Beyond Now: CSPs Can Lead Telecom's Digital Transformation

The telecoms industry faces significant pressure to innovate and drive efficiency. AI's transformative potential can act as a solution to this problem, offering benefits such as reducing operating costs, improving customer experiences and creating new revenue streams. 

However, before joining the AI crowd, Angus Ward, CEO at Beyond Now, believes that Communications Service Providers need to understand one thing: AI isn’t something you buy, it’s something you build - and collaboratively. 

“Viewing AI as a collaborative creation rather than a purchasable product and one that takes time and many data inputs, will allow CSPs to harness its full potential, customising solutions to meet unique needs and drive growth. This approach fosters continuous innovation, helping CSPs to stay competitive.”

However, for this to occur, Angus says they need to shift their perspective on AI and fully embrace its capabilities.

The role of CSPs in AI-driven digital transformation in telecoms

When it comes to digital transformation and the road to AI oriented business models, there is a common agreement in the telecoms industry that CSPs are at the forefront of this journey. Profit is a key driver and AI is becoming increasingly popular because it enhances traditional processes and acts as an upgrade, ultimately benefiting CSPs. 

“According to a recent survey by McKinsey, involving over 130 telecoms companies, significant cost reductions were attributed to the use of AI, particularly in customer service and network operations,” says Angus. “However, this is not always the case. Many CSPs have seen a decline in profit performance over the past few years, leading the global telecoms market to experience a 9.7% revenue drop in 2022. The reason being that some CSPs still operate within the constraints of manual processes, limited data analytics and traditional service models. Their operations are characterised by slower innovation cycles, less personalised customer engagement and fragmented technology infrastructures.”

This doesn't imply that CSPs will be unprofitable if AI didn’t exist. However, with evolving challenges and emerging issues identified through data, there is a need for a facilitator to address these gaps and fortify the structure.

“Since the core idea of AI is to refine traditional methods and make them more efficient and technologically advanced, let's break this down with a tangible example,” Angus continues. “The agriculture sector has been operating with the same methodologies and processes for decades. However, we are now in an era with significant demand for increased food production and a need for suppliers and farmers to adopt sustainable practices.”

Farmers are eager to adopt new technologies and modernise their operations to balance this process. This incorporation of technology into farming is commonly known as 'precision agriculture’. According to Mckinsey, 39% of farmers globally use or are planning to use at least one form of technology by 2025.

“However, integrating these advanced technologies is not without challenges, including the adoption of new systems, insufficient infrastructure, high upfront investments, a shortage of technical expertise, and the limited availability of customised agricultural technology solutions from CSPs,” he says. “AI alone does not instantly solve these problems but when combined with other components, it becomes a powerful tool that can help CSPs accelerate the deployment of precision agriculture solutions. Over the last few years, CSPs have been working on such offerings for vertical sectors. They have been merging the high bandwidth and low latency of 5G with Multi-Access Edge Computing for real-time data processing and collaborating with partners that offer specialised solutions such as drone or robotics technologies.”

However, immediate and decisive actions need to be taken for this transformation to occur.

How CSPs can accelerate AI adoption

AI might be a strategic priority for CSPs, but many hesitate to take it a step further. This reluctance is often due to dissatisfaction with either their current AI progress or the absence of a clear roadmap to follow.

“The telecoms industry is on the cusp of a significant digital transformation in the coming years. To speed up AI adoption,” Angus says. 

CSPs need to:

• Understand the value that digital business platforms offer and how their model will benefit their plans and missions
• Upskill their current workforce through workshops and other forms of training. Having the appropriate understanding and knowledge of AI can help solve the current skills gap that is preventing many CSPs to adopt it. The UK government, through initiatives like the Innovate UK BridgeAI programme provides resources to help businesses develop the necessary AI competencies. 

“The AI journey is a collaborative one. CSPs should adopt a platform that can enable access to new revenue streams through collaboration and co-creation of joint offerings within the ecosystem,” he finishes. “Similarly, existing digital platforms need to provide robust, scalable solutions that support CSPs in this transformation. They should offer tools for ecosystem orchestration, automated fulfilment, and data-driven insights to enhance operational efficiency.”

By embracing these innovations, CSPs can position themselves for sustainable growth and long-term success in the evolving digital landscape.

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