Good News for OSS and Enterprise Software Vendors? (cont'd)

Business Process Automation Systems, enable a corporation to set its priorities and design a BPM implementation program to suit its unique needs. These systems allow business users to design new business processes, and capture the data elements and attributes required to complete the work; the upstream and downstream handoffs; the exception handling policies, and the target performance metrics quickly and efficiently. The BPM tools provide edit and validation functions; alerting companies to errors or conflicts in the designed processes, and to impacts on current applications and data bases, enabling users to "see" the process in action before it is unleashed in to production.

And the component that really makes all of these applications work powerfully is Web Services.

That's why we suggest that Service Provider software and services spending should, and will, increasingly shift to generic enterprise tools to gain many of the advantages envisioned by NGOSS. Specialist applications will remain only in areas that are genuinely unique to telecommunications (looking more and more like the NGOSS BAC…).

One of the most important factors driving the logical need for streamlined OSS infrastructures is the continuing trend towards pricing bundles and flat-fee services. Consumers like straight forward pricing, sometimes even when it means paying more. Simplified rating eliminates the need for the hugely complex billing engines currently in place, each of which costs millions (or hundreds of millions). Ultra-slim profit margins demand ultra-slim infrastructure costs.

The Impact on Today's OSS Vendors

Rapidly maturing Service Oriented Architectures, BPM applications, and Identity Management systems all easily accessed and maintained through a Portal and Web Services layer means that Service Providers have some serious options to the current OSS nightmare. Inertia will keep the sales of established OSS systems going for some time, but increasingly Service Providers will be revamping their OSS Architectures to become sub-components of their Corporate Infrastructure. When they do, their spending will shift towards Corporate Infrastructure specialists. This will in turn force OSS ISVs into building those small, light, inexpensive, function-specific Business Aware Components. We will see a version of NGOSS become reality, though more than likely driven by global IT standards and platforms, than by the Telecommunications Industry gurus or by the TMF.

Service Providers must achieve dramatic reductions in cost and complexity of their OSS/IT infrastructures, and it looks like real options are rapidly becoming available to make that possible.

LTC International Inc. specializes in helping companies in the Telecommunications industry make more profits. We do that by bringing serious first hand experience to bear to align services and projects with business strategies and ensuring that measurable objectives are established for everyone to meet. We deliver results for Service Providers, Hardware and Software Vendors to Service Providers, and to investors. For more information, or to talk about how the LTC team could help you achieve your business objectives, please visit our web site: www.ltcinternational.com.

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