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BT Pioneers NGN "Open Innovation"
Networks Alone Won’t Drive Value, Says CTO
by Iain Morris
For many operators the migration to next-generation networks (NGNs) boils down to a radical overhaul of network infrastructure, but BT's Matt Bross argues
they are missing the bigger picture.
“You have to lift your thoughts above the level of boxes and wires,” says the CTO of BT Group. “To drive shareholder value on top of those investments takes organisational change. It takes innovation across the entire planning cycle.”
With that in mind, Bross is pioneering a concept he calls ‘open innovation’ at this year’s C5 World Forum. It’s already informed the UK incumbent’s own 21CN strategy, and Bross is looking to share his insights with others planning their NGN deployments.
Innovation inside and outside BT
According to Bross, ‘open innovation’ means both stimulating ideas within BT as well as encouraging developments in the wider world.
Last October, that led BT to launch a web-enabled set of employee ‘new ideas schemes’ that each carry a £30,000 (US$58,000) reward for the winners. “They’re generating significant value in terms of revenue generation and cost reduction for the business,” says Bross. “People – not boxes – make things work.”
Bross won’t be more specific about the perceived financial contribution of such internal schemes to BT’s 21CN deployment, although he says they are ‘without question’ crucial to keeping that project on track.
And what about the external component of ‘open innovation’?
“We’re trying to drive what we call Web 21C,” says Bross. “For example, at a recent ‘techfest’ conference we launched a set of SDKs [software development kits] and we’ve had 1,700 developers register to write to that set of capabilities. So we’re developing abilities for BT to mash up with services and applications that exist in the Web, and that turns this whole thing into a global innovation platform instead of just a global NGN.”
It’s no secret that BT wants to be an IT force to be reckoned with, but the software development also feeds into 21CN, says Bross, by helping the operator to expand its reusable capabilities.
“What’s happening in Cardiff [where the 21CN network is already active] is just at the edge,” says Bross (see Goodbye PSTN, Hello 21CN). “Today we have more than six million customers using common capabilities and by April we’ll have more than eight million. It’s easy for people to reduce this to how many wires you hook up.”
Multi-vendor integration
Another part of ‘open innovation’ is the work on multi-vendor integration being carried out at BT’s facility in Ipswich, UK. BT has contracted eight ‘strategic’ suppliers for its 21CN and getting these vendors to work together smoothly has, according to Bross, been “hard but ever so necessary.”
It’s also been of paramount importance given the operator’s global NGN ambitions. BT’s MPLS network now extends to 105 countries around the world, and Bross is targeting 160 by year-end. AT&T has set itself a less challenging target of reaching 155 countries with its MPLS network from 137 today (see AT&T To Spend US$750 Million On Global IP), and BT clearly feels its lead in multi-vendor integration gives it the ability to make good on its goal.
“Multi-vendor integration is one of our core competencies,” says Bross. “The strategic suppliers for 21CN have been worked into the global network so there’s commonality.”
It still appears to be an ultra-rapid deployment, but Bross denies that BT is doing a rushed job and argues that its strategy is being led by consumer demand.
“In the last quarter alone we’ve signed up 230 new multi-site customers,” he says. “What’s driving the urgency of our deployment is that demand.”
21C Global Venture
In line with the ‘open innovation’ ethos, BT also launched a new business unit called 21C Global Venture back in January (see BT 21CN Goes Global).
Dedicated to advising Tier 2 and 3 operators on their NGN plans, 21C Global Venture claimed Turk Telecom as its first customer in a contract worth more than US$10 Million. How has it fared since?
“I cannot share any other customer announcements with you now,” says Bross, “but there’s been a lot of interest, particularly from operators in the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific.”
Bross says that BT can help those companies to ‘de-risk’ their NGN deployments through its expertise in the field. But won’t they still prove too costly for players that undoubtedly lack the spending power of a Tier 1 operator?
“You can’t afford not to do it,” argues Bross.
More Information:
Goodbye PSTN, Hello 21CN
In the biggest project of its kind, BT is now starting to migrate PSTN customers onto its 21st Century Network (21CN)
AT&T To Spend US$750 Million On Global IP
Emerging Market Growth Spurs Doubling Of Annual Investment
BT 21CN Goes Global
More than three years from the scheduled completion of its own twenty-first-century network (21CN), BT last month announced the launch of a new venture to advise other operators on their next-generation network (NGN) plans.
BT Is High On Ethernet
Incumbent’s Ethernet Vision Balances Cost, Functionality
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