A consistent theme throughout MWC 2016 was the idea that operators are sitting on a store of customer data that, like an untapped oil reserve, could deliver rich insights that lead to significant revenue opportunities. Rising interest in the Internet of Things (IoT) isn’t making matters easier – we saw a flood of manufacturers demonstrating their latest connected devices, from cars to wearables, at MWC 2016, plus a fair share of big thinkers promoting their vision for larger-scale, IoT-enabled operations, like smart cities. Here are takeaways from the MWC panel “Operator Customer Analytics,” where those challenges and opportunities were discussed.

The Operator Perspective
Operators have always collected data, but the ways in which they pool, interpret and act on information has changed as technology and processes evolve.

Kuan Moon Yuen, CEO of the consumer group at Singapore-based operator Singtel, explained that his company has developed a more sophisticated analytics estate by pooling insights from multiple data sources. Customer data usage has always been important to telcos, but Singtel stressed that analysing other information – location, device and real-time contextual metrics – allows operators to deliver tailored network optimization, better customer support and predictive, real-time marketing.

Dr. Jiwon Ashley Joo of SK Telecom agreed that context changes the way operators can serve customers. Her company changed its analytics framework to gain a more holistic view of how its customers interact with various services. This type of observation led to service innovation, including a popular new connected wearable device for kids and pets. As these new services are used, the operator collects even more information about its users, which inform future initiatives.

The Standards Association Perspective

Of course, it’s easy enough to point out operators’ need to mine, interpret and act on their substantial data reserves. Rob Rich of TM Forum clarified the challenge by reminding MWC panel attendees of the significant skills gap that prevents many operators from actually putting these ideas into practice.

Of the substantial volume of data currently floating out there in operator environments, a small percentage – about 5 percent, said Rich – is actually actionable. To increase that percentage, operators need to develop an organizational culture for sharing data, and raise their level of sophistication when it comes to leveraging data.

That underscored what’s perhaps the biggest challenge operators face in maximizing customer data: they’re already a bit behind the eight-ball. For digital-born companies like Google and Facebook, a data-centric culture, mindset and competency is already built-in. Telcos need to change to acquire some of those qualities.

The Customer Engagement Automation Solution Perspective

So, if the objectives are to combine multiple insights from disparate data sources, get smarter about how your organisation manages and analyses data and change the culture of your organisation to be more data-centric, what’s your next step?

Third-party partnerships can help operators improve their level of sophistication around analytics initiatives, even democratising analytics insight, so anyone from IT to marketing to sales can make smarter decisions about customer information. Analytics platforms bring together raw data from multiple sources, enrich it to provide context and drive the right actions instantaneously. These solutions enable automated and real-time decisions and actions, helping businesses keep pace with fast-changing buyer needs and wants.

The biggest opportunity here is in real-time and contextual marketing: an operator who learns a customer is running low on mobile data while that individual is listening to a streaming music app has the chance to deliver a highly relevant and compelling top-up offer at the perfect time. It’s how marketing can and should work if you’re able to act in real-time with the right information about your customer.

Learn more about how successful operators leverage customer analytics data in our new book, Nexterday Volume II.

MWC 2015 was a significant show for Comptel, because it’s where we debuted “Operation Nexterday,” our framework to help digital and communications service providers transform their businesses and thrive in the post-digital era. We launched a book, threw a party and shared our vision for new sales, marketing and service playbooks with the world.

Operation Nexterday took off. It inspired our first anti-seminar, Nexterday North, and we’ve seen how it’s changed the way our customers and partners talk about business opportunity in the era of digitalisation.

At MWC 2016, we want to keep our foot on the gas and build on that momentum. We’ve declared 2016 as a year of action and execution, when telcos take the Nexterday concept a step further and commit to transformation. We’re ready to help our customers and partners take action. Here’s how:

Nexterday: Volume II

Our first book introduced readers to the four factors creating the need for digital transformation: evolving buyer expectations, new monetisation strategies, advancements in telco infrastructure and the need for rich data insights.

