CSPs have prioritised the consumer market for many years as these services have made up the bulk of their revenues. However, profit margins for consumer services are in decline, which is leading to more CSPs turning their attention to the enterprise market. 5G is a key driver for this move as it will enable new services in a range of verticals, bringing new opportunities to increase revenues and market share. But it’s not all about 5G – the B2B market already offers plenty of 4G opportunities for CSPs looking to boost their profits.
However, CSPs that try to use their consumer BSS stack to monetise their enterprise services will see limited returns on this big opportunity. Here are our top five BSS capabilities for CSPs looking to target the enterprise market in 2022:
1. Enterprise-ready agility
The enterprise market is extremely complex. It is characterised by solution-based, customised and negotiated sales, often involving multiple stakeholders. Traditional consumer BSS stacks were designed to fulfil a static set of requirements, so they may lack the agility and flexibility necessary to support enterprise use cases. If a CSP plans to offer basic B2B services that are similar to their current B2C services, this won’t be a problem, but as their enterprise offerings become more sophisticated, they will reach a tipping point where their BSS just won’t be able to cope.
2. The ability to test new business models
B2C BSS stacks were designed to be used with traditional business models, such as subscription or consumption-based plans. However, these models are too simplistic for many enterprise use cases, particularly those built on 5G. The beauty of 5G is that it enables CSPs to build services that meet their enterprise customers’ exact requirements for speed, latency and so on, so CSPs need to be able to charge for the true value of these services, which may be based on QoS guarantees and network slice usage.
3. The freedom to test and launch new services quickly
There is no one killer use case for 5G, so in order to extract the maximum value from their investment, CSPs must be able to experiment so that they can determine which new services are the most lucrative. They must then be able to launch these new services quickly, ideally within a matter of days, before the window of revenue opportunity closes, or a competitor gets in there first.
4. The ability to bundle together new and traditional services
These new services will be radically different from traditional telco services, such as fixed line and mobile, yet CSPs will need to be able to bundle them together with their existing services. They will also need to be able to bundle together a range of non-telco services, which may include hardware, such as handsets and printers, software, such as Microsoft 365 licences, and other services, such as hosting and security.
5. Enterprise self-service
CSPs have crafted seamless digital experiences for their consumer customers, with most able to check their balance, buy bolt-ons and change their credit limit or tariff via a simple app. Enterprise customers, on the other hand, must contact their account manager or email their CSP whenever they want to make even a small change, such as enabling roaming for a particular user, or redistributing allowances between users. Enabling B2B self-serve experiences increases customer satisfaction and spend, whilst enabling the CSP to cut costs by reducing the number of customer service agents they employ.
In order to serve the enterprise market effectively and to generate the maximum returns on their 5G investment, CSPs need a digital BSS designed specifically for the enterprise market and that comes with the above capabilities as standard. MDS Global’s B2BonDemand BSS-as-a-Service fits the bill perfectly. Designed specifically for enterprise service providers, B2BonDemand has been tried and tested in the B2B divisions of leading Tier 1 service providers, including as BT, Telefónica O2 and TalkTalk Business.