Hollywood Blvd Sign

Have you met the Hollywood superstar investor?

Jeff Barak | May 21, 2013
Looking to pitch your innovative idea to successful high-tech investor (and Hollywood A-list heartthrob) Ashton Kutcher? Don’t bother. If your idea is that good, Kutcher and his partner Guy Oseary, who just happens to be Madonna’s manager, will find you. As Kutcher explained: “We take pitches based on references, usually from founders of companies we’re already working with. The best way to get to us is to build something amazing, grow it and then we’ll find you.” With investments ranging from Skype to Foursquare, Kutcher, in particular, is regarded as the entertainment industry’s superstar investor. In Israel for a GarageGeeks ... More >>
me

Keep an eye on your network, as well as on the ball (LIVE blogging from Management World Nice)

Naomi Weiser | May 16, 2013
Move to 4G, and mobile usage can hit the roof, warned Sandvine’s Lee Brook at Management World Nice. Giving an example of a Latin American country where most people access the Internet via their mobile, Brook noted that per subscriber usage on an LTE network was a whopping nine times higher than that of a 3G network. Hopefully Brazil’s networks will be ready to support this demand because next month, the Confederations Cup, the first of three massive sporting events to take place in Brazil over the next couple of years, will kick off. Although Brazil has just officially launched a ... More >>
me in racing car

What on earth will Telefónica Digital do next? (Live from Management World Nice)

Naomi Weiser | May 15, 2013
For the record, I’d just like to say that in my (completely unbiased) opinion, women drive much more safely than men do. However, the insurance industry apparently disagrees with me, with premiums in the UK soaring very high for female or young drivers. This is why  Telefónica’s “pay as I drive” M2M collaboration (launched in Spain, and now to be rolled out across different geographies) with insurance giant Generali is good news. A pioneering automobile insurance premium for which Telefónica provide the connectivity, it’s calculated based on driving habits and is aimed at all types of customers. However, its price ... More >>
me at nice

Meet the industry “big guns”… (Live blogging from the first keynote session of Management World Nice)

Naomi Weiser | May 15, 2013
It was slickly choreographed, entertaining and managed to keep the attention of hundreds of jetlagged people – not an easy feat first thing in the morning… I’m talking about the opening-day keynote session at Management World Nice, which this year is focused on how best to navigate through the upcoming The Digital Storm and the ensuing flood of digital services. Survival, according to TM Forum Chairman Keith Willetts, depends on three main points: the need to get operating costs down and improve capital efficiency (“if you don’t do that, you’re dead”), the need for partnerships (because with digital services, “there ... More >>
nice neil ward

Are service providers going to woo Skype? (Live blogging from Management World Nice)

Naomi Weiser | May 14, 2013
I have to tip my hat to Neil Ward, Skype’s General Manager, Global Business Operations who took the stage at this morning’s keynote session at Management World Nice. Here he was, representing one of the most established and powerful OTT players, responsible for snatching a sizeable chunk of revenues from at least some of the attendees in the room.  So you think he’d be a little phased by their presence but actually, it was the opposite: he talked about working together, which, as GigaOm reports is something that operators Vodafone and 3 have already tried with Skype, as has Verizon: “Skype ... More >>
Rami award

And the award goes to…

Naomi Weiser | May 13, 2013
It might be nearly midnight here in Nice on the opening day of Management World, but it’s never too late to share some really good news: TM Forum just gave its coveted Solution Excellence award to… Amdocs for Amdocs BSS Advance and Amdocs Business Building Blocks (BBBs)! This award recognizes the supplier or system integrator demonstrating the most innovative and effective use of TM Forum Frameworx to reduce time-to-market, deliver tangible cost reduction and improve efficiency and operational agility. The winner of the award was decided by TM Forum’s 250 service provider members so that’s quite a pat on the ... More >>
Carlos Moreno and Ronit Doran

Let’s talk cable…(Live blogging from TM Forum’s Management World Nice)

Naomi Weiser | May 13, 2013
It was initially standing room only at today’s packed Cable Summit at Management World Nice as attendees lined the back of the hall until extra chairs could be brought in. And even though there was a diverse agenda ranging from IPDR 3.0, eTOM to the connected home, it still wasn’t too surprising that “customer experience” were probably the most used words of the day (after “cable”, of course…), especially when it came to the CIO presentations by service providers Vidéotron (Canada) and ONO (Spain). Vidéotron CIO Serge DeLisle was first off the bat. Vidéotron’s competitive environment has changed quite a ... More >>
house money

The next billion-dollar business

Jeff Barak | April 30, 2013
The launch of AT&T’s home security and monitoring service last week should set the alarm bells ringing for traditional home security suppliers. Initially the Digital Life service is only being rolled out in 15 US markets, but AT&T has big plans for disrupting the $18 billion US home security market. As Glenn Lurie, head of AT&T’s Emerging Devices team, explained to USA Today’s Edward C. Baig: “We want to make this our next billion dollar business.” AT&T is not the first service provider to enter this market in North America  – Comcast has its Xfinity Home monitoring service and Verizon ... More >>
With Amazon and netflix taking on established content producers, we might see some completely new faces at next year's award ceremonies...

And the Golden Globe for Best New TV Show goes to…Amazon!

