Tied to Network Development
The total cost benefits delivered by A3 across assurance functions is very much tied to the delivery of 5G. Interviews with 11 assurance vendors yielded insight into the gently increasing S-curve of value from assurance functions as demonstrated in the figure below.
* y-axis on the graphic = yearly financial value of assurance to a telco (e.g. capex and opex savings)
Main Findings
- Current capabilities include mainly descriptive/diagnostic functions and simpler automations.
- To date, these capabilities have brought value mainly from the customer experience improvements of improving fault finding and resolution; plus some capital savings from better cell site planning.
- As many markets move gradually to wider 5G deployment—bringing in SDN and NFV capabilities – A3 functions will enable more financial uplift.
- Assurance products will become an integral part of the automation of network management (which, has a much higher potential to reduce capex and opex needs for the telco).
- Telco emphasis has leaned toward achieving greater speed and higher quality, at the expense of cost savings in the classic project delivery triangle of “speed, cost and quality – pick two”. A3 assurance capabilities will need to deal with multiple new issues coming from new network implementations.
Please note, new research in early 2020 will look at the exact value to a telco from these new assurance capabilities.