Sectors and industries across a wide spectrum are navigating the advances in technology and strategizing how best to leverage transformative tools such as automation to improve their businesses and ultimately their customers’ experience.
Digitalization is undoubtedly a significant force of change. New technologies, such as artificial intelligence, 5G, and IoT bring a transformative impact across most businesses and industries. Digitalization plays a dual role as it redefines ways of working and core offerings and at the same time accelerates demand for what the industry produces. At the heart of much this technological evolution is data. In our work with CSPs we are utilizing data to enhance operations.
Key to leveraging operational transformation are healthy and productive partnerships like Ericsson and MTN where we are working closely to leverage automation, to improve operational efficiency and reduce time to market for new services for Communication Service Providers (CSPs).
As CSPs introduce virtualized and software-defined infrastructure and prepare to expand their business in the digital economy, automation is essential to re-scale and re-purpose operations. CSP partners like MTN Benin are beginning their journeys to a closed-loop, “highly automated, low-touch” operations and orchestration system based on real-time data analytics.
Operations for CSPs in the past have focused on networks, the IT environment and KPIs – all measured utilizing different tools. However, with the goal ultimately focused on constantly improving customer experience, operations have to bring together those various tools to enhance what the customer experiences.
How can CSPs like MTN Benin be enabled with intelligent data driven approach to operations? Shifting towards an intelligent automated network operations centre is essentially about focusing on bringing together the various data elements, developing an appropriate infrastructure with applied automation rules and injecting them with smart tools developed to bring in advance actions, tasks or steps to either prevent operational outage, to move traffic quickly, and adapt to the needs and behaviors of customers proactively.
While this transformation is not easy it can be enabled through powerful tools, hours of data crunching, analysis and algorithms creating automation rules implemented in front and back-office environments. That transformation can shift competences by bringing in analysts who allow an engineer, for example, to monitor network performance in real time and react to challenges or predict peaks in usage.
These transformations with partners like MTN Benin are being implemented through processes such as Ericsson’s Automated Network Operations portfolio. This portfolio allows CSPs to enhance network performance and scaling across physical and virtual resources, as well as simplifying the way networks are run in terms of time and efforts required. Unique analytics applications allow CSPs to leverage untapped data into actionable insights and real-time decisions, ensuring a superior customer experience.
Embarking on this journey is critical in this data rich world. A recent managed services engagement between Ericsson and MTN Benin over the last 18 months has focused on automating operations with improvements in areas such as automated alarm correlation so that the organization can be even more responsive to customer requirements or network performance. There has been a 15 percent increase in automated alarm correlation, 47 percent increase in automated ticket creation to respond to customer requests, with an additional 68 percent increase in automated work orders in the field.
In turn this has proven to not only improve network performance and quality but improve the overall availability of the network to MTN customers by enabling 55% reduction in faults on network sites and increase in data traffic and voice quality.
The foundation of MTN business is driven by the core belief that everyone deserves the benefits of a modern, connected life. A belief that enables MTN to make the lives of the people we serve a whole lot brighter. Being a Communication Service Provider, MTN Benin’s key focus is on enhancing customer perception and quality of services for customers. With automation and continuous innovation, MTN Benin is now better prepared, for unforeseen events such as outages, any degradation of quality of services etc.
Automation has not only simplified MTN Benin’s work environment, but it has also supported in enhancing client perception in minimal time. In addition to that there is significant improvement in organizational efficiencies, network resiliencies and reduction in number of issues. MTN Benin is also preparing to launch Artificial Intelligence use cases this year in this enhanced environment to further boost service quality.
In a nutshell, strategically implementing automation in MTN Benin managed services has delivered significant business value by enhancing the quality of service, time to market, increasing the response rate to changing business requirements and reducing security and compliance risks radically.
This just shows the fantastic brave new world we embark on bringing predictability in MTN Benin’s operations. This is just the beginning of the journey in terms of automation capabilities. CSPs services enable the broad spectrum of industry sectors allowing customers such as MTN to develop specific automation use cases to enable customers to be understood fully and develop tailored and quality services that reflect the potential that 5G will bring to the world.
Related Links:
The Internet of Things (IoT) technology
5G AI Report- Artificial Intelligence and 5G - What role will AI play?
What is 5G? How will it transform our world?
Automated Network Operations