This year’s sequel – a hard copy of which you can pick up at our booth, stand 5G40 in hall 5 – explains exactly how you can tackle each one. It also includes even more contributions from experts and visionaries both within and outside telco, including economist Dr. Kjell Nordström, business experts Stefan Moritz, Mark Curtis and Jeetu Mahtani, and analysts Stewart Rogers, Fredrik Jungermann, Caroline Chappell and Steve Bell.

#Nexterday Party

What’s a trip to Barcelona without a party? We’re hosting 400 people for a #Nexterday party on Wednesday 24 February starting at 7 pm CET. This isn’t the usual cocktails and canapes affair – we’ll have live performances, a DJ, superhero nitro cocktails, an open bar, bus transportation to the city centre and plenty of networking opportunities. You can pick up an exclusive ticket at the Comptel booth or at the stands of one of our partners: Salesforce, IBM, Tata Consultancy Services, Tech Mahindra, CloudSense and Hitachi.

FWD

Operators who stop by our booth can get a first-hand look at Comptel FWD, our disruptive digital sales and marketing channel for operators that creates a faster, convenient and more personal mobile buying experience for consumers. It’s a radical new way for operators to sell mobile services, and it’s how operators will connect the next 2 billion internet users to the Web.

Industry Blueprints

We’ll feature guides to help operators complete their digital business and IT transformations. Topics include cloud transformation, NFV service orchestration, IoT, agile elastic portfolios and automated contextual engagement.

Multi-Touch Demo Wall

Our demo wall will visualise how real-time data sources can be seamlessly connected with content and customer profiles, and then instantly turned into contextual, omni-channel actions for better business outcomes.

For Comptel, MWC 2016 will be about celebrating a year’s worth of progress and issuing a challenge for operators to take action. We invite you to join us in transforming for the better in 2016.

To book a meeting with Comptel at Mobile World Congress 2016, contact your Comptel account manager or send us an email at [email protected]. And be sure to stop by our booth, stand 5G40 in Hall 5, to pick up your copy of Nexterday: Volume II and get a ticket to the #Nexterday party.

We’ve published Nexterday: Volume II, a follow-up to our previous book, Operation Nexterday. You can pick up a hard copy of the book at this year’s Mobile World Congress or download a digital version by visiting our new online magazine and community, Nexterday.org. With this edition, our goal is to help each operator become a “Perfect Digital Company,” one that works for and with its customers to enhance the digital moments that make up life.

To achieve that, operators need to open their minds to fresh ways of thinking about serving customers, taking inspiration from their counterparts across the globe and visionary, non-telco businesses that are changing the face of digitalisation.

The Customer is in Charge

Generation Cloud is, as always, at the centre of the digital struggle. B2B and B2C customers crave the autonomy to customise, configure and purchase digital services at a faster pace and on their own terms. On top of that, operators are increasingly starting to play in non-traditional markets, including connected devices, smart cities and healthcare, in both established and emerging markets.

Technology advancements – from the introduction of and ongoing management needs for virtualised network functions to the rising importance of real-time data in sales, marketing and service management – mean operators have more tools at their disposal to serve buyers’ unique interests and succeed in new verticals.

The challenge is determining how to effectively leverage these tools, while also applying the creativity and radical ideas operators need to distinguish their service at a time when customers are willing to switch digital and communications service providers at a moment’s notice. It’s not just about offering dynamic new services, but also delivering those services as part of a more pleasant and fulfilling customer experience.

Creating Perfect Digital Moments

Nexterday: Volume II describes how your business can evolve to meet the needs of a changing digital economy. The book includes:

• Inspiring real-world examples of telco and non-telco businesses that strive to offer customers extraordinary digital experiences
• Perspectives on the qualities of leading digital businesses from economist Dr. Kjell Nordström and business experts Stefan Moritz, Mark Curtis and Jeetu Mahtani
• In-depth research from analysts Stewart Rogers, Fredrik Jungermann, Caroline Chappell and Steve Bell
• Blueprints on how operators can automate their enterprise sales approach, pursue Internet of Things (IoT) service opportunities, create a richer B2C customer experience and re-engineer their back end for accelerated service delivery and enhanced digital service lifecycle management

Though we believe strongly in the themes we cover in the book, we want it to inspire a rich dialogue about the state of our digitalisation. We invite book readers to visit Nexterday.org to share their opinions and challenge our thinking. Whether you agree or disagree, we want to hear from you at Nexterday.org. Registration is simple: just sign up with your LinkedIn account.

