Comments allow us to pass on our informed opinion on industry developments, based on our attendance at conferences and analyst events, on information provided in news announcements and briefings and on our ongoing assessment of the industry.
Policy management in mobile networks has become an acute issue as a result of the rapid growth in mobile data traffic, increasing availability of flat-rate data plans and new regulations in Europe. These factors drive operator requirements for supporting per-subscriber policy management and enabling customer-configurable policies. The combination of a pressing issue and the large number of vendors entering the market to address it will inevitably lead to fierce competition in the short term.
Many in the telecoms industry consider that early refarmign of GSM 900 is essential. We discuss why it is unlikely to happen, and the disruption it will cause for the industry.
WiMAX adoption has been patchy in Europe. This comment examines some case studies of WiMAX deployments in Ireland and Russia and looks at where the opportunitties are in Europe.
As traffic rises rapidly in the access network, Ethernet provides more flexibility to scale the mobile backhaul network. Ethernet standards and OAM mechanisms have removed the obstacles to cost-effective management of carrier Ethernet, which will accelerate the adoption of Ethernet technology in mobile backhaul.
Cloud-based delivery of technology is not a panacea. Service providers should highlight particular solutions, rather than their over-hyped cloud strategies.
On 10 February 2010, Oracle announced an agreement to acquire Convergin Inc., a provider of real-time service broker solutions. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of this year. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed. Convergin is an ISV that provides a Java EE-based service broker for network-based services. Its Accolade WCS platform supports the orchestration of legacy and next-generation services.
On 16 February 2010, IBM acquired Intelliden Inc., a private supplier of software for network configuration and automation. This acquisition fills a gap in the IBM Tivoli software portfolio, adds strong technology in the network configuration domain, strengthens its value proposition in the managed services and CloudBurst offerings, and enables IBM to counter any threats from Hewlett-Packard and the EMC Corporation.
Google's FTTH plans show not that it is especially interested in becoming a major transport player in the US ultra-high-speed broadband market, but rather that it is determined to influence US telecoms policy by showing how user and service provider behaviour changes under radically different conditions from those that currently prevail in the USA.
While there are lots of pockets of interesting fixed-line investment in Central and Eastern Europe, the fixed industry there also faces some major challenges. The foremost of these is a deeply entrenched wireless-only mentality. Analysys Mason’s Connected Consumer survey points to some potential to challenge and change that mentality.
Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden have often been regarded as bellwethers for the telecoms service industry in Europe, but evidence from the last four quarters indicates that these markets are diverging in terms of broadband take-up and usage. This article explores the implications of this for the overall direction of the data market in other developed economies.
