Page 365 - Handbook of Modern Telecommunications

3-156 CRC Handbook of Modern Telecommunications, Second Edition

TABl E 3.6.3 OSS Observer’s Telecom Software Market Taxonomy
Functional Area/Segment Associated Functions/Systems
Service Delivery Platforms Charging
Content Management
Telecom Applications Server
Device Management
Billing Rating & Pricing
Partner & Interconnect
Fraud & RA
Mediation
Customer Care Customer Interactions Management
CRM
Subscriber Management
Workforce Automation
Service Fulfillment Order Management
NRM/Inventory
Activation
Engineering Tools
Service Delivery Service Management
Fault & Event Management
Performance Management
Probe Systems
Network Management Systems Mobile
Residential Broadband
Business Data Services
PSTN
Middleware Middleware
Source: OSS Observer.

3.6.9.1 Implications of eBusiness for Service Providers
As new technologies and markets emerge, enterprises have to adapt or die. Technologies affect customer
needs while customer needs influence business designs. As business designs emerge, they affect pro-
cesses and processes influence both customer expectation and the next generation of technology.
In response to this new paradigm, it is imperative that enterprises integrate business, technology,
and processes. They must redefine the way in which they operate by using new technology-based busi-
ness designs, creating new interenterprise processes, and integrating operations to support changing
customer requirements.
The three principal reasons that service providers must integrate eBusiness and traditional business
processes are:
• Customer expectations and the need to move to an approach that focuses on the management of
customer relationships and the importance of improving customer retention and increasing the
value customers contribute to the enterprise.
• Productivity gains and the need to ensure that these can continue to be obtained.
• Provision of a broader range of products and services to customers. For the information and com-
munications services industry (more than almost any other industry), this requires a focus on
better collaboration between and integration of processes.
The processes required in an eBusiness environment are fundamentally different from those in a
traditional business environment.