AT THE FOREFRONT OF INNOVATION:

HOW AI, IOT, CLOUD AND 5G ARE

TABLE OF CONTENTS

EPISODE 1 Reinventing Infrastructure Maintenance Within Field Services

EPISODE 2 Why Flexibility is the Best Reason to Move into the Cloud

EPISODE 3 How to Make your OSS 5G Ready

EPISODE 4 On the Road to Zero-touch End-to-end Network Design and Optimization

EPISODE 5 Paving the Way for AI in IoT

EPISODE 6 Putting the Digital Customer Experience at the Heart of Telco Omnichannel Strategies

EPISODE 7 A Hands-on Guide to Customer Engagement in Field Service Delivery

EPISODE 8 Predictive Maintenance as the First Step towards Intelligent Assurance

REINVENTING INFRASTRUCTURE MAINTENANCE EPISODE #1
WITH FIELD SERVICE

Given the high costs of network downtime – $5600
per minute for the average mid-size US service provider,
according to Gartner1 – it’s worth investing time and
resources in a robust infrastructure maintenance strategy.
Data analytics and virtualization mean that staying operational
is no longer based on resolving issues as they arise.
Preventive maintenance combines elements of data
analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning with
Internet of Things (IoT) devices to monitor, analyze and learn
from past events, equipment parameters, and the network
hardware environment. In this way, the solution such as
Comarch FSM can carry out or suggest actions based on
accurate predictions of potential issues.

Certainly, there is a need for reactive
maintenance in any network;
a CSP’s field service team will spend
anything from 50% to 80% of their time
tackling such problems.
It’s equally important, though, to plan for proactive work that
can predict and avoid potential network issues. The question
is, how to combine these predictive and reactive elements in
a single, holistic infrastructure maintenance strategy?
By implementing such a solution to coordinate predictive
and reactive field operations for infrastructure maintenance,
technical and human resource management and
strategic planning are optimized, significantly reducing
field service costs and limiting the expenses arising
from network downtime.
On their own, neither preventative nor reactive maintenance
are perfect. The former relies heavily on “averages” concerning
a give piece of equipment’s expected lifetime, while the latter
can be very costly. Yet, carefully optimized, they are essential
in keeping your network running and your customers happy.

A solid field service management solution

handles both predictive and reactive
maintenance to optimize resources,
time and costs.
It can be tailored to fit network equipment and complexity,
is scalable, and once implemented is simple to operate
and maintain.

In terms of reactive maintenance, the solution manages

the field workforce and resources, allowing initial
estimates of task duration, real-time task adjustment
and rescheduling. Estimates are automatic or based on system
suggestions, depending on the task type, SLAs, technicians’
skills, availability, location, work performance, priorities,
and other configurable attributes.

