Enterprise open source: A telecommunications case study

Factors driving open source software adoption in large enterprises are complex. Fanatical approaches and evangelism are not the answer. Going open source should be based on sound business and technical decisions. Nothing else!

Company background
Neotel is South Africa's first converged communications network operator, dedicated to improving the way South Africans communicate. Neotel is redefining the telecoms market through innovative solutions to meet both enterprise and consumer requirements. Neotel’s  aim is to challenge the existing telecoms status quo/or way of doing things, without compromising on world-class standards and services. Neotel is licensed as South Africa's first alternative infrastructure-based telecoms provider, capable of delivering a broad range of wireline and wireless data, voice and internet services on a national and international level. Neotel provides these  services to the wholesale, enterprise and consumer markets.

The business challenge
Neotel’s strategy for fixed line replacement in the consumer and small business segment was built around a fixed-wireless CDMA product set. In doing so, Neotel was breaking ground into uncharted territory in South Africa. The South African consumer base had not encountered CDMA services, but  was  conversant with existing GSM technologies.

In order to introduce customers to these new products, Neotel planned an initial pilot that was free. A key aspect of the initial pilot was to ensure an excellent customer experience, showcasing Neotel’s commitment to customer service.

Figure 1: Automating round trip customer service processes in a telecommunications carrier in SugarCRM

The technology challenge
Launching a telecommunications provider is a challenging task for any technical organisation, but meeting the business need for this scenario made for an even greater challenge.

A pilot project geared to impress customers with service is no easy feat.

An initial analysis of the IT system requirements for the project produced a number of key attributes:

Low cost – The pilot project was free to customers with the goal of showcasing the potential product line and customer service. During this phase of the product launch, the budget for supporting an infrastructure was limited. Based on customer adoption and feedback, the service would undergo an evolution of formal product development and commercialisation.

Limited complexity – Telecommunications management platforms, referred to as OSS & BSS (Operational Support Systems and Business Support Systems respectively) are inherently complex in nature. To increase the project’s probability of success, the delivery plan would be to break up the project into phases, where the initial one would exclude billing and simplify the selling processes.

Pre-built functionality – An additional design factor would be a system with pre-built modules and processes that are specific to the telecommunications industry. Neotel would then need to modify these modules and processes rather than have them built from scratch.

Open platform – The infrastructure supporting the pilot might not have necessarily been the final system that would be used in the commercial phases, this would require customers from the pilot to be migrated to the final platform. A vital aspect would be the “openness” of the pilot system. All customer related data would have to be exported and any proprietary mechanisms would make migration cumbersome.

Phased delivery – The pilot was supposed to run for a number of months, but the time to launch was extremely short. The only feasible approach was to phase the project into a sequence of smaller deliverables based on the end user priority.

Challenges bring opportunity … opportunity, drives innovative out of the box thinking.

Figure 2: Functional and integration points around key customer modules within SugarCRM

Meeting the challenge
With these challenges came opportunities, generally unheard off in the telecommunications vertical:

Virtually all OSS & BSS implementations are spearheaded by the billing system, with CRM and integration layers following in subsequent, and often, much later stages. This opportunity presented an uncommon scenario to begin with CRM, followed by the integration layer and then billing. The business benefit was  creating processes and models that are centered around customer services rather than customer billing.

The nature of these challenges demanded a technology management team and an implementation partner that would have to work outside traditional thinking around systems in corporate telecommunications companies.

TAUSPACE’s solution development model utilising open-source, and extensive experience with OSS & BSS in telecommunications was an ideal fit to challenges faced by Neotel.

To expedite delivery, the route of customising a TAUSPACE point solution around SugarCRM to automate Neotel operational processes, was taken over building anything from scratch. The core solution would focus around automating the Order Management processes from the eTOM model, and then Service Assurance aspects of Trouble Management.

The architecture was based on the philosophy of:

Single user interface – Every business user would use a single Web 2.0 based interface, SugarCRM, simplifying training and deployment. Also, any interaction with the customer, via any channel, would leave a record in SugarCRM.

Customer centricity – The customer is the center of the universe, implied an IT application stack where SugarCRM would become paramount in that all master customer data would reside in the SugarCRM database, accessible using service based interfaces.

Integrate appropriately – Given the tight project timelines, a full SOA initiative would not be possible. However, when integration  is done, it would follow SOA principles, and reside in an integration and middleware domain.

Fluid multi-dimensional product catalogue – There are no short cuts in OSS & BSS architecture. A bad domain model relating to customers and products would lead to a very fragmented view of business operations. An impetus was placed on using a metadata-management layer, over using the product catalogue of a billing system or CRM platform. This data-centric middleware would then abstract and expose all product views to any integrated application.

Agile delivery – To meet the extreme timelines and business expectations, TAUSPACE created a phased delivery in an agile manner, with iterative monthly releases. This proved successful, and the project went live in under four months thereby meeting the expectations of the Neotel customer management and sales teams.

Exceeding expectations
One year later, the solution has proven to be extremely successful in terms of stability, flexibility and overall cost, so to date there is no intention of replacement and it has become part of Neotel’s IT roadmap. The platform has since been deployed to manage channel partners and customer billing processes. It has been extended to integrate into banking infrastructure, credit authorities and Neotel’s own SAP instance.

Large telecommunications enterprises strategise about open platforms and unlocking their customer data from proprietary systems. The choice, to go with open source in enterprise environments, is riddled with “non-issues” of licensing, systems reliability and product roadmaps.

By taking a calculated business decision Neotel found that using commercial open-source and strong partnerships over traditional supplier relationships make this utopian requirement in the telecommunications vertical a reality.

About TAUSPACE
TAUSPACE is a niche technology outfit based in South Africa, with a strong focus on commercial solution delivery based on open-source and the benefit it brings in the African context.  With verticals in consulting, solution development and managed services, TAUSPACE is geared to tackling customer challenges from innovation to operations and providing solutions with high impact that meet and exceed expectations.