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  • 1.  Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 12, 2017 18:28
    Should telcos have IOT/M2M employees as a separate team or have it as scattered members within the same organization structure (i.e. one or few M2M/IOT operation engineers in the O&M team, one or few M2M/IOT planning/design Engineers in the planning team, one or few M2M/IOT marketers in the marketing team, etc.)? I know about companies that have separate units and sometimes complete subsidiary for M2M/IOT business and my perception is that this type performs far better and that worldwide M2M/IOT market is worth that; this indeed comes at a cost (hierarchy, responsibility, workforce cost, etc.).
    What are best practices for IOT/M2M teams within the traditional telco organization structure?

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    Bassem Abdou
    Mobily
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  • 2.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 13, 2017 07:19

    Basem,

    While I haven't yet heard of IOT departments in Telcos, it is important to start thinking about it.

    The question you ask can be answered slightly later, as it would depend on the integration of the IOT product with the main line products of the Telco. So first, has anyone discussed product integrations anywhere?

    I would like to follow this thread.

    Thanks

    Sanjay



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    Sanjay Mehrotra
    MindShift Ltd
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    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 13, 2017 07:21

    Hi Abdou

     

    In my experience a blend of both is always better – especially if you are charting out new waters like the IOT/M2M business.

     

    A strong central team completely focused on developing the IOT/M2M platform ably supported by common individuals in the field teams/operational teams / NOC teams would be a good mix. This enables you to quickly scale up operations using best practices and local knowledge garnered over many painful or otherwise educational events by the Ops/field teams; as also, ensure focus on developing expertise within the IOT/M2M domain at the center by dedicated subject matter experts that can be quickly disseminated to the rest of the support community..

     

    Regards

    Uday

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    Original Message


  • 4.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 13, 2017 07:21
    It's based on the organization's strategic imperative. If an operator would like to roll-out the IoT/M2M network and to offer various services on that backbone - there is no much change required in the delivery & assurance unit (other than upskill/cross-skill/hiring the team). However the product business unit, engineering business unit should have talented expertise as an additional new hiring.

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    Rasool Irfan
    Tata Communications Ltd
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    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 13, 2017 07:21
    from my view based on solution evolution to 5G where we should have network slicing between different type of networks based on requirements from normal consumer to MTC ... etc so i believe to be ready operators should have separate teams to manage each network with E2E team on top to have the planning, strategy and synergies ...

    And i guess even from business and marketing view still most of the use cases target different type of customers 

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    Tamer Ragab
    Nokia Networks
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    Original Message


  • 6.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 13, 2017 07:21
    I believe that the delivery of any enterprise product should first be fed through the normal end to end process for enterprise products. however, if the volumes for certain products become big, then resources are dedicated at each service level. i.e. sales, order processing, deployment, billing and support.

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    Stanley

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    Original Message


  • 7.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 14, 2017 06:33
    Hello Bassem,

    As of my experience in STC and my colleagues in other telecom operators, It is preferred to have a separate departments and systems to be specialized in such projects and new technologies as a new stream for the any telecom operator other than the regular voice, sms and data services.
    It is always better to segregate the functions cause in the near future and even nowadays telecos are expanding and trying to provide wide variety of service like Cloud Services, ICT Projects, M2M, IOT and other out of the box solutions which requires a special departments, systems and team to handle each group of related services.

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    Sherif AlSherif
    Sr. RA Business Analyst
    Saudi Telecom Company
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    Original Message


  • 8.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 14, 2017 06:34

    Hi Bassem,

    I believe this depends on the maturity of your organization in IoT world. 

    In initial phases from exploring technology and market and lunching pilots in different vertical, I believe the shared resources is better, however you have to engage top management to give your pilots the same priority same as they give to other business products.

    Once you have a queue of projects and products and with increase number of customers, you can go with assigning dedicated resources for IoT.

    Best Regards  

     



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    Tamer Mazen
    Etisalat Misr
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    Original Message


  • 9.  RE: Telcos organizational structure

    Posted Feb 16, 2017 07:21
    Thank you all for your contributions and responses.

    @Sanjay: I think AT&T has some dedicated team/teams for M2M/IOT business (Yet I am not 100% sure); however, have a look at Objenious, which is Bouygou's IOT subsidiary. In my opinion, French companies in general are very clever when it comes to IOT!

    @Uday and Rasool: Your mix looks fine as a starting point but as time goes on and M2M/IOT business grows, you will indeed have to deal with the diversified priorities of the different teams. From what I see, this can be a real issue in operation!

    @ Tamer Ragab, Stanley, Sherif, and Tamer Mazen: I think I fully agree with you!


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    Bassem Abdou
    Mobily
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    Original Message


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