1 See “Ensure Cost Balances Out With Risk in High-Availability Data Centers” by Dave Cappuccio
WHY FLEXIBILITY IS THE BEST REASON
TO MOVE INTO THE CLOUD
Traditional telco or digital service provider (DSP)?
That’s the choice facing telecommunications organizations
today as they address the challenges of increasingly
demanding customers and fierce competition from over
the top (OTT) operators such as Google and Amazon.
In fact, the question itself is becoming increasingly moot;
CSPs that don’t make the digital leap are
going to fall away, and those that do must
shift their business models radically to
adopt cloud-native architectures.
A CSP focuses on hardware, while a DSP seeks to maximize
the benefits of software. The right BSS/OSS supported
by software-powered cloud-native networks unlocks a new
dimension of possibilities. Virtual, modular, easily scalable,
responsive… the benefits of the software approach become
significantly greater when telcos move into the cloud.
The principles of the cloud-native approach to software
-based operations are relatively straightforward.
Development, integration, deployment and maintenance
must be automated. High availability and “continuous
everything” should be the watchwords. Software should be
stateless – designed to ensure that operations are distributed
and processes can be decomposed. Horizontal and vertical
modularization facilitates scaling, and containerization means
software packaging and delivery are consistent and easily
automated.
Attend to these principles first, then learn
lessons from how the OTTs do things.
Pay attention to the digital experience. Every aspect of
purchasing and customer service must be available online.
The next natural step is to implement a robust omnichannel
strategy, so customers can switch between sales and
communication channels, on any device, and always simply
EPISODE #2
pick up where they left off last time. This calls for a well-layered
IT architecture, in which all workflows, processes, data models
and logic are stored in an omnichannel process engine and
exposed to all possible interaction channels via standardized
open APIs. A centralized product catalog lets telcos reduce
offer complexity and manage products and services by
speeding up development and deployment and facilitating
focus on specific sales channels and customers/groups.
In addition, OTT customers enjoy a level of personalization
only possible with the implementation of artificial intelligence
and analytics – so telcos also need a recommendation engine
powered by an AI algorithm to deliver perfect next best
engagement suggestions and personalized offers every time.
This means big data analytics built into the cloud BSS/OSS
stack implementing open digital architecture (ODA).
In digital transformation, most benefits come when business
and IT feed into and drive each other. With cloud-based
solutions, telcos can configure everything quickly and easily
according to customer requirements, build, test and launch
services in fail-fast mode, innovate more and automate
practically everything. Moving to the cloud also frees telcos
from the burden of monolithic hardware, which they pay for
whether they use it all or not. In the cloud, operations can be
scaled automatically to meet demand at any given moment,
and operators pay only for what they use.
Today’s CSPs that intend to stay on the
market, maintain a competitive edge and in
fact drive the future of telecommunications
need to bear all of this in mind, for their
ultimate goal should be to become
tomorrow’s DSPs.
HOW TO MAKE YOUR OSS 5G READY
The Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G are forcing telecom
operators to innovate and look to artificial intelligence
(AI) to transform their operations support systems (OSS).
Increasing demand, rising traffic levels, a complex and
expanding network of devices and the requirement for
future-proof, robust and cost-efficient service delivery
and provisioning are all elements of the challenge.
In a landscape increasingly dominated by software-defined
networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV),
artificial intelligence can go a long way towards helping
operators meet that challenge.
AI gathers and processes network data in real time and
automates network functions. The ability to develop
self-healing networks is one clear advantage of this.
Another is that AI facilitates complex big data analysis,
allowing a customer-centric approach and a deep view
of physical and network resources.
5G networks will launch many vertical
services, creating tremendous business
opportunities demanding high availability,
real-time analysis, comprehensive auto-
mation and intelligent service assurance,
alongside network slicing in which the very
infrastructure may be virtualized.
Legacy silos will need to be broken down, and future OSS
will need to expand to deliver business rules and service
models associated with today’s over the top (OTT) players.
Future OSS must be capable of managing all elements of
a hybrid network, in a fully automated, closed-loop model,
as well as handling business support systems (BSS),
so that order management can be handled in real time
through a dynamic product catalog that can decompose
services in accordance with pre-defined parameters.
Future OSS will also have to plan, design, create, configure,
deploy and manage services faster than ever. In all of this,
EPISODE #3
microservices and APIs will play a major role in enabling
OSS to orchestrate complex cross-domain services that will
greatly enhance CSPs’ interoperability and openness
with third-parties.
In considering future OSS, telcos need
to ask several questions about business
benefits. Is modular deployment possible
for hybrid networks and scaling?
Will the OSS deliver a real-time, compre-
hensive network view? Can the OSS create
and manage federated networks across
heterogeneous architecture?
Does it support different technologies
in a cross-domain approach? Is it possible
