Balance the data boom with revenue inflows

 

 

The explosion of data, along with the rapid proliferation of connected devices and converged services, is stretching the capabilities of many existing mediation platforms. Based on research from Heavy Reading, there are several key areas that next-generation data mediation platforms can support to help meet operators’ business requirements.

 

For instance, global operators are looking to consolidate and aggregate their OSS/BSS systems and centrally manage the transactions for several countries to reduce operational costs and streamline business processes, thus increasing overall efficiency. In order to do so, they need a cost-efficient, scalable, convergent mediation platform to manage their existing services and handle the roll out of next-generation services. Operators require mediation solutions that can not only support different service types, but also manage product transitions, several business lines and usage activities from varying device types.

 

Enabling positive customer experience management (CEM) is another area where next-generation data mediation systems can be useful because at the heart of CEM is accurate and timely data collection. A CEM system should collect everything that makes up a customer’s multi-faceted experience, including dropped calls and call center events. Well-designed data mediation platforms can play a crucial role in this process by providing a platform that can model and analyze this data in real time on a per-subscriber basis, and find correlations and patterns between events that may affect individual customers. This intelligence can potentially give operators the best opportunity to anticipate and respond to customer interactions, and identify possible reasons for and control subscriber churn.

 

Next-generation mediation systems can also help plug revenue leakage arising from bad data, configuration discrepancies, incorrect credit limit checks due to batch-oriented rating processes and incorrect inter-carrier accounting. Data mediation vendors, because of their proximity to the network and access to raw data, are well equipped to provide an element of revenue assurance. For example, they can equip operators with the tools needed to detect unauthorized VoIP or P2P traffic to protect their network capacity from undesirable third-party bandwidth hogs.

 

Next-generation mediation platforms, with their extreme performance and scalability, are the cornerstone of being able to maintain control over one’s networks and services, while keeping customers happy and maintaining a satisfactory bottom line. They are the key to simplifying operations management and creating centralized competence centers for analysis and development.

 

And with the service ecosystem evolving, operators must take steps to avoid being cut off from the content value chain. Flexible, future-proof data mediation systems can ensure this, and help them streamline their business practices and put a stake in the ground for years to come.