Ken Roulier | April 25, 2013
Whether you hate Game of Thrones, love Mad Men, get irritated by Suits or were annoyed when Arrested Development was cancelled, don’t you sometimes wish that you could be given the chance to decide which TV shows actually get made? Well, now you can. Not satisfied with being the world’s largest Internet retailer, Amazon has now made a move into broadcasting by creating 14 of its own pilot TV shows and posting them online for users to watch for free and give feedback as to which they like the best.  The Amazon Studios production company will then decide which projects ... More >>
10 years

What will look familiar in the next 10 years?

Tsahi Levent-Levi | April 18, 2013
Travel back in time ten years and you’d have been hard pressed to find a service provider data center with a Linux machine in it. You would also have probably found that each system performed just one service, with its own set of installation and management quirks. But jump forward a decade and things are now very different, thanks to the fact that our lives are now governed by a convergence of four forces – Social, Mobile, Cloud and Information (data) – that analyst group Gartner has called the Nexus of Forces, and a service provider now has to deal ... More >>
cloud tablet

Get ON my cloud… (The Rolling Stones got it wrong)

Kathy Cianciolo | April 11, 2013
The Rolling Stones got it wrong. Today, everybody is rushing to get on rather than off the cloud and you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who hasn’t heard of the cloud, or isn’t using it – even if they’re unaware that they are (Gmail, Twitter, Facebook? They’re all cloud-based content).  And spurring cloud adoption on is our unbridled enthusiasm for both mobile apps and sophisticated devices, along with “almost everywhere” access to wireless broadband, and emerging technologies, such as machine-to-machine (M2M), connected home and unified communications. But the cloud market isn’t restricted to us “regular” consumers – service providers aren’t ... More >>
makeover paint

Wi-Fi’s “poor relative” image gets a makeover

Kathy Cianciolo | April 7, 2013
Once considered the “poor relative,” Wi-Fi is being reinvented as a carrier-grade extension to today’s fixed and mobile networks. According to a recent survey from Analysys Mason, on behalf of Amdocs, a record number of wireless and cable operators are turning to Wi-Fi for new market and monetization opportunities. In fact, eighty-nine percent of all service providers surveyed said that Wi-Fi is critical to their growth strategies and have either deployed or plan to leverage Wi-Fi networks.   Beyond data offload Growing at a staggering rate, the demand for data continues to reach milestones and break records. The Cisco® Visual ... More >>
coffee money

Would you like some omni convergence with your latte, sir?

Naomi Weiser | March 28, 2013
Just when you were getting used to “convergence” which was about bundling prepaid and postpaid services together or supporting voice and data on a single system, meet omni convergence. Because if you and I want to enjoy the real-time, intuitive connected experiences of the very near future – regardless of the device (from smartphone to connected car ), technology or service you’re using to access it – omni convergence is behind it.   And the implications it holds for your service provider? They will need to be able to support it and think about launching differentiated data services that focus ... More >>
basketball 2

It’s March Madness time!

Eric Danis | March 21, 2013
This could be my least popular blog post yet, because apparently everyone (at least, in the U.S. anyway) is too busy obsessing about March Madness, America’s college basketball tournament, to read a blog post, work, or do just about anything else.  Employers beware: sixty-six percent of American employees will be watching March Madness during work hours, according to a recent MSN and Impulse Research survey cited by outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., with 20 percent anticipating spending one to two hours following games and 16 percent predicting they will spend five hours or more watching games instead of ... More >>
Service providers need to look for new income streams to make up the shortfall caused by OTT players

Ready? Set…GO! It’s time to focus on small to medium-sized businesses

Jeff Barak | March 20, 2013
As the Formula 1 Grand Prix season opened this weekend in Australia, Vodafone announced that it would be ending its sponsorship of the McLaren racing team at the end of the year, leaving McLaren with an annual $75 million hole in its budget for 2014 and onwards. But not for long, it seems – there is already speculation that Mexican service provider Telmex, which sponsors McLaren’s new driver Sergio Perez, could take over Vodafone’s role at the racing team, enabling a pretty seamless transition for McLaren. If only life was as simple for service providers. Like McLaren, they’re also suffering ... More >>
light bulb in hands

When being “cool” just isn’t enough

Eli Itin | March 12, 2013
Mobile World Congress 2013 has come and gone, and with it, the usual launch of gadgets, devices and technologies. And while few, if any, would argue that the Samsung Galaxy S4 or GM’s LTE-enabled connected car aren’t innovative,  is innovation really just about “cool stuff” or is there an alternative view of innovation beyond shiny new gadgets? I’ll be more specific: which do you think is more innovative: a new iPhone 6, or the innovation methodology and infrastructure behind it? Let me explain… From my own experience in running ideation workshops for communication service operators (and within Amdocs itself), I believe ... More >>
Is competing against OTTs a thing of the past?

Surprise! (OTT life isn’t as great as you might think…)

Gadi Ben-Gad | March 7, 2013
Imagine I’m a service provider and that I’m holding a great party at my house, but I end up getting locked out and when people leave, they start to take my stuff with them. That’s a (very) simple analogy of what an OTT (over-the top) player usually means to service providers who, despite investing billions in enabling the connectivity that we take for granted, don’t see a return on the services or the apps that are being used over the top and congesting the network. On top of this (pardon the pun), OTT is also having an negative impact on their ... More >>