Telcos are in a great position to benefit from convergence but need to work out appropriate revenue-sharing models with potential partners to maximize the opportunity.
Prashant Singhal, a telecom industry practice leader at Ernst & Young, said the telecom industry was headed toward varying levels of convergence, but operators’ future infrastructure investments could be hindered if the right service partners were not selected. “The dawn of cloud computing in particular, hints at major convergence between telecom and IT,” Singhal said.
“Operators need to select the proper partners to augment their services or risk being relegated to a dumb-pipe role.”
Speaking at the CommunicAsia2011 Summit, Singhal said the importance of partner selection applies to all forms of convergence, citing device, network, industry and services as four major convergence types.
“Our research has shown that convergence leads to revenue enhancement, cost efficiency and reduced churn. But are operators ready to make the decision?” Singhal asked. The data explosion that APAC is experiencing is both a headache and potential revenue opportunity for operators with both fixed and mobile service offerings.
According to Singhal, fixedmobile convergence serves as the starting point for other forms of convergence such as mobile money, a market expected to be worth $245 billion by 2015, mobile health, mobile education and mobile TV.
“No operator can offer complete value-added services. That’s why finding the right partner is very important,” Singhal said.
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