Summary Bullets:
- Nokia used the TMF Live! event to conduct its 2015 Nice Analyst Day, including an update on its Nokia Telco Analytics solution highlighting China Mobile’s adoption for predictive complaint analysis as well as its overall approach to solving operator pain points.
- Nokia still must show that its Telco Analytics solution can improve near-future operator monetization and data management objectives to avoid extending operator ROI concerns with previous analytics investments.
Nokia provided an update of its Nokia Telco Analytics solution at its Nice Analyst Day during the TM Forum Live! event. The solution encompasses descriptive analytics (e.g., traffic steering, analytics-aware SON), online analytics (real-time GEO) and predictive analytics. The predictive analytics component included a China Mobile use case for predictive complaint analysis applications that enabled the operator to realize outcomes such as a 38% decrease in complaints about network and service quality and 66% improvement in first call resolution.
The China Mobile use case strengthens the Nokia Telco Analytics proposition since the solution was selected by an operator with close links to China-based OSS/analytics suppliers such as Huawei, ZTE and AsiaInfo. However, beyond the proverbial feather in its cap for selling its analytics solution into a very competitive market, the question still remains: “How does Nokia plan to win over more operators to adopt its solution?” Per Nokia, the plans could come off as perhaps too similar to the plans of most other analytics vendors.
- Actionable Insights: The Nokia Telco Analytics solution establishes correlations between customer complaints and network key performance indicators (KPIs). While this capability is considered table stakes for an analytics engine purpose-designed for telco operations, the Nokia solution proved well-suited for multi-vendor environments from China Mobile’s perspective. This validates the trend that analytics solutions must produce actionable insights within multi-vendor implementations.
- Predictive Action: Nokia is hardly alone in heralding the need for operators to become more adept at using analytics to predict and prioritize customer complaints. Nokia’s strong suit comes in linking prediction of customer complaints with priority cells in the mobile network. Due to its first-hand portfolio knowledge of mobile infrastructure technology, including small cells, Nokia asserts an upper-hand over OSS/analytics suppliers that lack in-house mobile infrastructure products.
So, as Nokia champions its Telco Analytics solutions, what steps can the company take to render its analytics approach more compelling to operators prioritizing improved business value outcomes from investments in analytics platforms?
- Strengthen Monetization Links: The Nokia Telco Analytics solution needs tighter linkage to monetization benefits, such as targeted per-application charging, to strengthen its value proposition for advancing telco agility. Without more robust promotion of integration with third-party BSS platforms (i.e., revenue management), Nokia risks the solution’s monetization benefits being rendered opaque in relation to rival solutions that can pre-integrate telco analytics with BSS capabilities.
- Biometrics CEM: The Nokia Telco Analytics solution needs to include support for emerging IoT-related biometric applications including wearable devices and voice/face recognition. Although the potential for biometric applications has received its fair share of marketing hype over the years, the expansion of cloud-based virtualized networking has helped put biometric applications back into mainstream networking consideration. For example, NetCracker and its parent company NEC have already developed a biometrics CEM/analytics solution targeting the enhanced potential for scaling and managing biometric apps. Nokia needs to consider producing a similar analytics module to meet renewed operator interest in the field and counter rival differentiation efforts in the area.
Overall, Nokia has already demonstrated that the Nokia Telco Analytics solution can meet the analytics-driven preventive complaint demands of top-tier operator China Mobile. Now, Nokia must show it can develop stronger links to operator monetization priorities and biometric/IoT applications to enhance its long-term differentiation goals.