Next Generation Communications Blog

Web 2.0

Successfully Monetizing the Digital Media Opportunity: Combining Marketing and Merchandizing with a Superior User Experience


By Special Guest: Wim Van Daele, Director, Communications – Mobile Commerce, Video & Immersive Communications, Alcatel-Lucent

Service providers are discovering new opportunities brought by the expanding market for the delivery of digital media services (applications, music, games, e-books, and more). Answering the question how to leverage this opportunity is one thing; but even more important is the question how to successfully monetize it.

In other words, how can service providers position themselves as critical components in application and content value chains to add value? How can they successfully differentiate from/compete with players such as Apple and Google?

players such as Apple and Google?

Quality of Experience (QoE) - A New Tool for Measuring Video Streaming Performance

By Erin Harrison

Video has become an integral part of everyday life – it has greater emotional impact and delivers visual complexity better than any other medium, a recent Alcatel-Lucent blog,  An Innovative Tool for Measuring Video Streaming QoE,  pointed out.

“Successful video delivery requires an understanding of these twin factors, and how best to shape the video experience to deliver them…“Delivering an outstanding QoE is critical for video streaming service providers. It is a differentiating factor in attracting new users, but also the best way to enhance multimedia revenue streams,” the authors stated.

HTTP Adaptive Streaming (HAS) 'Well-Suited' for Mobile When Client Parameters are Optimized

By Beecher Tuttle

A recent blog post by Bell Labs’ Harish Viswanathan and Mark Clougherty, "Optimizing HAS for Mobile Wireless," looked at technical issues surrounding the delivery of quality video over mobile networks. There they discussed in detail why HTTP adaptive streaming (HAS) is capable of doing so but not at its default settings. 

This is an important finding since HAS currently is used for delivering acceptable video quality over a wide range of typical network conditions,  and thus is a strong option for wireless networks where data rates can vary substantially.

The Challenges of Evaluating Services as Individual or Collective Customer Experiences

By Oliver Krahn, Guest Contributor, Customer Experience Transformation Lead, Alcatel-Lucent

Customer experience management (CEM) focuses on the relationship between service providers and their subscribers, and has become a critical priority in the industry.  However, the management solution chosen by service providers to meet the needs of their diverse customer bases can differ widely.

There are two ways of looking at the options:

  • Considering the subscribers as a collective group and evaluating a statistical average of experience.
  • Accepting and appreciating each individual as (s)he uses the services provided.

Network Operators Need to Prepare for Booming M2M Traffic

By Erin Harrison

The so-called “Internet of Things” is expected to connect 15 billion devices by 2015, demanding a new approach to communications business models, operations and technologies.  As a result, driven in no small measure by the dramatic projected increase in machine-to-machine (M2M) communication, wireless network operators are in a position where they need to prepare for an explosion of signaling traffic, according to a recent Alcatel-Lucent TechZine item, "Getting Ready for M2M Traffic Growth."

How Service Providers Can Take On Customer Experience Challenges


By Erin Harrison

It's indisputable that improving the customer experience, the way end users interface with a company's support people and business processes, will improve the service provider's bottom line.

According to Alcatel-Lucent, customer experience challenges that service providers face include: the cost of acquiring new customers; technical support and customer support/help desk.

“For many service providers, the new path to profitability is a holistic approach focused on anticipating customers’ needs and improving their Quality of Experience (QoE),” according to an Alcatel-Lucent article that points out the customer experience has not always been a priority for service providers.

HP and Alcatel-Lucent Creating the Cloud-Ready Data Center

By Erin Harrison

Cloud computing has already transformed the way we live and do business. Consumers like the idea that they can access low-cost applications anywhere, anytime, on any device – and enterprises are moving applications to the cloud to reduce costs and streamline operations.

The movement toward to the cloud gives service providers an opportunity to deliver cloud services from their data centers as a natural extension of the network and hosting services they already offer. According to Alcatel-Lucent’s whitepaper, “Creating the Cloud-Ready Data Center,” with the right infrastructure, service providers can leverage their greatest assets: 

Why Social Media Services are Critical for Communication Service Provider Revenues

By Andreas Lemke, Applications Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent

We live in a time of tremendous disruption in the digital economy. Applications are moving into the cloud while smart phones and tablets are multiplying. Everything is becoming social including: shopping, customer service, search, gaming, learning, work-life in the enterprise, reading, traveling, and dating, even politics through social media campaigns and voter participation.

Communication service providers (CSPs) can benefit from these disruptions. They are selling rapidly growing numbers of smartphones and mobile broadband services that propel the social media phenomena, yet commoditization looms and network load demands high infrastructure investments.

Expose Network Capabilities to Facilitate Innovation on a Smart Network

By Ed Silverstein

In a Web 2.0 world, explosive growth in demand "has created an environment dominated by third-party application and content providers," according to an analysis from Alcatel-Lucent. These ACPs, company officials say, "are not only delivering the applications and content generating the huge increase in traffic, but are also benefiting from the associated revenue." Mobile network providers want to take advantage of the money being generated. TMCnet's David Sims says that to meet end user expectations and get a piece of the new application and service revenue pie, a recent Alcatel-Lucent study found, "mobile network providers must find new ways to use their network assets to work with third-party partners." The Alcatel-Lucent Open API Service, company officials say, might be a way to accomplish this. The service provides a hosted, cross-carrier application mediation environment network providers can use to "expose valued network assets to multiple third-party partners to improve time-to-market with new applications and multimedia content for targeted end users." In other words, as a network provider, you'll stand out for the value you add, instead of being replaceable. Most any network providers can effectively manage relationships with one or two key third-party development partners.

Content is King - For Multi-Screen Advertisers, Too

By David Sims
"Content wants to be free from platform restrictions; free to move around and follow the consumer." So says industry observer Jon Gibs, adding for good measure that "it's a fallacy to compartmentalize consumers into mobile, TV or Internet users." Gibs points to Nielsen studies, which, he says, show that "high-consuming individuals remain high-consuming individuals, regardless of the device or platform they're using." Makes sense, some people just have to have it, and they'll take it any way they can get it. Plus you have to figure that heavy users of content will have diversified their addic- sorry, their consumption means. Therefore, Gibs concludes, content and service providers "need to look at content and delivery from the consumer's perspective rather than categorizing consumers by platform... Customizing content for as many screens as possible will allow content and service providers to enhance the multi-screen experience and retain the attention and loyalty of consumers." Alcatel Lucent has published a recent post by Connie Torres, arguing that in tandem with this trend, "advertising helps drive multi-screen innovation and new business models." Multi-screen, Torres says,"can expand the reach, impact and effectiveness of digital advertising. Service providers can profit from understanding what multi-screen services users want." Young people today, those prized by advertisers, "no longer simply want to be connected," Torres finds: "They want rich, Web 2.0, interactive multimedia experiences that can be enjoyed according to their needs, and on whatever device they are using - PC, TV or mobile. The Alcatel-Lucent Market Advantage Youth Lab was created "to understand the wants and needs of this important consumer segment," Torres reports. "The Youth Lab provides unfiltered access to the perceptions, attitudes and behaviors of 13 to 26-year-olds from around the world. In one recent study, Alcatel Lucent officials say, "answers were sought to key topics relating to the three devices (PC, TV and mobile) used as multi-screen services endpoints."
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