Still, the fact is that the vendor companies that seemed to be having the most successful shows were, to be sure, those who viewed Management World as a venue for pre-arranged meetings, and a place to nurture nascent relationships in a centralized way. OSS/BSS isn't the sort of technology that's easily hocked from booths. It's a different animal, with different requirements. Face-to-face meetings are valuable, but if they are the ultimate goal, it makes one question the value of the massive booths and the expo floor and the overall pomp that surrounds events like these. Still, the event showed no signs of flagging just yet, even in a very precarious time, economically. It seems

that the Management World model, while occasionally imperfect, is still one of the best things going in the industry.

A Few Notes from the Show Floor

With nearly continuous meetings, we were able to hear the latest and greatest from dozens of companies with interesting stuff on the horizon. However, in the interest of time, we can only afford to focus on a cross-section of these companies.

SAP was at the show announcing their acquisition of Highdeal. The evening before this deal was announced, the savvy analysts at LTC, International made the declaration that Highdeal would be acquired very soon (though they imagined it would be a different giant that gobbled up the pricing, rating, and billing firm.) The next morning, their betrothal to SAP was announced. We'll be interested to hear more as the deal progresses.

Nakina Systems packed a conference room for their presentation with Verizon as they showcased the success of their CEMS strategy with the North American giant. (You can read more on that here.)  It's another example of the strength that Nakina has in the element management space, drawing largely from the extensive hardware knowledge of its staff.

Clarity, a company most familiar to us for their work in developing markets where they provide single-vendor solutions, has moved into a very (we think) topical space with their deal with Western Power to provide Unified OSS for the purposes of delivering effective utilities. The implications of using OSS solutions to aid in the creation of smart-grid technology is particularly interesting as the Obama administration promotes the propagation of smart-grids in the US.

Telcordia told us that their consulting division has been setting benchmarks for best-in-class CSPs around the working and identifying areas for improvement coming out of the consulting side.  In what they call “Transformation Meets Reality” the migration of data is “a serious problem.”  Telcordia told us they are one the few vendors to migrate data slowly AND correctly.  Furthermore, the firm announced that Portuguese wireline operator OniTelecom has awarded them a contract to help them enhance the overall customer experience, reduce costs and accelerate time-to-market for new services for its corporate customers.  Along with a host of other customer wins on the books and in the works, Telcordia continues to be one of the top names in the fulfillment space.