to define, add and modify KPIs,
KQIs and CEIs?
Comarch’s strategy for the evolution of its OSS portfolio
addresses all of these issues. It re-uses existing OSS, enabling
CSPs to deliver software-enabled network-based products
without the need for massive legacy system transformation.
It utilizes AI algorithms to increase the efficiency of operational
processes via automation. It is dynamic, capable of supporting
both hybrid networks and data federation models, while the
structured data store gives operators a complete view of the
network’s historical evolution. Closed-loop control based on
automation supports readiness, fulfillment and assurance for
operators utilizing different network domains and technologies.
Comarch’s OSS strategy also implements cloud-native assurance
based on microservices and containers to improve scalability
and decrease the cost of maintenance. Unified configuration
of integrated intelligent management is based on policies
aligned with operators’ business objectives, while knowledge
accumulation dynamically transforms data into information
necessary for the automation of operational processes.
ON THE ROAD TO ZERO-TOUCH END-TO-END
NETWORK DESIGN AND OPTIMIZATION
Artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), automation…
we tend to overuse these phrases in every field touched
by technology. So it’s worth taking a brief look at what
they actually mean.
AI involves optimization and search algorithms, used by
computers to find and implement solutions to specific problems.
ML refers to processors being able to analyze vast quantities of
data and predict how a given situation might impact overall
operations. Finally, automation refers to the process of defining
certain rules or conditions, contingent on which a system will
carry out an action.
Communication service providers (CSPs)
have had most success using AI and ML
to automate business operations
– for billing, invoicing and provisioning.
It’s been much more challenging to automate processes on
the network side, such as planning, configuration and
optimization. This is because CSPs’ networks are traditionally
composed of mixed legacy infrastructure that can prove costly
and time-consuming to integrate. That’s a vital point, because
successful operations support system (OSS) automation relies
precisely on integration, without which the costs can easily
outstrip the benefits. So, for CSPs, there’s a strong incentive to
shift to integrated, even virtual network architectures in order
to make the time and financial savings that can give them
a competitive edge via automation.
Telcos also need to be clear about what
they hope to achieve from OSS automation.
Thus, it’s vital to grasp the difference between supervised
and unsupervised learning. A CSP may deploy supervised
algorithms to solve a given problem using an established
model. Unsupervised learning gives computers more autonomy,
allowing them to analyze a set of data and work out what the
(optimal) outcome may be.
EPISODE #4
Reshaping infrastructure, understanding
goals and deploying the correct tools to
achieve them are, however, only part of
the journey towards autonomous OSS.
Telcos must also consider whether automation is intended for
specific use cases, or to implement assisted support systems.
In the first case, a CSP may look at automating functions such
Internet service provisioning via self-organizing network (SON)
and service/network fulfillment solutions. The assumption
of this scenario is that the appropriate implementation will
allow such functions to be performed fully autonomously,
based on pre-defined algorithms and business rules.
In the second scenario, assisted support, there is no end to end
automation as such. Instead, computers are directed to capture,
process and analyze data from given sources, and to present
the results to a human operator who will then feed
that information back into the system to trigger specific
network actions.
If all that sounds complicated… well, that’s because it is.
The challenges presented by OSS automation are not, however,
insurmountable – as long as telcos remember the steps
outlined in this post: integrate infrastructure, understand your
goals, deploy the right tools for the job, and plan carefully.
Whatever the specifics of your business operations, your OSS
solution should remain the platform from which network
autonomy springs, supporting – rather than replacing – your
key engineers, and being flexible enough to adapt to changes
in your company today, tomorrow and in years to come.
PAVING THE WAY FOR AI IN IOT
Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are
increasingly visible in our lives. Most people will be familiar with
domestic appliances such as robot vacuum cleaners, which can
learn the layout of a room; the banking sector implements AI
and ML to identify anomalies and protect our personal finances;
and online retailers use this technology to offer carefully tailored
products and services.
The Internet of Things (IoT), the complex web of
interconnected devices in our homes, workplaces, cars and
cities, relies heavily on AI and ML to ease the paths of our
daily lives and optimize business operations across many
industry sectors. To those already mentioned, we might add
manufacturing (for monitoring and automating processes
and predicting problems before they cost money), healthcare
(automatically notifying doctors if a patient’s vital signs show
dangerous changes) and logistics (tracking vehicles and
planning routes). That list isn’t comprehensive, but it does
indicate that a rising number of devices and sensors deployed
across many industries is generating an unprecedented
volume of data that is impossible to utilize without
the assistance of AI and ML.
So, AI and ML are practical necessities.
They are also perfectly designed to handle rising customer
demand for sophisticated services, for example in cross-vertical
offers such as the security, optimization, logistics and insurance
