Convergence has become one of
those words in
telecommunications -- a buzzword that has many definitions and
little tangible impact on the everyday consumer. We have, as an
industry, freely used this term to speak about the next generation
of IP-enablement, regardless of device. In business, the mobile
enterprise has waited a long time for the day when employees could
use a smarter, more comprehensive device to communicate across
cellular, 802.X and campus environments. We've seen band-aid
solutions from a myriad of suppliers but nothing that really speaks
to the concept of true convergence. To level set, from the author's
perspective, convergence means that the wireless device becomes
another access point to the larger, secure backbone network --
supporting voice, data and applications in a seamless, global way
across technologies. There are three generally accepted obstacles
to making this a reality: revenue, culture and technology. And I
will add a fourth: U.S. global leadership.
I've maintained for some time that the No. 1 obstacle to
convergence is service provider revenue. In particular, how do you
support real convergence across technologies without destroying the
fundamental voice and data business model? Perhaps more
importantly, how do you properly account for revenues as the user
roams between technologies? None of the cellular providers today
wants to become a "fat pipe" supporting applications; there's too
much money to be made (still) in pure voice traffic, and this still
accounts for the majority of yearly revenue. As their networks have
become more efficient in this area, margins have grown
considerably. This isn't necessarily a bad thing; I think we can
all remember when none of the major providers was making money.
Another fact is that data revenues, on a per-user basis, are still
maturing. The percentages regarding growth are encouraging year
over year, but the dollars involved still do not come close to
where this market will be going. A standard for the clearing of
roaming revenues between technologies needs to happen for all
involved to embrace it and for the technology to move forward.
Another obstacle in the path of real convergence is the
cultural, personal, end-user perspective. The facts point to a
(domestic) population of customers that are finally grabbing on to
chat, multimedia messaging, video, audio and other value-added
offerings. Is the general population, outside of large business,
ready for a seamless, IP environment? These types of presence and
peer-to-peer services will become more stabilized and mainstream
over time but linger today in a younger demographic and segmented
market. This drives the service providers yet again to slice their
research, CAPEX and support into differentiated pieces --
complicating the business model and incurring costs. It will slow
growth and progress to real convergence in the short term.
A further obstacle is technology. In the U.S. market, we have
created a wonderful world of all things proprietary and a
marketplace full of walled gardens. The mantra has been to maximize
revenue and margin on proprietary technologies and satisfy a Wall
Street expectation to continue supporting those investments and
yielding profit. GSM, CDMA, iDEN, AMPS -- you name it, we have it.
We've built our markets around it. This again, in my opinion,
hampers our ability to adopt convergence quickly. Handsets will
compensate for this in the short term but don't solve the
fundamental problem.
The fourth major obstacle is global leadership and, in
particular, the position of the U.S. in global broadband. In many
ways, we (the U.S.) lead the charge in the global economy. The
reality is that -- all things remaining equal and unchanged -- in
10 years we will be far behind many major foreign economic powers
in broadband deployment. That is clearly unacceptable for a variety
of reasons and certainly has an impact on convergence. The reason
global leadership is important to you, very specifically leaders in
the IT and business community, is that it will be incumbent on many
of you to drive change and alter this trend. You will be the
front line in driving open standards, better security technologies,
and accessibility for people beyond the enterprise. You will make
it happen, and the time is now to contemplate and act on driving
change.
About the author: Michael Voellinger is widely respected
as one of the nation's top technology strategists and is considered
to be a thought leader in telecommunications. With more than 10
years of experience, Michael's analysis of security risk
mitigation, compliance and the convergence of telecommunications
has been continually sought out by leading corporations,
government, and financial institutions. Michael's commentary has
shown up in The Wall Street Journal,New York Times, Investors
Business Daily, Smartmoney.com, and CNN Money, as well
as numerous industry publications.