What issues are telcos facing today? How have you planned to utilize these as opportunities?
Primary challenges plaguing telcos today are increasing operational expenditure, improving customer service, finding new sources of revenue, and transitioning to next generation networks. We, regarding the same, have developed a set of offerings to help clients in the area of enterprise transformation and services transformation. The management of complex networked applications, and the ability to deliver high-value content and revenue-generating services quickly and reliably has become paramount.

Also, explosive growth in the subscribers base has left many service providers with challenges related to significant IT scalability cost. And, we have been able to effectively service the Indian telecom market because of our past track record and experience in handling similar challenges.

Do you have any new products in the pipeline for the telecommunications industry?
After the acquisition of Micromuse, we integrated its Netcool technology with our homegrown technology. Coupled with this, the acquisition of Vallent in 2007, formed a powerful and comprehensive suite of service assurance functionality across network domains and discrete network environments. IBM is uniquely capable of helping service providers manage services across wireline, wireless, IP, and IT infrastructure.

In the context of emerging services, what will be the challenges faced by the SPs?
Today, telecommunication service providers are looking to bridge the gap between traditional circuit-switched networks, and converging packet-switched technologies such as optical, DSL, VoIP, and IPTV services. And the Tivoli Netcool portfolio for telecommunications can help by providing a holistic, end-to-end management approach for these converging technologies by reducing overall opex and capex, and allowing SPs to proactively manage their infrastructure from a single point.

How do you look at the Indian market in the near future?
We are encouraged by the fact that India is going to witness service providers' adopting high-speed mobile Internet, WiMax, mobile advertising, social networking in mobile services, etc, which shall become key drivers for additional revenue. Hence, we are rapidly expanding our presence to cater to these needs. Already over 1,000 service providers, including all of the Top 20, rely on IBM Tivoli Netcool to ensure that their most critical services are performing to the highest standards.

Kannan K
kannan@cybermedia.co.in