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So then, still feeling like someone from Mars, I ask the CSP guys to give me some examples of those innovative services they have created and launched in the last few years. Hmmm. Turns out that of the many new services out there that have changed the personal and business lives of millions of people, not one of significance has actually been invented by one of the good old phone companies. Furthermore, the companies that have driven the revolution in online services have generally grown from the seed of a single idea, they have worked hard to develop expertise, they have experimented and shown agility in building on good ideas, and they have thrown away the ideas that don’t work. And they have, by and large, managed to do all this without going out and buying an SDP. (Sure, they have platforms that deliver service, but that’s different.)
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“Exactly what are these ‘innovative services’ of which you speak, earthling?” |
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it, and deliver them in the right order at the other end with minimal latency. This is a challenge that is being met better all the time. The network will become a utility - just like the electrical grid, which delivers the energy required to run whatever services the user wants, whether it is a hi-fi system, refrigerator, or industrial machine complex, limited only by the size of the electrical pipe into the premises. CSPs will eventually come to terms with the fact that the services supported by the network and the service of the network itself are different beasts.
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It’s not the SDP that makes the difference. In the right context, an SDP can be immensely useful. However if CSPs want to get into the content business, maybe they should think more about their own business culture, attitudes, and assumptions, rather than hoping that buying some management technology will make the difference.
I know that there is a school of thought out there that says that CSPs should just stick to the business of carrying the bits, and leave content services to others. That is not my position. If they can deliver better content services and make money out of it, I wouldn’t want to stop them. Just like I wouldn’t want the CSPs to limit the ability of others to deliver their cool services over the CSP networks.
As we move resolutely to an all-IP world, driven by the unrelenting business pressure of cheaper, cheaper, and cheaper, it is possible that the world of disparate networks will disappear sooner rather than later. The future lies in a coherent network that is flexible enough, can handle all of the bits thrown at
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CSPs are adept at always-on, which is a very challenging and very important skill, and one on which the entire world will continue to rely for the foreseeable future. The skills, and culture of always-on are almost diametrically opposed to “let’s see if this works,” which is the culture of the invention crowd designing services that run over the CSP networks. Carrying the bits is still an honorable trade, and one with solid long-term prospects and a high barrier to competitive entry. Not a bad business to be in.
Of course CSPs can choose to enter many other lines of business like Entertainment, Media, and multi-player Gaming. But the best approach may be for CSPs to recognize these as separate business endeavors, indeed as separate businesses units, requiring different skills, different organization, and a different culture. It’s just not the same as carrying the bits.
CSPs, with some reason, persist in holding the idea that there is, somehow, a natural
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