margins on broadband services. We also see over-the-top providers taking a substantial portion of the consumers’ budgets. The industry will undergo a transformation which is not far away from what has happened in the airline industry the last ten years. In this new reality operators needs to focus on providing faster and faster Internet connectivity, on a tight budget. This requires a renewed focus on operational cost efficiency, on many levels of the business; one being cost efficient support systems where the traditional end-to-end approach have proven to be a big risk as well as cost for many operators. One successful strategy in mitigating these risks and costs is by using standardized, flexible and easy-to-use best-of-breed systems, thus avoiding being fully dependent on a single support system provider.
Torbjörn Sandberg is CEO of Netadmin Systems, a market leader in OSS systems. He has more than 15 years of experience from leading positions in the data and telecom industry.