Nexterday: Volume II, which will be available in hard and digital copies, will be officially released at our #Nexterday party on Wednesday, 24 February at 7 p.m. CET during Mobile World Congress. We’ll have live performances, an open bar and plenty of opportunities to unwind and mingle. You can pick up an exclusive ticket at the Comptel booth (stand 5G40 in hall 5). If you are not attending Mobile World Congress, you can download a digital copy of the book at Nexterday.org.

We invite you to join the movement and become a ‘Perfect Digital Company’ that serves the best interests of its customers. Nexterday: Volume II will show you how.

The Comptel team was excited to share our vision for the future of telecommunications with the 40,000 attendees who turned up for this year’s Mobile World Congress Shanghai. This year’s event was abuzz with talk of innovations in mobile and digital technology.

Asian markets are rapidly adopting mobile and digital services, and there’s a chance to grow these markets further. Idea Cellular managing director Himanshu Kapania spoke of the opportunity to connect more of India’s 1 billion mobile voice users to the Internet. Only about a quarter of the country’s telecom subscribers have Internet access, but new initiatives to extend connectivity have contributed to 37-percent annual growth in the number of Indian Internet users.

China is experiencing a similar trend with 4G. Since December 2013, China Mobile has added 190 million 4G connections, according to its executive vice president, Li Huidi. As a result, 21 percent of the company’s mobile user base runs on 4G, and that population of subscribers delivers 3.8 times more average revenue per user (ARPU) than non-data users.

Overall, 46 percent of the nearly 4 billion Asia-Pacific consumers are mobile subscribers, of which 62 percent – about 1.3 billion individuals – are also mobile broadband subscribers.

As mobile and digital penetration continues to grow in these markets, operators in the region should not only innovate to win over customers but also do everything in their power to maximise even the smallest digital moment. As we’ve written about in our book, Operation Nexterday, operators will be able to drive more revenue by giving customers exactly the service they need at exactly the right moment and on the right platform.

Data is the key to finding and enhancing these digital moments, but only if it can offer immediate visibility, deliver context in-stream and enable instant action. That’s Intelligent Fast Data at work.

Certain operators in emerging markets are leveraging consumers’ data to drive revenue by overcoming cultural or regional obstacles that limit information access. Tadashi Onodera, chairman of KDDI, explained that his company has been able to address cultural privacy concerns through a direct billing approach. Because nearly all Japanese mobile customers are on a postpaid agreement that requires a national ID and credit card, they trust their operator with their data, according to Onodera. As a result, KDDI has access to data it can use to learn about customers, deliver unique services and add value.

We’ve seen direct carrier billing work successfully in places like Indonesia, where Indosat has been able to deliver a modern and convenient mobile purchasing experience to its customers, while simultaneously unlocking new monetisation opportunities. It’s a powerful example of how digital and communications services providers are thinking creatively to overcome obstacles, move past current ways of doing business and embrace Nexterday.

Having spent time with the heavy hitters in Shanghai, we’re more confident than ever that the future of mobile and digital services in APAC and beyond will depend on this type of creativity and focus.

In November, the antiseminar you’ve been waiting for hits Helsinki. Nexterday North will bring together the brightest minds in digital and communications services to think ahead to examine our collective blindspot, think again to challenge the status quo and think beyond to find new digital disruptions. Register now to reserve your exclusive spot.

We made our mark on MWC by launching our book Operation Nexterday at a special launch party Monday evening, and we were thrilled to share our game plan for the future of digital communications with a large crowd that turned out for drinks, tapas, and free copies of the book!

Some of the communications industry’s leading innovators and visionaries are in attendance for MWC, which is a big benefit to attendees who want to get a sense for how the industry is changing and where it is headed in the coming months and years. Here are three key takeaways we gathered from conference keynotes and sessions we attended:

1. Mobile Consumers Need Digital Confidence

In the event’s opening keynote on Monday morning, the chief executives from four of the world’s top operators – Telefónica, Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom and Telenor – shared their thoughts on how mobile will need to evolve to meet the demands of the future.

