MCI INTERVIEW MCI INTERVIEW

a direct responsibility for the customer experience. And that’s about results, not process. I saw so many interesting things but I had to dig to find out what they were all about. And I suspect that a lot of exhibitors don’t get the traffic they could be getting because they’re sending out a message that’s aimed at the wrong audience.” It was impossible to miss the

focus on embedded technology and the ‘internet of things’ at MWC and Johnston, like many within the indus- try, is alive to the opportunities that this movement presents. Specifically, he says, carriers can offer “incred- ible value” by enabling billing and charging for the multitude of devices that will become connected over the next decade. He references the Kindle model, through which the consum- ers don’t have a direct relationship with the organisation that provides the connectivity (AT&T) but the or- ganisation that provides the service (Amazon) does.

Best in show

Garret Johnston visited 117 stands at this year’s mobile world congress. Of those companies, only six were able to tell him in simple terms how their product or service could improve the consumer experience and thereby the MTS offering. With a little more digging, though, Johnston was able to unearth a total of 46 companies which had products that excited him. To find out which companies they were, visit www.telecoms.com.

This could be a major opportunity,

he says, and one that could be en- hanced by carriers looking to cooper- ate in areas that have previously been key competitive differentiators. “So far ‘coopetition’ between operators has been limited to handsets, stand- ards alliances, procurements and network sharing, that kind of thing,” he says. “But it would make sense for operators to cooperate on things like payment systems and clearing houses for the same reason that it made sense in the beginning to have network interoperability on voice. It’s

a logical extension of that thinking, and that’s an agenda that we’re going to push here in Russia very strongly in the next 24 months.” But as much as being driven by

opportunity, it seems, Johnston is aware of the defensive benefits of adapting business models and work- ing practices. “We as operators have an inherent competitive advantage because of who we are and where we are today,” he says. “But we could easily be disintermediated if we don’t hurry up and get our act together.” n

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