Unified digital delivery model for telco service providers

Digitalization and Cloudification are vital to business success and not an option any more. The Telco industry is one of the first to adopt newer technologies. The exponential rate of change in technologies makes adoption and maintenance of the IT estate a critical and challenging task.

With Next Generation (NexGen) technologies, the IT estate turns multi-cloud/ hybrid cloud in nature and the delivery structure becomes more complex (See Figure 1). This leads to the need to integrate many systems, processes and functions to make the entire ecosystem function smooth. Hence, having an integrated, automated and optimized delivery model and platform that can support core Telco systems/ equipment, network functions and business IT applications in a seamless manner becomes crucial. 

Figure 1: Logical view of the Telco IT estate

Key requirements from a unified, integrated delivery model are:

• Multi-platform support: Physical, virtual, multiple containers
• Multi-location hosting: On-Prem and public cloud
• Alignment with business and Open Source
• Support for diversified technology stacks
• Workload portability across clouds
• End-to-end ecosystem integrations
• Capability to meet compliance and security requirements
• Simplified and enhanced user experiencef
• Access and support from anywhere
• Flexible, modular
• Support DevSecOps along with agility

The challenge: The silo effect

With the introduction of Cloudification, the delivery models in an organization become more discrete and silo (See Figure 2), and have major constraints like:

• Manageability, integration becomes more complex
• More expensive
• Huge dependency on multiple providers
• Interoperability issues for integrations
• Cumbersome governance 

Figure 2 : Discrete, silo delivery model

Delivery model options

Some of the best possible delivery models in the cloud era to meet business demands are multi-fold wherein each model has its own pros and cons (See Figure 3).

• OEM led models – This is more predominant for Telco NF functions
• Public Cloud specific models – Each public cloud service provider has its own delivery model
• Technology specific models  -  Key technology players such as Cisco, VMware, etc have their own models
• System Integrator (SI) led models - For specific set of applications such as support for IT Apps 

Figure 3 : Widely used delivery models

An optimized, integrated delivery model should enable support to achieve not only cost benefits, but also ensure compliance along with meeting changing business demands.

An SI-led model supported by respective OEMs (See Figure 4) would enable a seamless, integrated, and accountable delivery model that will deliver key benefits with:

• A collaborative approach by SI-led partners and OEM partners. This will bring in both depth and breadth of skills and competencies
• Standardization, consolidation and integrations in the ecosystem that can normalize across business units and geographies
• The best of breed from respective partners
• Expert consultations and joint innovations

Figure 4 : End state delivery model

The execution approach

Since there is a mix of heterogeneous set of technologies, and multiple service providers / SIs and OEMs in the target model, it is essential to define a systematic approach, either in a waved or phased manner aligned with business, to reach the end state transformed model. This will help protect the investment while defining the cloudification and transformation journey.

In the transition state, key tasks are to standardize the support portfolio and integrate with the ecosystem (See Figure 5).

Figure 5: Transit state of delivery model

Some of the benefits of this approach are:

• Resources optimization by eliminating redundant roles across service lines
• Supports cross skilling approach
• Enables multi multi-level skill enhancement
• Single point of contact for all services
• Unified support vendor management
• Integrated ecosystem for partners

End state model:

Figure 6 : Target delivery model: Unified and integrated

How it delivers better results

The unified and integrated delivery model adopts the reliability engineering methods (See Figure 7).

• With reliability engineering, pool of skilled resources are created
• Enables multi-level capabilities with automation
• Multi skilled resources alignment

Figure 7: Reliability Engineering Mode for resources 

Conclusion:

Based on the organization’s technology roadmap, cloudification journey and transformation approach, one has to define the transit approach by selecting the low hanging fruits first. The unified, integrated delivery model supports digital transformation while delivering hybrid cloud benefits such as scale of economies, flexibility for workload portability while ensuring security and compliancy.

With the power of Software Defined Everything (SDx) and APIs, Wipro has built integrated and unified delivery model platforms and IPs that deliver automation and integration for digital transformation. These enable businesses to offload their delivery responsibility completely and focus on their core business growth.

To know more about Wipro’s unified delivery model, please contact us at sdx-cis@wipro.com