Mobile carriers are increasingly turning to Hadoop to harness the technology's data analytics capabilities. Apache Hadoop has emerged as the standard platform for enterprise-level big data projects. The framework's flexibility and scalability make it an ideal solution for organizations that want to easily collect, store and process large volumes of information. With a dedicated analytics team, companies can then use that data to make more informed decisions regarding the direction of their operations.
According to Hortonworks, telecoms stand to benefit the most from employing Hadoop as their data streams are becoming more complex and varied. Beyond phone lines, these organizations have a wealth of information at their fingertips coming from email, video and Web browsing, among other sources.
"This rapid (and irreversible) pace of telecommunications data growth requires more efficient, scalable storage," Hortonworks stated. "So telcos are using Apache Hadoop to turn their burgeoning storage liabilities into strategic information assets."
The dynamic nature of the Hadoop framework allows mobile carriers to account for various types of incoming data and effectively leverage them to glean useful customer and operational insights. In addition to Hortonworks' clients, there are numerous other mobile companies making the most of Hadoop:
- China Mobile – The Chinese telecom's subsidiary, China Mobile Guangdong, had difficulty accounting for the surging amount of incoming data it was seeing as its subscriber base increased significantly. The organization utilized Hadoop to recreate its billing system to better cope with this additional traffic, including gaining the ability to scale up its storage capacity as needed. In addition, access to vast stores of information and analytics tools has allowed China Mobile Guangdong to retrieve actionable insights regarding its customers' needs. This has enabled company representatives to offer more personalized and directed services to their clientele.
- Verizon – In November, the telecom announced it had formed a partnership with Hadoop provider Cloudera to develop big data analytics services for its customers. Those clients that utilize the company's Verizon Cloud platform will have access to enterprise-level, advanced analytics capabilities.
"The ability to identify, gather, store and share large amounts of data is one of the true benefits of cloud computing," said Verizon CMO John Harrobin. "Providing those capabilities on top of our high-performing, secure and scalable architecture strengthens the Verizon Cloud offering for our clients."
- Telefonica – Telefonica CIO Phil Jordan recently sat down for an interview with Computer Weekly, touching upon a variety of issues currently affecting the telecom space, including the potential for Hadoop to aid enterprise operations. Telefonica has begun utilizing Hadoop, but is still in the process of determining how the carrier wants to leverage the technology.
"The thing that's probably talked about most is what do we want to use big data for, what are we trying to solve, what is the biggest value we are trying to create – then let's apply technology to that and sometimes that will be big data technology," Jordan told the source.
Many other mobile providers are investigating the benefits of Hadoop and have projects in various stages of development. Hortonworks alone has multiple telecom clients that have found numerous ways to utilize the analytics platform, including viewing network traffic in real time and making adjustments as needed.