Telecos \'must transform\' to deliver new services, Gartner

Tag : telecommunication services

As voice revenues decline, telecoms carriers “have less thanfive years to come up with a new IT and network infrastructure andapplications that will support the new digital services”,Jean-Claude Delcroix, research vice president at Gartner warned.
By 2012, half of the 20 largest carriers will offer a greater arrayof high-tech services to offset fast-declining voice revenues.These include music downloads, streaming services, small paymentmechanisms and ticket ordering services, Gartner advised.
Fifteen percent of leading telcos' revenue should come fromnon-traditional sources within five years, Gartner said.
Telcoms carriers should become “IT and networkfactories”, and avoid becoming simply “bandwidthproviders”.
But telcos must also be prepared for coming into direct competitionwith internet firms of all sizes, as well as hardwaremanufacturers.
Mobile operators have the further challenge of preparing for nextmobile technologies, including long-term evolution (LTE) andfourth-generation (4G) technologies.
"The price of mobile data services and devices is too high for massusage today, so through 2012, carriers need to devise a better roadmap, with new mobile digital services that require less bandwidthbut offer users good value for money,” said Delcroix.
“Opportunities for new digital services range from extendedtransmission services to content services and IT services," hesaid. "The main challenges will be a much more competitiveenvironment and a much more intense use of IT in the delivery ofservices by CSPs [communications service providers].”