Over the years we have gained a deep understanding of the culture within telcos. We are best known, through the ROC, as specialists in Revenue Assurance and Fraud Management. As such, we know how to deliver different views of the same data.
Having successfully done this in the BSS world, we have turned our attention to the networking side of the business. Controlling costs and optimizing network capital investment are priorities for the business and managed by the CFO’s office. Optimal usage of the network assets and manage traffic effectively are under the control of the CTO’s office.
Both offices need access to the same information but in different ways. With different priorities, sharing the same information without interpretation or tailored analytical choices would make communications between the two entities very difficult.
A CFO needs to know how many assets are stranded and therefore not producing revenue. Right now, the status and whereabouts of only 75 percent of a telco’s assets are known. Knowing where assets are, knowing how long an asset is in place before it is revenue producing and knowing that delaying an investment for a month makes financial sense is of huge importance to a CFO.
Understanding which assets can be re-used in other parts of the network, or which need to be retired can help the CTO with his priorities. Some assets can be effectively re-sold, so what is a retirement to the CTO becomes a possible source of revenue for the CFO.
We believe that creating a view into network assets will benefit both offices and create a better collaboration between them. Revenue Assurance can provide a financial view of IT assets, which adds a new and effective dimension to that craft. So, too, Asset Assurance adds the tools to the network capex side of the business to actively manage it. We not only believe it, we know it. Working with one of our customers we found $17 million of stranded assets in a single week. Better yet, Asset Assurance also benefits the customer.
Talk to a Telecoms Manager about what he would like from his telecoms provider and he will not say more accurate bills as a priority. He accepts that billing is complex and accepts that his comms bill will never be 100 percent accurate. What he would like more than anything is to know what inventory is in place in his organization, where it is, whether it is still live and whether he is paying for it. This can be discovered with Revenue Assurance tools, but now the communication providers can actively manage the whole inventory issue with the new Asset Assurance solution.
By leveraging our experience in Revenue Assurance and Fraud Management in the OSS world, we are now proud to be able to offer solutions and expertise to operators in all of the vital parts of their business, including network. And we are already proving that this concept of asset assurance is important in managing assets more effectively and efficiently. We also believe, like many such solutions, that we will discover uses for Asset Assurance that we cannot quite see yet. We will keep you up to date with the story as it unfolds.
