StraightTalk


Succinct, incisive, and challenging insights and analysis from Ovum's global analyst team.


We welcome your suggestions, questions, and comments. You can reach us at straighttalk@ovum.com. You can also chat with us on Twitter at @OvumICT and at our LinkedIn group.
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Telcos not out of the woods yet after another flat quarter

Preliminary 1Q13 results for service providers are in. Price pressures, tough regulations, and new competition persist. But making an early move to new technology platforms, while expensive, does help deliver revenue growth. Big Data analytics and application enablement are important too.
Matt Walker

Telcos get many things right on innovation, but often miss the big picture

An opinion piece that provides insights on how telcos innovate and introduces Ovum's "net innovation benefit" metric.
Emeka Obiodu

Big Data analytics and the telco: a big headache or a cure for all ills?

Big Data analytics provides an opportunity for telcos to exploit an existing asset that is increasing in size exponentially. This asset is the telcos’ network, operational, and customer data, which can be mined to provide better business insights. Ovum's new report, Big Data Analytics and the Telco: How telcos can monetize customer data, is the first in a series of reports examining how telcos are using Big Data to improve customer experience and increase their revenues.
Clare McCarthy

FTTH Council Asia Pacific: monetization takes the stage

The focus of the second day of the FTTH Council Asia Pacific Conference was monetization and service differentiation. This Council can boast given the number of Asia-Pacific countries with significant FTTH networks under deployment.
Julie Kunstler

Oracle’s CX portfolio gathers pace, increases reach beyond the enterprise

At the Oracle Industry Analyst World conference (April 2013), Oracle executives updated analysts on the development and tighter integration of its CX portfolio following the acquisitions of best-of-breed applications. Oracle is executing fast and building momentum, and large organizations grappling with the customer experience should take a look at what Oracle has to offer.
Jeremy Cox

ConteXtream gets a jump on SDN revenues

Nothing seems to attract more attention in the networking market than mentioning “software-defined networking (SDN)” and “deployment” in the same sentence. So, ConteXtream should get a lot of attention after recently announcing a large-scale commercial deployment of its SDN solution with a US-based tier-1 wireless operator.
David Krozier

BT’s cost transformation strategy enters a new phase

BT recently held its 2012/13 annual result briefing for analysts at the BT Centre in London. Customer service delivery, cost transformation, and investment for the future were at the heart of all of its presentations.
Adaora Okeleke

Global spend on cloud-based integration platforms to touch $3.7bn by 2018

Ovum estimates that the share of cloud-based integration platforms in the global spend on integration middleware will increase from about 7% in 2012 to about 20% by the end of 2018.
Saurabh Sharma

Mobile app development takes center stage as BYOD adoption increases

The shift to mobile, enabling enterprises to harness the fast pace of technological progress in consumer electronics, has profound implications for the application development community.
Michael Azoff

Al Gore and Ovum focus on wholesale partnerships at ITW 2013

Al Gore and Ovum described the basis and value of partnerships in wholesale markets at International Telecoms Week 2013.
Paris Burstyn