Partnerships with non-operators bring immense strategic benefits to cellcos. Collaborators bring significant expertise which operators can never hope to develop in-house. They can also bring massive customer bases in adjacent industries - which the operators would never otherwise have access to.
However, partnerships must be nurtured and the relationships must be symbiotic.
The success of Apple and Google’s app stores has demonstrated how creating a win-win value chain can help all parties.
Given that it is now clear that these examples of collaborative innovation are beneficial, operators need to ensure that their internal culture and structure is adequately set up for collaboration.