Mobile operators need to make sure they have a platform in place that allows them to offer services to multiple wholesale customers, messaging specialist Tecnomen has warned.
With regulation enabling MVNOs beginning to have effect, Vesa Kemppainen, corporate development director at Tecnomen, said that operators need to have a single back end messaging platform in place that will allow them to offer multiple branded services to a number of MVNOs.
“The traditional value chain has become much more complicated.” Kemppainen said. “Operators are being divided between network operators and service based operators. Network operators don’t have the tools to support this model and are losing money. They need one installation that can support multiple segments on the value chain.
“A virtual operator has only his brand and must inject that on top of this platform.”
To address this quandry, Tecnomen has introduced eZoner, a three part solution consisting of a telephony server, application server and storage system. Each component in the system is equipped with standard interfaces, Kemppainen said, meaning that operators can choose a modular approach, choosing by component.
Kemppainen said that the application server offers a “unique” hierarchical domain model, meeting the need for flexibility, with many MVNOs being unpredictable. The branding for the service is “5”, reflecting the five key capabilities of the system. They are; single storage, customer segmentation, universal access, openness and collaboration.
Kemppainen said that using Open Source means that Tecnomen has opened up its system architecture to operators, meaning they or their own partners can develop their own services using protocols and standards such as J2EE or VoiceXML.
“This takes the internet publishing paradigm into the mobile world. With MVNOs there will be a demand for much quicker time to market for services, and operators will not have time to go through the testing procedures they have done in the past. This way, if an operator does have a buggy service it won’t compromise the whole system,” Kemppainen said.