Panellist César Alierta, executive chairman and CEO of Telefónica, explained that nearly 43 percent of the world’s population – around 3 billion people – are connected to the Internet, and 90 percent of the world’s population is expected to have a mobile phone by 2020!

Each of these consumers will need to have “digital confidence,” or better control over their digital lives and privacy, explained Alierta. The industry will also need to support up to 50 billion new connected devices that make up the Internet of Things and the ‘industrial Internet.’

As a result, operators will need to embrace efficiencies that will enable millions of new customers to connect to the Internet and engage with new digital services. Alierta identified network quality, affordability and service attractiveness as potential areas of improvement for operators who anticipate a surge of new consumers.

2. Data Drives Context, Which Drives Mobile Opportunity

As we have discussed before, targeted marketing is one effective way to reach the digitally savvy Generation Cloud – but only 4 percent of enterprises have the resources, budget and promise to deliver on context and better serve customers, according to Andrew Harrison of Dixons Carphone. Harrison was one of eight panellists in a conference session that explored how businesses could gain the context needed to deliver engaging, personalised content to the right customer at the right time.

Panellist Peter Fitzgerald of Google UK described why context is so critical to the buying experience. Mobile means purchase opportunities arise regardless of location and situation, whether a consumer is at work, home or even sitting on a train checking their phone. Forty-two percent of consumers use their phone in a retail store to compare prices for a product they see on the shelf – a practice known as “showrooming” – but savvy retailers are taking the opportunity to reach these connected buyers by pushing relevant, in-the-moment offers to their devices right in the store, said Fitzgerald.

Businesses today can leverage contextual data to propel instantaneous, personalised offers, and mobile devices are the perfect starting point to find that data. Smartphones and tablets are at the centre of our digital worlds, and as a result, they’re an ideal resource for contextual consumer data.

3. It’s Mobile’s Moment. How Will You Connect Consumers?

Sundar Pichai, senior vice president of products at Google, described Google’s efforts to enable Internet connectivity for consumers around the world. As Pichai explained, consumers in the developed and emerging world may take connectivity for granted, but 4 billion people around the world currently lack access to the Internet.

Google’s efforts to expand connectivity include bringing Google Fibre to urban areas in Africa, and its Project Loon initiative, which uses a network of high-altitude balloons traveling in the Earth’s stratosphere to bring LTE speeds to rural areas around the world. Pichai also discussed the drone company Titan, a recent Google acquisition that designs lightweight solar-powered airplanes which act as “floating cell phone towers,” bringing connectivity to consumers below.

Pichai added that Google will work with operators to build services to deliver to newly connected consumers, but when asked how Google could justify its lofty infrastructure investments, he explained that “it’s mobile’s moment right now.” The bottom line? In the age of affordable connected devices, operators need to follow Google’s lead and embrace innovative ways of reimagining service infrastructure. Better-connected consumers present bigger business opportunities for the savvy service providers who can innovate in the new era of Generation Cloud.

In Operation Nexterday, we describe the perfect storm currently changing the way operators serve customers and drive revenue, securing their future in the digital and communications industry. It all starts with Generation Cloud, digitally savvy group of consumers and businesses who are setting a new standard for service in today’s highly connected digital world.

These buyers make real-time purchasing decisions and shop on their own terms. They don’t want to play by the old rules of engagement, and if your products and services are too restrictive or slow for their needs, they won’t hesitate to switch to one of your competitors.

The numbers back this up – a recent consumer survey we conducted in January 2015 revealed that nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of consumers prefer to purchase digital content when and how it is convenient for them.

And these pressures aren’t restricted to B2C buyers. As our book explains, the trends of hyper-personalised marketing, multi-channel purchasing and instant gratification extend to B2B buyers as well. Instead of separating B2C and B2B channels, we need to start thinking of a unified business-to-human approach.

How do operators adapt to this new landscape?

