Jim Machi : Industry Insight
Jim Machi

October 2013

You are browsing the archive for October 2013.

At Gitex, MEA's Premier Telecoms Event, Lessons in Luxury Selling

October 29, 2013

The Gitex tradeshow in Dubai is a great place to see a lifestyle-over-cost approach to selling telecom services. The show, which I recently attended for the second time, has a Mobile World Congress feel to it with a frenzy of meetings that would normally take weeks to conduct. There are two main differences, however, between Gitex and the West’s premier mobile event. First, the attendees at Gitex come from throughout the Middle East and across Africa.

Despite Carriers' Views, OTT is Not the Enemy

October 22, 2013

Last week an interviewer asked me, “How will the carriers combat OTT?” Well, from a certain point of view, OTT apps aren’t the enemy. They drive traffic on the data part of the mobile network, which drives revenue for the mobile network operators. It’s the pricing plans that are the enemy.

However, I think the root of the question was really about OTT players taking revenue away from carriers.

The SBC evolution toward media

October 15, 2013

As networks grow, session border controllers need to do more in order to keep pace. There’s no reason why SBCs shouldn’t incorporate the functions of a media server. SBCs came into their own as edge devices that could insulate one IP network from another. This applies to both enterprise IP-IP networks, service provider IP-IP networks, and enterprise/service provider IP networks. 

The PSTN is dead. Or is it?

October 8, 2013

The PSTN is dead. We all know this because all we hear about is IP and government-backed PSTN sunset requirements. Right? If that is actually the case, then when Dialogic sells a softswitch, why do we also still usually sell media gateways as part of the overall solution?

Location Insight Could Yield Different Kinds of Revenue

October 1, 2013

A few weeks ago, I first heard the term "Location Insight Services," or LIS, from Telco 2.0’s recent research. LIS basically take location-based services (LBS) to the next step. Location-based services involve tracking your cell phone, for instance (with your consent). Mobile service providers can determine your whereabouts and know where your phone is because of the tower it’s connected to or because of GPS.

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