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Tata SNO!

Thursday, 02 February 2006 00:00 Written by Mariette Du Plessis

There`s a big difference between `can` and `will`, hat if the SNO can`t resist borrowing the blueprint for its SA operations from equity partner Tata? SINCE LITTLE proper news is forthcoming from South Africa`s Second National Operator (SNO), let`s play devil`s advocate for a moment. What if it could rely on more than just technical support from its equity partner, the Tata Group of India? What if it borrowed its telecommunications blueprint? If at all possible, that would give it lots of room to move.

For starters, the SNO`s core strategy would then be to become an integrated enterprise communications player in Africa, leveraging strengths in both telecoms and information technology.

It would enter the market, perhaps as early as April, by targeting large enterprises with sizeable telecoms spend and offer them customised, end-to-end voice and data solutions. In fact, this could be the SNO`s primary differentiator during the first 18 months, becoming a one-stop voice and data shop with a single point of contact to service all its customers` comms requirements.

After all, it is the ability to service this need that decides the success of any telecom venture, new or incumbent.

To this end, the SNO would adopt a threefold go-to-market strategy. Firstly, it would focus on adding value by offering managed data and voice services. Secondly, with a view to meet SA`s current and future bandwidth needs, it would commit to increasing bandwidth availability in the country. And lastly, it would offer customised telecoms solutions to help companies optimise their use of existing telecoms infra-structure.

To deliver on this strategy, the SNO would need two principal business units: a Teleservices Unit (let`s call it SNO-Teleservices) that offers basic and cellular services and an Enterprise Business Unit (what the heck - SNO-EBU), offering managed bandwidth services (managed data and voice solutions).

Managed data and voice services, in fact, could be the SNO`s core value proposition - moving customers onto a managed bandwidth platform, thus providing the efficiencies of operations.

On the SNO`s list of end-to-end managed services would be, among others, managed voice minutes, domestic and international ATM/MPLS services, customer premises equipment (CPE) management, managed , disaster recovery and business continuity planning (DR & BCP) services, etc.

As for the overall services bouquet from the SNO, expect an array of tele-phony, data and voice offerings.

On the telephony side, for example, services will include wholesale connectivity services (voice and data), basic telephony services, fixed-line, mobile, fixed wireless telephony, broadband and wireline ISP services.

Its voice-based value added services will include a voice portal, roaming, three-way conferencing and Closed User Group (CUG), while data-based value added services will include WiFi Internet services, international IP-VPN, broadband access services, Internet gateway services and wireless data services such as downloading of ringtones, wallpapers and games through its data portal.

And this would be a good start.

Other things it could bring to market sooner rather than later could include prepaid fixed wireless phones, multimedia handsets, expanded WiFi across public hotspots, new voice and data services such as on-demand multimedia and interactive applications like news, cricket, astrology, etc.

In fact, we may see `s BlackBerry being challenged by Ego, a nifty Bluetooth-enabled pocket PC that comes with an inbuilt camera and video recorder and allows video streaming. This handset also allows all office applications such as Word, Excel, etc.

The SNO would also be very bullish about its basic wireless services, and lay greater emphasis on limited mobility WLL (wireless local loop) everywhere it intends to launch operations.

The basic idea would be for the SNO to cater to the mass market with wireline, cellular, fixed wireless terminal and broadband services, and to tap the enterprise space by offering end-to-end managed voice solutions and a combination of competitive international long distance, managed infrastructure and ISP services.

Additionally, it is likely to be aggressive on pricing of its services. The key for the SNO would be to offer multiple flexi-tariff plans for all segments of the market, that is right from low-end and mid-level high-end users of its WLL service. We may also see bundling of various value-added services within the various WLL tariffs.

In such a scenario, the future of telecoms in South Africa is looking bright indeed. But will the SNO take its cue from strategic equity partner Tata/VNSL?

When senior SNO officials tell a journalist to "look at Tata`s strategy in India and you`ll know what we can do"... perhaps they intend to. But as I said, there`s a big difference between `can` and `will`.