It’s one thing to understand the technical challenge of combined IP and Optical network management– but it’s quite another to quantify the business benefits. Appledore recently completed an extensive, independent, business benefits analysis for deployment of an IP/Optical network automation software platform, NetFusion from Sedona Systems. The process is worth understanding because no matter how smart, technical innovation alone doesn’t make a business case. The reality is that in telecom the return-on-investment proposition for “don’t change anything” can often look pretty strong to a corporate Finance team. It is essential for start-ups and other innovators to understand how to relate their technical innovations to the real operational and business metrics of a CSP. The case for new (or redirected) investment must be evaluated and justified against a model of a CSP’s current and future operations in detail, and with credible baseline of typical data. Our analysis for Sedona is based on decades of experience working with and for CSPs, understanding their processes and typical metrics for everything from provisioning time to the cost of truck rolls. As networks become more complex, additional human intervention is a critical area of cost to try and avoid. But it is only one part […]