'Indian telecom market is still in the happening stage'

Many Indian service providers are yet to pick up some of the
best technologies available in the global market in order to offer quality and
cost effective services to customers. What are the main reasons?

The Indian telecom market is still growing as compared with the Western
markets. Demand for innovative moving technology products will increase over a
period of time. The demand will be supported by customer needs. We do not think
that there is lack of awareness about availability of such products. In fact,
India is presently catching up with international telecom markets.

The entire world is talking about the need for standardization
of mobile platforms, technologies and protocols. Does the lack of
uniform/standard platform affect the business?

Not really. In fact, vendors are equipped to offer solutions depending on
the geographies and platforms.

IBM has been promoting several telecom software solutions in
India. Indian CTOs/CIOs and have different needs. How is it different from the
developed world?

We are not surprised to see some difference in the approach by Indian
business houses. This happens in Europe. Look at the UK market, which is totally
different from some of the markets in the European Union. Cost effectiveness of
solutions is one of the demands of Indian CIOs and CTOs. The main tips for them
to enhance business outcome would be correlating the main business goal with
that of functional managers, enable business with the right automation and try
to derive maximum benefit from the existing network itself.

How has the response been to IBM's Netcool software solutions
in India?

You know the response in India is encouraging by the fact that a few telecom
companies have already picked up the IBM Tivoli Netcool software, and more
deployments are expected over a period of time. We are targeting service
providers including, telecommunication providers, wireless providers, managed
service providers, Internet service providers etc worldwide to monitor and
manage their sophisticated technology infrastructures, providing a unified
platform for management of infrastructure and issues, enabling business
continuity

What is the uniqueness of the IBM Tivoli Netcool software
solutions?

The combination of Tivoli Netcool and IBM's Service Management technology
provides customers with a comprehensive approach for reducing the complexity of
their network requirements and efficient use of their network resources while
improving the quality of customer service by being more responsive to business
challenges, and lowering operational costs and addressing compliance at the same
time.

What is your strategy in the growing and the most competitive
telecom world?

IBM's strategy for growth in the telecommunications business sees our
recently acquired companies such as NetCool and Vallent, playing a role in
helping advance next-generation telecom services such as VoIP, and improving
customer retention rates for embattled telecom providers. Today's networks are
no longer just pipelines of data between clients and servers—they're
sophisticated channels of data, audio and video that communicates with a growing
array of mobile devices. The challenge this presents is: how do you manage all
this complexity while ensuring your network remains secure to outside threats?
That's a major reason why IBM acquired Micromuse-to help companies take
advantage of these new network capabilities in a way that ensures both security
and quality of service-because you can't have one without the other.

Baburajan K


baburajank@cybermedia.co.in