From building blocks to smart platforms
Don Inglis, Telstra Wholesale’s Group Product Manager for Transmission, discusses how Wholesale is collaborating with customers to bring new solutions to market.
These are exciting times at Telstra Wholesale. As technology changes the way we live and work, we are changing too. We are building on our network expertise to create a range of new smart platforms that offer growth opportunities for our customers. To do so successfully, we are adopting an approach we call co-creation.
Co-creation is not a marketing buzzword with no tangible outputs; it is a fundamental shift in the way we develop new products and services. At its heart, co-creation is about collaboration to produce better solutions and services. Customers are now a vital part of our product development process and are seeing the benefits of co-creation in the design and functionality of solutions we are bringing to market.
Co-creating cloud connectivity
Our Cloud Access solution is one good example. When we began thinking about how to serve our customers’ need for cloud services, we anticipated a Telstra Wholesale Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) offering. Whilst performing early customer trials our Vendor decided to exit its IaaS product. We contemplated exiting Cloud development. However, what we did learn was that there was a very real, unmet need for a solution that would help customers connect to multiple cloud services in a simple, cost-effective way. Following our consultation, we pivoted our development and created the connectivity solution our customers needed. Feedback was crucial in enabling us to offer a compelling Cloud Access proposition, which we recently launched to market. Going forward, our ongoing collaboration with customers will help ensure that new features, and the platforms we connect to, match their requirements.
Extending the capabilities of Ethernet Access
Our approach to co-creating innovative platforms and services continues with the launch of some exciting new product trials including Wireless Ethernet and Business Voice over IP. Wireless Ethernet will provide more options for back-up and provisioning of our industry-leading Ethernet Access product. The first stage of the Wireless Ethernet trial focuses on back-up traffic using the mobile network before we turn our attention to extending the functionality to fast turn-up for Ethernet Access. We know the end game for customers is a layer two solution for Wireless Ethernet backup, fast turn-up and primary service. While this pilot is for a layer three solution, it will help guide us towards this longer term goal.
IP telephony solutions for businesses of all sizes
Business Voice over IP will become the go-to solution for business and enterprise voice services over the nbn network. It is an end-to-end package, which includes the access service, a SIP trunk, and Telstra’s IP Telephony platform. It enables customers to meet their end users’ voice needs while giving them control over migration to nbn and individual service functionality through an intuitive portal. We are trialling the service now ahead of a launch in November. We will target other accesses in a later launch.
Customer involvement in these trials is vital, and we are looking for participants to join right now. If you want to help co-create the technology platforms of the future, please get in touch with your account manager today.