By embracing Operation Nexterday to help rewrite your playbooks for approaching sales, marketing, technology and service in the age of Generation Cloud consumers and prosumers. Our book describes those who are pioneering the market, offers industry research and features third-party expert insight, offering the strategies you need to transform your business. More specifically, it includes:

• Examples from operators like T-Mobile and Telefonica, who are successfully turning the industry on its head with new service, sales and marketing, and technology strategies
• Research and insights from leading industry voices such as Fredrik Jungermann of tefficient, Dr. Mark Mortensen and Anil Rao of Analysys Mason, and Nancee Ruzicka of ICT Intuition
• Thoughts on transformation through strategic innovation from Professor Neo Boon Siong, Chairman of the Nanyang Executive Education and former Dean of the Nanyang Business School at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University

Operation Nexterday, which will be available in hard and soft copies, will be officially released at a special launch party on Monday, 2 March at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The party will be held at 5 p.m. CET at our stand, #5G40. We invite you to join us to pick up a copy of the book and learn more about our suggested framework for guiding operators’ future in the digital and communications industry.

If you are not attending Mobile World Congress but would like a hard or digital copy of Operation Nexterday, please contact our team at [email protected].

We urge all like-minded telco professionals and businesses to join the Operation Nexterday movement by getting the book and spreading the word, which you can do with the #operationnexterday Twitter hashtag.

My colleague, Leila Heijola, recently wrapped up Comptel’s 2014 with news of several significant orders, but what wasn’t mentioned was the success Comptel had at events near and far over the course of the year! From industry events like Mobile World Congress in Spain to Comptel’s very own user groups in Europe and Asia, we were able to communicate and collaborate with our communications service provider (CSP) customers, industry partners and other global enterprises alike.

To start off the year, we made a splash at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. More than 85,000 visitors and 1,800 exhibiting companies joined together to discuss hot topics in telco like Big Data, connected cars and the newest smart devices on the market. Comptel’s Matti Aksela, for one, spoke on a panel, “Big Data Goes on Stage,” covering the current state of data collection, refinement and analysis and the changes we can expect to see over the next several years.

While at the event, we launched our study detailing the issues on the minds of CMOs and CIO/CTOs in 2014. Additionally, we were excited to announce partnerships with Tecnotree and a Tier 1 U.S. mobile operator.

Next came TM Forum Live! in Nice, France, where a significant focus was on network function virtualisation (NFV). Around this theme, we announced several partnerships including an integration with GE Smallworld to streamline telco service fulfilment. The conference was a great space to discuss the emerging technology with other attendees, and opened many people’s eyes to the potential SDN and NFV have for the telco industry.

The fun didn’t stop in Nice, though… Salesforce’s Dreamforce, which took the form of a beach party in San Francisco, California, was a great opportunity for Comptel to hone in on the connection between front- and back-office systems and telcos’ evolution with the cloud and virtualisation. Beyond the lively entertainment, one of the themes, Reimagine: Customer Experience, definitely rang true for Comptel, as we exhibited with our collaboration with CloudSense and technology blueprint to help CSPs improve the B2B customer experience.

In addition to attending these industry events, we decided to host our own to connect on a deeper level with our customers. Our first user group of the year took place in Långvik near Helsinki, Finland, and the second was held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Both were great opportunities to discuss the processes and technologies to help spur CSPs’ transformation and future innovation. At the APAC event, we also picked the brains of some attendees on how they were planning to revolutionise customer experience in 2015.

Not surprisingly, analytics, automation, intelligence and the customer experience were on the minds of CSPs globally in 2014, and through great events, we were able to hear from operators about their business pressures and share our views on tackling their various areas of friction.

It’s no secret that the telecom industry is rapidly changing, and we’re looking forward to building on the progress made at a variety of events in 2015!

By now, it’s obvious to telcos that business models need to change and new strategies have to be implemented, but it’s difficult to know where to begin. That’s why Comptel conducted research with Vanson Bourne: to identify the barriers, strategies and attitudes facing telco CMOs and CIOs/CTOs as they look into 2014 and beyond.

