November 14, 2013

Summary Bullets:

Alcatel-Lucent’s 2013 Technology Symposium kicked off with a focus on Bell Labs innovations.
For would-be customers, those innovations need to be about supporting today’s products – not just branding.

Where NSN decided to host analysts down in Brazil last month, Alcatel-Lucent’s decision to host its 2013 Technology Symposium in New Jersey at the onset of winter (November 14th and 15th) was just one more sign that these are two very different companies with different messaging agendas. With the Shift Plan in its infancy, Alcatel-Lucent is still very much in an ‘education mode’ around its most recent restructuring. It’s no surprise, then, that it convened a mix of industry analysts, financial analysts and the media; it has a lot of different audiences it needs to educate (convince). Likewise, while NSN made the decision to focus its business narrowly on mobile broadband and CEM, Alcatel-Lucent’s broader focus means that the topics being addressed this week in New Jersey will both overlap with and diverge from the things NSN likes to talk about (at least based on the initial agenda). Continue reading “Alcatel-Lucent Technology Symposium: Day Zero” →

Summary Bullets:

A new generation of end users will demand continuously enhanced services.
SDN/NFV will be required to provide the flexibility to keep up with these changes.

Industry pundits have been debating the value of software-defined networking (SDN) and network functions virtualization (NFV) for the past year. One line of questions asks whether their value to network operators rests in an ability to cut capital costs, reduce operational expenses or stimulate revenues. Since network operators are relatively conservative, they generally base their decisions on how sure they can be of the savings or revenue figures, with the descending order of confidence being:

1. Capital costs (reliable, as an upfront figure);
2. Operational expense (somewhat controllable, but mostly future); then
3. Revenue (practically uncontrollable in an operator’s eyes).

It was surprising, then, that two operators at last month’s TM Forum Digital Disruption 2013 conference posited that potential revenues, not cost savings, would drive SDN/NFV deployment. Continue reading “SDN/NFV Killer App: New Generation Demands Continuous Service Enhancement” →