Cloud computing: drawing parallels from Telecom

“It would be so nice if something made sense for a change.” ― Lewis Carroll

I finally get to publish this post since eternity, and at the risk of repeating the known. This post, based on my brief experience with telecom, is my interpretation of concepts and operations framework within the telecom industry that can be applied to (or is already being applied to) Cloud computing. Perhaps my 'oversimplified' way of putting cloud computing in perspective.


FAB-BOSS

If you had a brush with the telecom industry, you are most likely familiar with FAB. For the rest, FAB is an acronym for Fulfillment, Assurance and Billing. It simplifies and provides an operational process framework for a telecom provider. Without having to dive deep, an ‘oversimplified’ way to look at FAB is “order-to-cash” and everything in between (or behind that process which isn’t visible to consumers). Although in reality, it isn’t as simple as it sounds. In addition, there are the key BSS (Business Support Systems) and OSS (Operations Support Systems) systems, which I like to call as BOSS (BSS+OSS=BOSS; Refer figure above), that enable or help realize the FAB process framework. BOSS comprises of systems that address four areas broadly grouped into Customer Relationship Management, Service Management & Operations, Resource Management and Operations, and Partner/Supplier Relationship Management. Each of them plays a key role in the fulfillment, assurance and billing cycle of a telecom provider. A great source to understand this in depth is the Tele Management Forum (http://www.tmforum.org/) and their Telecom Operations Map.

To simplify and put things in perspective, 'Fulfillment' deals with 'provisioning' of a service purchased by a customer. Ex: Broadband or Mobile services. It deals with activation and configuration of capacity by the service provider and creation of the customer profile. Once services are provisioned, 'Assurance' deals with availability and performance of the services, with the objective of minimizing downtime and compliance to contractual service levels – think in terms of service coverage and availability of service (both voice & data) on your phone. Assurance is built on the foundation of Quality of Service (QoS) along with service monitoring, management, remediation and restoration. It is perhaps where customer satisfaction begins. 'Billing' deals with invoicing and collections for usage of services at a fixed interval, monthly as we know it in the case of retail consumers. Assurance and Billing can be viewed as two sides of the same coin, the former deals with 'service assurance' leading to the latter 'revenue assurance'.

As telecom consumers, most of us have been through and continue to go through the above cycle. Consumers, both retail and business, are abstracted from the complex infrastructure and technologies at play in a TSP (telecom service provider). What they are presented is the customer interaction layer, through the TSPs CRM systems and processes (order management, verification, activation, self-service portals for billing & online payments, customer service centers, etc.), while the orchestration and management of the infrastructure itself is abstracted from the consumer. If we can imagine a TSP as a monolith of network capacity, both voice & data, then as consumers we simply rent a slice of that capacity and pay for it based on our usage and the rate plans we’ve signed up, and we can even switch rate plans to better reflect our usage pattern and optimize monthly rentals. If we take a simplistic view, this network capacity is built by TSPs based on their business plan, targeting a subscriber base or market share, is scalable depending on growth, allows to on-board new consumers and also manage customer churn.

Looking through the clouds
If you followed all the mumbo-jumbo up to this point, then it must be fairly easy to imagine where this is headed. Applying the concepts of FAB-BOSS provides a simple operational framework for cloud computing or CSPs (Cloud Service Providers). It is easier to visualize how it can be extended in the context of cloud computing – private, public or hybrid – to deliver provisioning, elasticity or scalability of resources, pay-as-you-go pricing, usage metering, billing, service assurance, etc.

Like in telecom, Fulfillment in the context of cloud computing deals with the ability to ‘provision’ computing resources with no manual intervention, often referred to as ‘self-provisioning’ and ‘automation’ in cloudspeak. Its aim is to empower cloud consumers with the ability to ‘order’ and ‘assemble’ compute resources through self-service portals, workflows and automation that abstract the consumer from the complexities of having to actually build and make that resource operationally ready. Assurance deals with providing guaranteed availability and performance through proactive service management and operations. Once again, the tools and resources required to deliver assurance remain abstracted from the consumer. And finally Billing deals with invoicing the customer based on agreed billing rates through monitoring or ‘metering’ resource/service usage.