elements of connected cars. In addition, AI and ML can help
companies detect and remove anomalies, security issues
and errors.
This all adds up to a better customer
experience, lower costs, and more
effective solutions that bring tangible
benefits to individuals and those who
use their services.
EPISODE #5
For example, a heart monitor enabled with ML can not only
detect changes in vital signs but also learn to recognize when
this is due to a brisk workout and when it’s something requiring
medical attention. When your preferred home entertainment
provider sends you information about a new film or TV show,
it’s very likely to be something you actually want to see.
When a sensor detects that an ATM is on the move (yes, it’s
happened), the bank knows there is an urgent security
problem. And, if a truck making a delivery to Brussels spends
an unexpectedly long time stationary in Amsterdam, the HR
department knows it’s time to have a chat with the driver.
Of course, it would be a mistake to treat
AI and ML as some kind of panacea.
Sometimes, a simple algorithm might do
the job more quickly and cost-effectively.
And it should be remembered that IT is
only as good as the people behind it;
it can be more cost and time-effective to deploy human
skills and know-how to optimize ML mechanisms with pre-
defined, algorithm-based responses and direct them towards
the required solutions.
It is by understanding and correctly utilizing this combination
of AI, ML, IoT and human potential that organizations can
set themselves apart from the competition. Those who fail
in any of these aspects – or who ignore AI completely
– are destined to fail.
PUTTING THE DIGITAL CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
AT THE HEART OF TELCO OMNICHANNEL STRATEGIES
Everything now and everything fast – these are the demands
of today’s consumers. While over the top players such as
Amazon have written their own rulebook in this respect, many
telcos struggle to keep pace.
In order to succeed in this endeavor,
CSPs need to understand that interaction
via digital channels must always be simple,
reliable, and near instantaneous.
To deliver on this, they need new tools and new approaches.
Many telco customers have one interaction with their provider
each month: the invoice. Confusing or inaccurate bills stoke
frustration, and could cost you customers. This problem can be
addressed by implementing digital invoicing and deploying
artificial intelligence solutions capable of interrogating vast
quantities of invoice data before the final bill ever reaches
the customer. The true digital invoice will also let customers
drill down into every detail, increasing their confidence in
their provider.
If your customers do need to contact you for any reason,
they are unlikely to halt their current smartphone activity
to do so. This is especially true of “Generation Z” – the customers
that telcos are now wooing. They want to “tap and text” using
the channel of their choice; and while telcos already understand
that a well-implemented omnichannel strategy can help them
meet this demand, they should also be prepared to make
the leap to the next level – a channel-less approach.
A channel-less customer journey builds
on traditional omnichannel by focusing
on maintaining a brand’s presence only
in the channel a customer is using
at a given moment.
EPISODE #6
In BSS (business support systems), with customer self-
enablement, personalized recommendations and all
the business logic and the data hidden behind the scenes,
this approach ensures a consistent and seamless journey.
It also simplifies digitization of the customer journey,
reducing dependency on a particular application used in
the interaction channel. This requires business logic
independent of all applications, with channel apps utilizing open
APIs which serve access to predefined processes. In addition,
business processes must be defined with the correct gradation
to assure swift and simple processing in digital channels.
These business processes rely on a robust, catalog-driven
(model-driven) approach. This may be most commonly
associated with products and services, but in fact the product
catalog is not the only catalog involved here. Different domain
models drive different business processes. For example,
while the creation of a customer record may be orchestrated
by the relevant process, the actual data and respective
validations are driven from the model. This facilitates
implementation of built-in business processes ready to deploy
in digital or physical channel apps, while all the models are
set up in the system.
Telcos that are prepared to meet the
demands of the “always on” generation
and adopt some of these modern,
customer-centric and channel-less tools,
will be best placed to transform into digital
service providers able to innovate
at the pace required by today’s market
and customers.
A HANDS-ON GUIDE TO CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT
IN FIELD SERVICE DELIVERY
In field service planning, companies are driven to implement
new solutions for automation, communication and business
intelligence by the sheer volume of data involved in providing
top-class customer experience. Yet not all have made the leap,
and in terms of the evolution of field service management,
organizations can be divided into three groups.
First there are  proactive   businesses, which harness
the potential of existing technologies and data pools to deliver
outstanding and comprehensive customer communication
and optimize operations. For example, they use chatbots for
some levels of customer interaction, and implement advanced
data collection and analysis to predict and prevent issues
before they become a problem.
Then there are the efficient  companies, which have already
deployed field service management solutions to integrate
their systems, so they can automate and optimize planning,
task management and customer communications.
Finally, some organizations still work on a  manual   basis,
