The Future Of Telecom: Strategies To Move Off The Endangered Species List

Telcos are an endangered species; their traditional business model has come undone, and many operators face a downward revenue/earnings/investment spiral. The classic telco position is eroding due to competition from alternative connectivity providers, IT services firms, and over-the-top providers, all enabled by open regulatory environments. To move off of the endangered species list, they must define strategies for adjusting their network cost structure via network outsourcing and sharing. Operators must outline a clear migration strategy for their existing customer base from a legacy to an all-IP environment, while defining new, sustainable revenue opportunities in wholesale and cloud computing. Operators will need to better align their network capabilities with consumer behaviors and core business processes. This will mean acting as a central ecosystems manager for some, orchestrating network, software, device, and professional service capabilities. We expect few operators to make such a transformation. Those operators that can't, or don't want to, commit to this transition will instead adjust their operations to become lean connectivity utility providers.