As mentioned in the beginning this is just an oversimplified view to draw a parallel between cloud and telecom service providers. The demands and needs of enterprise IT are not to be underestimated. While simple in concept, the BOSS (BSS+OSS) ecosystem required to achieve the basic tenets of cloud computing and its implementation and management is fairly complex. It requires an ecosystem of multiple product vendors, just like in telecom, and their integration to realize this operational framework. As the cloud provider market matures and evolves, the ecosystem of BOSS vendors will also influence and set the pace through development and maturity of their own offerings.

It also isn’t difficult to imagine the consumerization of enterprise IT in the future. It is tempting to imagine cloud service providers compete on tariff plans and build product offerings and bundles much like in telecom. Think of your data plan that has unlimited data usage or 10GB of free data usage per month, with a fractional cost being charged to you beyond that limit. In a similar way, Storage could potentially be offered for free up to a limit, say 3-5TB, bundled and sold with certain compute capacity of Windows ^TM servers. It remains to be seen how data security and privacy concerns will be put to rest and when inter-operability and data portability between cloud service providers will garner more attention.

It is also being said that cloud computing can alter the contours of traditional outsourcing and even push it to the brink. It will be an interesting evolution to watch indeed.
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Is it Back to the Woods for the Tiger?

Much has been (un)covered, blogged, tweeted, aired and everything possibly done under the sun to publicize the private life of Tiger Woods. I personally know very little about golf and don't follow the game, especially coming from a cricket crazy nation. But I do respect, admire and know Tiger as one of the greatest golf players. It isn't easy getting to the top and it is ever more difficult to stay there in our respective professions.

Tiger is not just a great player but is a great brand of the sport and until recent events was even a great brand himself. It is public knowledge that the player endorses several global brands (apart from his own) and the ones that I recall are Accenture, Nike, Tag Heuer, Gillete, and perhaps there are many more that I do not know. The key question is, how will these companies that own these brands reexamine their association with the player for their branding, endorsements, sponsorships, etc.?

Among those brands I've listed above, and in my personal experience, I've seen and recall a lot more market communication (in both print and television) from Accenture that involves the player compared to other brands like Tag Heuer, Nike and Gillette. All other brands (listed here) with the exception of Accenture, leverage accomplished individuals from other sports or professions as their brand ambassadors or have alternate communication strategies. Probably because of the nature of their business. For example, Nike has associations with other sports depending on its business interests, like soccer or athletics for instance, and will have professionals from that sport endorsing their brands. I'm sure it also has communication strategies that do not depend on "individuals". Tag Heuer for example has other brand ambassadors like Shahrukh Khan for instance in India apart from the player himself.

Over the years, and again in my personal opinion, Accenture has built and nurtured its brand through some effective market communication that leverages and corelates Tiger's strengths in the game to its very own brand attributes. It has cleverly crafted and communicated its positioning and differentiated itself through some creative and effective communication strategies. It has undoubtedly created tremendous recall and awareness for its brand. But in doing so it has heavily relied and centered all its branding and market communication around the player. Will this over dependence on the player create potential damage to Accenture's brand? Unlike in the B2C business, the B2B services world and its target audience don't rely heavily on advertisements. May be there is very little or nothing to worry at all and this will all end up as just another blip. However, what will be interesting to watch is how Accenture (or for that matter, other brands and products that the player is associated with) will re-assess its brand strategy moving forward and its long association with the golfer.

The point is how much of credibility is really riding on Tiger for Accenture or all the other brands he endorses? And how will it impact brand equity or sales? If it doesn't, then the larger question is "are brand ambassadors worth what they are paid for"? Or should marketers just use them to create awareness for their brands and get rid of them along the brand or product journey?

While the player is going through a credibility crisis in his personal life how much will it affect brands that the player is associated with? Will his excellence in the game prevail over his moral virtues? Or is it back to the woods for the Tiger in the world of branding and sports marketing?