Telco companies are continually increasing their scope and scale to satisfy new customer demands, overcome COVID-19 challenges, and support the transfer of content between various devices, apps, and users. These have made the telco industry to become a complex industry, which encompasses multiple business lines and a wide range of products and custom solutions serving customers on B2B and B2C level. To continue providing the same service that they already do, telcos need to ensure that their business is secure, resilient, and robust, and operates even in times of crisis.
Traditional narrow solutions that target only one specific point of the complex infrastructure that telcos have are not enough anymore as they do not guarantee resilience and optimal operating; telcos need end-to-end solutions that would ensure safe and reliable management of their complex infrastructure. Considering the growing complexity of infrastructure, and the data and information coming from various dispersed sources and systems, a crucial step in maintaining and improving telcos’ business resilience is the identification and implementation of end-to-end Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) solutions. These solutions deliver not only system interoperability, but also provide technical value, insights for improved analysis and control, continuous functioning, stable production environment, and more.
In our previous blog post, we talked about the challenges that COVID-19 poses to the Telco industry, and in this blog post, we are going to cover two EAI end-to-end solutions that ensure business resilience even in times of crisis.
1. Merging and acquisition of two telecommunication companies
In an increasingly competitive environment, big corporations continually identify and pursue growth opportunities that will strengthen their position in the market. Sometimes these opportunities include introducing new products or services, expanding the already existing offerings, partnering with other related companies, or pursuing a merger or acquisition. The merger and acquisition processes are thought to be way better than all the previous ones, but they come with their own challenges. In the table below you can see some of the Merger & Acquisition challenges in business support, and operational support systems.
| Business Support System (BSS) Challenges | Operational Support System (OSS) Challenges |
| 1. The need for unified Order2Cash process which also includes Order Management, Inventory Management, Unified Billing process, and systems. | 1. Unification of Inventory Management Systems and focusing on a single ERP. |
| 2. Customer Management which includes: a) A single CRM with merged B2B and B2C clients b) Configure Price Quote (CPQ) and Product Catalogue unification/integration c) Customer Support merger without service interruption d) eCommerce and Web Presence | 2. Unification of Incident Management System, and efficient integration of the entire organizational structure. 3. Human Capital Management system synchronization – unification of all HR processes and systems. |
One of our clients wanted to expand and grow the business by doing exactly that – merging with another telecommunication company. What they needed was an end-to-end solution that would ensure smooth and fast merging without affecting the everyday company operation. By implementing an EAI end-to-end solution, they have successfully merged with another large telecommunication company providing internet, television, telephone, and mobile services. The solution ensured continuous provision and maintenance of customer service and provided:
- Overview and new ways of managing customer data
- Significant administrative processes support (invoicing, payment arrangements)
- Up/down selling
- Full control over products and services
- Improved self-service and contact center
- Increased efficiency and productivity
- Reduced complexity and enhanced maintenance
Enable the merging of two telecommunication companies
Adopting Microservices architecture to ensure business resilience
2. Improving the payroll process and transparency by implementing Enterprise Application Integration
An efficient enterprise includes the optimal operation of all its departments. The Human Resource department is not excluded, and in terms of telco, the HR departments are rather complex just like the telco’s entire infrastructure. Very often HR managers are faced with the challenge of precisely calculating payroll in terms of bonuses, awards, etc. and a highly optimized and streamlined HR process results in satisfied employees, increased productivity, and ultimately increased ROI. Some of the challenges in telco’s HR include:
| Need for a single system for organizational management |
| Operational organization and different work processes due to the nature of work |
| Payroll calculation complexity due to different types of working processes, bonuses, awards, etc. |
| Absence and Vacation management |
| Custom hiring, on-boarding and off-boarding |
One of our clients with an enterprise including 14 subsidiaries, had multiple legacy systems used for tracking payroll and absence data. All the systems were based on different file formats and worked on different principles. As a result, the data across the enterprise was disconnected and data managing had to be done manually which resulted in increased costs, time, and mistakes in payroll. By using an end-to-end EAI solution, the client was able to automate the payroll process completely, enabling stakeholders to make decisions that will improve internal processes and provide better customer service. In addition, the solution increased transparency among the subsidiaries of the enterprise and greatly improved the decision-making process by having consistent data reports and statistics based on real-time information.
Connecting internal HR systems to improve payroll process and transparency
The two aforementioned EAI solutions are end-to-end solutions because they do not include only EAI, but rather a set of best practices and principles to ensure that the implemented solution satisfies the client’s requirements. These practices include:
1) Implementing agile methodology and use of the latest Atlassian products to track the planning and development of the solution, and to speed up its delivery.
2) Continuous testing by using best testing practices and solutions to verify that the services provided by the implemented system provide the same and even better functionality than the substituted system.
Migration testing of SOA based system
3) Continuous support and maintenance of the established solution to enable a stable production environment with continuous visibility and no data loss.
Continuous monitoring of transformations handled by TIBCO platform
CI/CD – Streamlining order management process
Employing a complete end-to-end solution has many advantages, the most important is the fact that you have the same partner that you have already put trust in to provide you a solution to all your challenges. ⋮IW has been delivering end-to-end Enterprise Application Integration solutions to clients since 2004 with a 98% rate of delivery success. However, this number would have no meaning if it is not supported by the positive feedback that we get from clients and can be seen in our testimonial section.
Our technical consultants are devoted to delivering exponential value to our clients all the time by providing end-to-end solutions that best suit our client’s needs. If you want to discuss and check how end-to-end solutions would benefit your business, reach out – we would be more than happy to discuss any topic that you have.
