"Always speak politely to an enraged dragon." Steven Brust. Regular readers will have noticed my penchant for referring to the Pareto Principle (aka the 80/20 rule). I'm a big believer in focusing on streamlining the high-use or highly important items of OSS implementations. OSS are simply too big and too complex to get bogged down in the minutiae. But for those with a slant for the…
Read More »AT&T creates $500M joint venture for a Netflix-style TV service AT&T, America’s second largest broadband provider and wireless company, is getting into the streaming business with a $500 million joint venture created to acquire, invest in and launch a Netflix-style video streaming service. As the television distribution model that’s been in place for decades collapses online, this deal marks the first time a big U.S. ISP…
Read More »NewWave Communications Agrees to Long-Term Extension for Converged BSS with NetCracker. NetCracker Technology announced today that NewWave Communications has agreed to a long-term extension for its converged BSS and customer self-service solutions. NewWave Communications provides cable TV, broadband and voice services to consumers and businesses in the Southern and Midwestern United States. This five-year agreement renews NewWave and NetCracker’s ongoing partnership for advanced, converged revenue management…
Read More »"A merger is hard to pull off under any circumstances. It's harder when everybody is against you." Carly Fiorina. As mentioned yesterday, in a merger / acquisition situation where there are two distinct OSS, it's common for the stronger of the organisations in the partnership to dictate the technical direction. It's also for the stronger group to proceed with the systems they're familiar with and perhaps…
Read More »"Every single time you make a merger, somebody is losing his identity. And saying something different is just rubbish." Carlos Ghosn. Today's blog is derived from a wonderful question from a subscriber to the PAOSS blog. She asked: I would be interested to know more about Data integrity/Synchronization approach and challenges, especially when various mergers/acquisitions involved. Due to this reason service provider has various Inventory systems and none of…
Read More »Champion Broadband Signs Multi-Year Renewal for NetCracker Revenue Management Solution. NetCracker Technology announced that Champion Broadband has agreed to a multi-year renewal for its fully hosted Revenue Management solution. This managed service will continue to support and enable Champion’s end-to-end order-to-cash process for its residential, SMB and B2B service offerings. Founded in 2003, Champion Broadband is a cable TV, Internet and telephony provider serving major urban…
Read More »China Unicom deploys Impact 360 Speech Analytics from Verint Systems. Verint(R) Systems Inc. announced that Shanghai Unicom, a subsidiary of China Unicom--a leading telecommunications carrier in China--is gaining continued value, following its implementation of Impact 360(R) Speech Analytics(TM) . The organization uses the software to help uncover underlying customer issues and key drivers of calls into its contact center. Using Verint's speech analytics software--part of the…
Read More »"If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at the one, I will." Mother Teresa. In recent times I've regularly blogged on mining and presenting data collected from OSS databases. But today I have a fascinating paper on human psychology to discuss that may make you think again at how you wish to present your information if you wish to persuade.…
Read More »"To be happy in this world, especially when youth is past, it is necessary to feel oneself not merely an isolated individual whose day will soon be over, but part of the stream of life flowing on from the first germ to the remote and unknown future." Bertrand Russell. Wow! A team at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology has developed Wi-Power technology that…
Read More »"Our communications services revenue growth is being driven by continued strong top-line performance in data, Internet and international - three of the fastest growing and most profitable areas within communications services." Bernard Ebbers. For those of you who don't know, Bernie Ebbers was the CEO of WorldCom. He was also convicted of fraud and conspiracy in 2005 in relation to falsified financial reporting at WorldCom and…
Read More »"Datafication" is a new term used to describe the process of turning an existing business into a "data business." Bersin. We've had industrialisation and digitalisation. Are we already on the brink of a new business model mindset? Datafication. Many industries are now producing and storing prodigious amounts of data, of which OSS is one of the leading exponents. The digitalisation age and it's technological improvements is ensuring…
Read More »"You can motivate by fear. And you can motivate by reward. But both of these methods are only temporary. The only lasting thing is self-motivation." Homer Rice. When it comes to OSS operators, I'm not a particularly strong believer in the carrot or stick approach to motivation to gain outstanding results using the tools they're provided with. I'm going to divert slightly here with an analogous…
Read More »"Strategy making needs to function beyond the boxes to encourage the informal learning that produces new perspectives and new combinations... Once managers understand this, they can avoid other costly misadventures caused by applying formal techniques, without judgement and intuition, to problem solving." Henry Mintzberg. Henry Mintzberg described the following strategic approaches / perspectives: Strategy as plan – a specific set of actions intended to achieve a…
Read More »"The fluttering of a butterfly’s wing in Rio de Janeiro, amplified by atmospheric currents, could cause a tornado in Texas two weeks later." Edward Lorenz. I'm currently reading "The Click Moment" by Frans Johansson. It discusses many interesting stories about rapid change and randomness in our daily lives. One such story describes how Edward Lorenz ran a weather prediction simulation using the number 0.506127 as a…
Read More »"In vain have you acquired knowledge if you have not imparted it to others." Deuteronomy Rabbah. When implementing an OSS for a customer, I love getting hold of their real data because then their environment seems to become clearer. The more aspects of the data you investigate, the more the flower unfurls. The more their network, their services, their processes, their issues and so much more…
Read More »Emma Coats, Pixar’s Story Artist, tweeted the following 22 rules of story-telling. Perhaps I've been spending too much time writing blogs and sections in my upcoming book, but I see so many analogies between telling a story the Pixar way and telling a story with the mountains of data you have in your OSS: You admire a character for trying more than for their successes. You…
Read More »"A skilled author of data presentation will choose the right visualization to emphasize a message. The data, chart, and supporting descriptions will work in harmony to point out what is interesting. The reader simply goes along for the ride. Unfortunately this is the exception more than the rule. Many data products are a muddled mess of chart choices, obscure labeling, and arbitrary layout. In essence, the…
Read More »"To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved." George MacDonald. In yesterday's blog, we spoke of the shades of grey that different users feel on the spectrum of free services versus secure/private services. We also spoke of the potential strategic advantage held by many traditional CSPs compared with their relatively newer Internet (OTT) equivalents - the advantage of a having a trusting customer base.…
Read More »"If you're not paying for it (an app or service), you're not the customer; you're the product." Adage. Declines in revenues from traditional services have CSPs scrambling to identify new revenue streams, often through very lateral approaches. The massive databases held by CSPs are one of their biggest assets even if they don't appear on balance sheets directly. Some organisations are better than others at leveraging value…
Read More »SevOne Acquires Log Analytics Provider RapidEngines. SevOne, the leader of scalable performance monitoring solutions to the world’s most connected companies, today announced it has acquired RapidEngines, a leading provider of highly scalable log analytics software for IT enterprises, service providers and application developers. The acquisition is the first from SevOne since closing the $150M investment from Bain Capital which remains one of the largest venture financings…
Read More »A huge thanks to everyone who has voted on their preferred covers for my upcoming OSS implementation book. The results were surprisingly even. I thought there would be a clear stand-out, but it's been pretty close so far. The results are as follows: For cross-referencing, here are the four options again:
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