Around the World…

Telecom Asia…
Bill Shock Worse Scourge Than Thought: FCC
In our last “Around the World” post, we touched on the recent ‘back and forth’ between the CTIA and the FCC on ‘bill shock’. Since then, Tony Poulos, head of the revenue management sector at TM Forum, has shared his thoughts on this topic in a recent article for Telecom Asia. As the subject of “bill shock” continues to captivate the world—customers, CSPs, regulators, etc.—Tony asks, “What should we, as an industry, do about managing it?” He believes it is not sufficient enough to simply inform customers that they will be charged a certain amount for services rendered; end-users should be careful—proactive action is necessary. Tony suggests that CSPs automatically set usage limits—as long as the method to override the limits is instantly offered at the same time. Do you have any ideas to add?

Connected Planet…
TM Forum, NGMN Alliance Will Yield Converged Requirements
TM Forum and the Next Generation Mobile Networks Alliance (NGMN) have agreed to work together on 10 requirements for next-generation network (NGN) management and long-term evolution (LTE). NGMN has focused on understanding the requirements that next-gen mobile operators have, while the TM Forum provides the standards and expertise to enable the creation, delivery and monetization. For now, the 10 requirements center on:

• OSS standard interface requirements
• Inventory management
• Quality and quantity of alarms
• Automatic software management
• Energy-saving requirements (green)
• Self-organizing networks (define management of networks, help organize/heal themselves)
• Performance management
• Trace functionality (trace problems to their roots and to specific network errors)
• Plug-and-play/self-installing
• Tool support requirements

The alliance plans to reach out to 3GPP and other organizations that have core competencies. Martin Creaner, president and COO of the TM Forum states that “…the purpose is to get the various organizations to line up their brain power around common problems.” What do you think about this collaboration?”

Total Telecom…
LTE: Sharing the Burden
Ken Wieland wrote an interesting article that appeared in the July issue of Total Telecom. He considers this question: with high expenditure levels to deploy LTE networks, including spectrum and backhaul costs, are more operators are considering network sharing? Ken explores the pros and cons of network sharing and speaks with several industry analysts on their views of the market. He concludes with the following: “Yet to compete effectively in the mobile broadband market, there will be growing pressures to offset the cost of spectrum and equipment, as well as to reduce the cost of installing fatter backhaul pipes to support the higher volumes of traffic that LTE-based applications should bring. And that seems certain to drive LTE network sharing up the agenda.” Do you agree?