Adding product catalog and management to Sigma’s provisioning and activation solutions results in what Sigma calls its Idea to Install platform.
CSPs have historically lacked pervasive visibility into their portfolio and quote-to-order process, i.e., what they sell and how they sell it, which impacts the accuracy of quotes and
designs, the speed at which new products can be rolled out and the performance of new products in a provider’s network. A unified product catalog that extends from order entry all the
way through activation and resource provisioning solves these problems and many more. Additionally, a data-driven platform that pulls from a single source is superior to time-consuming,
expensive data-transformation projects because it better accommodates the two fundamental features of the digital-services economy: volume and speed.
Sigma Systems: “Idea to Install”
One vendor that offers a solution, and has emerged at the forefront of the market with its innovative “Idea to Install” platform, is Sigma Systems. You may be familiar with its provisioning,
activation and mediation solutions, but that’s only part of the story.
In July, Sigma acquired Tribold, specialists in product management and product catalog. The combination of the two companies made a lot of sense: Sigma and Tribold had experience working
together, and both embraced a best-of-breed approach.
"Sigma and Tribold have worked together closely over the last several years to ensure interoperability between our solutions. We have also collaborated on several service provider cloud projects,
including the recently announced deployment with Tiscali in Italy," said Catherine Michel, Sigma's Chief Strategy Officer (CSO). "Sigma's acquisition of Tribold enhances the overall portfolio,
particularly for our idea-to-install blueprint. Rapid integration of EPM (Enterprise Product Manager) and CPQ (Configure Price Quote) with Sigma's SMP (Service Management Platform) portfolio is
already well underway.”
Adding product catalog and management to Sigma’s provisioning and activation solutions results in what the company calls its Idea to Install platform. With this single platform, CSPs are able to
rapidly create and deploy new products, accurately create and configure orders and efficiently manage delivery, installation and activation. Unlike hard-coded solutions, the
catalog-driven nature of Idea to Install ensures repeatable successes, not just one-time wins. It also provides sales teams with a dynamic view of the availability of offers and options,
drives out proper orchestration in the resource layer and enables CSPs to rapidly scale their offerings with demand.
Another new development is Sigma’s integration with Salesforce.com in order to accommodate the many sales teams that now use Salesforce, which offers great advantages over
legacy CRM (customer relationship management) systems. It’s a strong channel partner for Sigma, but it doesn’t have catalog capabilities, and
it lacks the degree of complexity that communications offerings require. Several customers have already taken advantage of Sigma’s Salesforce partnership, including Sky Italia and
CenturyLink.
A defining feature of Sigma’s portfolio is that it’s architected to enhance key processes by integrating into legacy back-office systems and offering full interoperability with diverse network
backbones. CSPs want to extract maximum value from their existing systems, and with a premium placed on velocity, rip-and-replace projects don’t make a lot of sense—they simply take too long
and cost too much. As a complimentary solution, Sigma’s platform was engineered to enable CSPs to best capitalize on their existing CRM and billing systems.
