Telecoms Tech

The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) has released its ‘Who has your back?’ report for 2013, its third edition. As a company whose tagline is “defending your rights in the digital world”, this document helps consumers understand the service providers they can trust.

The last few weeks for both BT and TalkTalk have been interesting for UK telecoms - some may say slightly pathetic - but a lot is at stake for the broadband companies’ financial future.

Research conducted by MDS has found that 75% of IT and telecoms decision-makers are looking to move towards a Unified Communications (UC) infrastructure in the next 12 months; good news for operators looking for additional revenue streams from the business segment.

Last month, Neelie Kroes used her MWC 2013 speech to call for a single Telecoms market, which as Vice President of the European Commission for the Digital Agenda holds some amount of weight, so how has the industry reacted?

The traditional channels of television consumption continue to change, and the latest research from ABI offers more pointers in that regard as the over the top (OTT) video market hit $8bn in 2012. ABI Research, in its analysis, has also revealed that in the North America, Europe and Asia Pacific regions the year on year growth was in excess of 50%, and forecast that the market will go past $20bn by 2015.

High speed data services like LTE are changing how operators develop and market services – operators are selling more services, with a faster time to market, to an increasingly segmented customer base and new business models are constantly on the horizon.

Facebook has this week launched ‘Home’, software running on Android which turns a user’s phone lock screen into a news feed and a user interface for the social giant. But how does this align with other Facebook strategy, and what are the wider implications for the telecoms industry?

With the UK’s 4G auctions concluding, it is clear the early 4G land grab is set to take place in the corporate market; and the emphasis on quality of service, network availability and corporate specific data mining will become a critical component in service differentiation. Tony Over, Operations Director, M7 Managed Services Ltd, explains that first mover advantage will be essential.