Defining the future telco — and what it means for operators and their partners
STL Partners’ forecasts less than 1% annual growth for global telecom revenue from fixed and mobile services for 2019-2022. Our telecoms revenue forecast covers eight regions and 94 countries, and includes over 200 charts and a detailed spreadsheet.
Over-focus on 5G was a distraction from fundamental changes in the world economy that telcos should prioritise in their strategies, investments and actions. What are the opportunities, and what should telcos, vendors and the GSMA do about it?
Our predictions for 5G, based on our assessment of the opportunities and barriers it faces, including how and when it will impact different markets. Combined with other technologies and industry trends, 5G will change the shape of the industry, but not in the way that many expect.
In this report, we outline the potential roles and business models for telcos in blockchain ecosystems for digital identity and IoT, building on examples of how companies are already using blockchain to create value.
With Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC), telcos can move workloads and applications closer to customers, potentially enhancing experiences and enabling a plethora of new use cases. But with competition looming from other players, telcos need to start commercialising MEC. We have identified and modelled five viable telco business models.
Building a telco based on ‘free’ open source software is theoretically highly attractive to telcos, particularly those looking to increase their control over innovation and differentiation, and/or where cost reduction is critical. This report looks at how to address the challenges, identifies practical options and choices, and how, when and why to go about open source transformation in the real world.