juggling multiple systems and focusing too much time on
maintenance and problem-solving to give customer experience
the attention it deserves.
Understanding customer journey mapping
is vital for the delivery of excellent
customer experience.
This is a process by which customer interaction points and
motivations are analyzed in order to plan and enhance service
delivery. This paves the way for clients to take the lead in
many aspects of service planning – for example by changing
a technical visit, using the channel that best suits them at
a convenient time – and even switching quickly between one
channel and another. In such an example, the customer-
1 See: ”Gartner Says 25 Percent of Customer Service Operations Will Use Virtual Customer Assistants by 2020”, Gartner 2018
EPISODE #7
led re-scheduling should be automated on the provider side,
so field service resources can be optimized.
No more downtime for engineers waiting
for new instructions to be written up
manually in the event of a rescheduled
service visit or no-show.
Comarch Field Service Management  addresses these issues
by making it easy for clients to access service visit information,
change the appointment to suit them, and keep up to date
with every alteration.
Alongside customer journey mapping, integrated virtual
customer assistance should also receive careful
attention.  According to Gartner, 25% of service and support
operations will deploy such integrated systems by next
year1,  letting web portals, mobile applications, field service
management systems and chatbots automate work order
generation and reducing the number of direct call center
interactions. The employees freed up in this way can focus their
efforts more on analyzing and understanding customer behavior
and motivations, and dealing with the more complex issues
that might be beyond the abilities of chatbots underpinned
by artificial intelligence. These same employees could thus
become customer experience ambassadors, using the analyzed
data with which they work to present personalized offers and
solutions to clients.
There is no doubt that customer experience management
presents field service teams with by opportunities
and challenges. Automation will optimize some operations,
and the role of human players will change. The trick will be
to strike the correct balance that addresses the demands
of today’s customers in a convenient and timely manner.
PREDICTIVE MAINTENANCE AS THE FIRST STEP
TOWARDS INTELLIGENT ASSURANCE
Artificial intelligence is ubiquitous. From telephones to cars,
vacuum cleaners to lighting systems – AI has so many and
varied applications that we often don’t realize that it is there.
Machines operating on predetermined command algorithms
have been around for more than half a century. What’s changed
is the way that today’s devices learn; human input isn’t always
required for AI to take in lessons and change the way it behaves.
Some of the biggest challenges for AI
lie in their capabilities to learn through
interaction.
On the machine to machine level, it’s not such an issue.
But factor in unpredictable human behavior, and it’s
a different story altogether. Nevertheless, today’s AI is able
to handle complex interaction with humans, as evidenced
by virtual reality devices for gaming, military and aviation
technology, and for training people how to act in difficult
or dangerous situations.
In telecommunications, AI has proved
essential.
Digitization demands more complex systems, and planning
on a level well beyond the capabilities of the human brain.
The emergence of 5G technology and the Internet of Things
has driven the development of new standards that let
devices communicate without human interaction, so today’s
telecommunications management systems need to respond
to many varied events, to be “always on”, and to operate at
the highest levels of security. AI can assist with all
of these challenges and more. To see how, let’s take a look
at three key areas.
EPISODE #8
First is automated situation generation,
with root-cause analysis and removal powered by machine
learning. It is used in network and service surveillance/
operations centers to automate the process of analyzing and
removing causes of multiple events, including those reported
directly by customers. Because a single root cause can lead to
many alarms, this approach cuts time and work required to fix
an issue, and keeps services available for customers.
Next is automated problem generation,
which involves deep ML-powered analysis of recurring network
problems concerning alarm situations and the links between
them. The result should be that embedded problems are
rooted out, with the added benefit that the software carrying
out analysis is not subject to human frailties such as tiredness,
poor concentration or the tendency to take shortcuts, and does
not disrupt services.
The third area is automated baseline
generation and anomaly detection.
This requires information to be collected by human operators,
and involves analysis of multiple sources and comparisons of
one-off parameters that vary from the norm. This tool is primarily
based on the designation of typical parameters established
by human experts. In this case, automation will allow more
flexible and dynamic variables to be brought into play,
which can help identify symptoms of problems before
they become issues for customers.
And that, really is the driver of AI and automation in digital
telecommunications. Customers are demanding, and telcos
strive to meet those demands, creating a new type of demand
in itself – for innovative solutions that can take over arduous
repetitive tasks and bring AI to every area of intelligent
assurance and analytics.
ABOUT US CONTACT US
Since 1993, Comarch’s specialist telco solutions business unit has worked with some of the biggest telecoms companies in the world to transform Visit www.comarch.com for the contact information
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