Customer Experience: The Top Priority

Our research found that telco executives almost unanimously (80 percent) agreed that customer experience should be a goal of every employee in the organisation. While that goal may be established, executives are planning a number of different ways to get there. When asked about strategic priorities for 2014:

• 60 percent are hoping to understand gaps in the service delivery process
• 56 percent want to improve network performance
• 52 percent are focused on developing new products
• 48 percent want to understand customer experience on a granular level

The Big Data Behind Big Decisions

The intelligent use of data seems to be integral to telcos’ strategies this year. Predictive analytics, OSS/BSS consolidation and other initiatives can help streamline processes and modernise infrastructure; our research showed that executives are working hard to see these through.

While we found that integration, coordination and analytics are on the horizon, there still needs to be a fundamental shift in the way that different departments communicate – while 72 percent of CMOs want to understand gaps in service delivery, 68 percent of CIOs/CTOs said that they want to improve their networks.

These are the focuses we would traditionally expect from these organisations. Until executives agree on the mutual importance of each other’s responsibility, customer-centric initiatives are likely to remain at a standstill.

So how are communications service providers planning to overcome those barriers? And what will be possible if customer-relevant insights are shared between two traditionally separate organisations?

Check out our infographic, and download our eBook below to find out more!

Click to zoom.

In this eBook, we share exclusive, global executive research that highlights:

- Executive strategies for 2014

- Barriers to integration

- Technology priorities

- Attitudes toward data & planning

Download

From Big Data to smartphones, connected cars to connected refrigerators, Mobile World Congress 2014 showed us a glimpse of what we can expect this year… and next year and the year after that. As a final recap, we decided to comb Twitter and see what topics had caused the most excitement.

In this eBook, we share exclusive, global executive research that highlights:

- Executive strategies for 2014

- Barriers to integration

- Technology priorities

- Attitudes toward data & planning

Download

The consensus was that mobile devices and the dramatic, sweeping changes in traffic requirements are going to fundamentally change the structure, dynamics and functions of networks around the world.

“I believe we are just at the beginning,” said Combes.  He emphasized the importance of a structural change to build networks for the customer habits of tomorrow. “We clearly have to see the network differently to deliver the scale and elasticity required for new applications.”

Networks, in Context

Combes charged that the whole telecommunications industry is at a turning point that started about five years ago, when an increasing number of mobile devices entered the scene. He estimates that there will be a 440 percent increase in cloud and datacenter traffic between 2012 and 2017, but many communications service providers (CSPs) are still building networks with a legacy footprint.

Combes highlighted the debate taking place about the need for more intelligent, faster networks and how networks and the cloud are becoming more integrated. He touched on how this is changing the dynamic of the industry, because network operators will be deploying across a unified cloud platform and datacenters will be shared by multiple tenants.

“In Europe, there still aren’t enough investments in network and IT,” he said. “[CSPs] have no other way but to compete on price, as opposed to innovation.” He believes that networks must adapt to user needs and become user-aware.

Comptel’s vision of contextual intelligence at every touchpoint plays right into this line of thinking.

Infrastructure 2.0

Joe Tucci, the CEO of EMC, discussed the phenomenon as well.

“What’s happening is IT is bleeding into networks and vice versa,” he explained. “We call it the 3^rd grade platform of IT.” He added that developers will rule in the future. They will look for platforms that help them create new and innovative solutions. And a lot of those platforms will be in the cloud.

Patrick Gelsinger of VMware picked up the conversation by explaining how virtualisation is bringing efficiency and savings to networks that used to rely upon physical servers. He added that VMware has actually virtualised 70 percent of the company’s own servers.

Comptel has been very excited about the potential held in software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualisation (NFV). If the expected benefits of lightning fast speed, agility and real-time responsiveness are realised, these new networks will empower CSPs to deliver better, more personalised customer experiences than ever before. It was great to hear that other companies in the space are working toward similar goals.

The telecommunications industry is indeed at a turning point and with the right infrastructure, CSPs will be able to meet both customer and business goals in new and creative ways.

In this eBook, we share exclusive, global executive research that highlights:

- Executive strategies for 2014

- Barriers to integration

- Technology priorities

- Attitudes toward data & planning

Download