Author: Alfie Amir

Alfie Amir is a senior analyst in Current Analysis Group. He is responsible for research, consulting and analysis focusing on market and technology trends, competitive analysis and account-based intelligence for ICT spending and modeling future investments. He also works across several trackers (e.g., fixed, mobile and IT) providing market sizing, forecasts and insights across the region. Alfie is quoted regularly in trade press and is a regular speaker at conferences, workshops and other industry events.

Will Maxis’ New Enterprise Strategy Work?

by Alfie Amir, posted in Communicate, Internet of Things, IT Leader, Mobilize, Network
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Maxis redefined its enterprise strategy to grow its business in the managed services market.
  • The provider needs to tackle the real needs of enterprises instead of just replicating best practices.

The practice of consumer telcos entering the enterprise managed service market is not uncommon, especially for telcos playing in a mature market. Telcos are looking to expand their revenue streams, as business from the traditional services (e.g., data, broadband, voice) is no longer growing. Maxis, a leading consumer mobile provider in Malaysia, started this journey as early as 2010, although the consumer mobile market was still growing at that time and there was no critical need for the service provider to look for new business areas. The move was mainly driven by technology leadership, following ‘best practice’ from other global leaders at that time. Today, while the provider is still playing in the enterprise managed service market, the driver has shifted from technology leadership/innovation to a real need to grow revenue in the segment and hence the overall business. Without much success in the past (with only 1.4% growth in 2017 and 3.1% decline in 2018), Maxis recently shared its new strategy to grow its enterprise service (managed services, cloud and IoT) by threefold in five years, focusing on leveraging connectivity assets and replicating industry best practice. While the strategy looks promising, will it work for Maxis in the Malaysia market? Continue reading “Will Maxis’ New Enterprise Strategy Work?” →

Regulation Change Did Not Impact Telekom Malaysia’s Overall 2018 Business Performance, but Pushed TM to Accelerate Its Transformation

by Alfie Amir, posted in Communicate, IT Leader
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Telekom Malaysia (TM) survived a challenging 2018 with stable business performance despite a huge decline in net profit.
  • TM is expected to bounce back in 2019 with growth in enterprise, driven by PIP 2019 and a vertical focus.

2018 was a challenging year for telcos in Malaysia. The Mandatory Standard on Access Pricing (MSAP), set by the new government, has pushed down connectivity prices in the country. As the domestic fixed-line market leader with a connection share of 66% (source: GlobalData Malaysia Telecom Forecast Q4 2018), Telekom Malaysia was heavily impacted by this new regulation. The provider had to reduce its connectivity service price by around 40% whilst offering up to 10 times the speed for some of its packages in order to meet the new regulation. As a result, credit rating agencies such as Fitch revised the company’s outlook from ‘stable’ to ‘negative’ and the S&P changed TM’s profile from ‘intermediate’ to ‘modest’ last year. Its share price went down by 57.0%, from RM6.18 (at the beginning of 2018) to only RM2.66 at the end of the year. (It has gone back up since November and closed at RM3.18 on March 8, 2019.) Continue reading “Regulation Change Did Not Impact Telekom Malaysia’s Overall 2018 Business Performance, but Pushed TM to Accelerate Its Transformation” →

telkomtelstra Takes Multivendor Approach with Its SD-WAN Offerings to Address Diverse Market Needs

by Alfie Amir, posted in IT Leader, Network
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • As one of the first providers to offer SD-WAN in Indonesia, telkomtelstra has the early-mover advantage to capture the early SD-WAN adopters.
  • Its multivendor strategy addresses the diverse needs of around 30 million enterprises in the country.

Backed by Telkom Indonesia (the Indonesian telco with the largest market share in the country) and Telstra (the Australian incumbent carrier, which is expanding rapidly in Asia-Pacific and globally), telkomtelstra started its operation in 2015 focusing on the managed services market in Indonesia. Within only three years, the provider has rapidly expanded its portfolio and customer base. It now offers managed network services, security, UC&C and cloud solutions. The provider also offers various security consulting services such as advisory and assessments. For more, please see GlobalData’s telkomtelstra company assessment from November 27, 2018. Continue reading “telkomtelstra Takes Multivendor Approach with Its SD-WAN Offerings to Address Diverse Market Needs” →

TM Forum Digital Transformation Asia 2018: CenturyLink Strengthens Asia-Pacific Business

by Alfie Amir, posted in Cloud Enable, IT Leader, Network, Secure
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • CenturyLink expands and enhances its portfolio in Asia-Pacific to challenge other carriers and grab the growing opportunity.
  • However, there are still gaps with its competitors, especially in portfolio and presence in the region.

At the TM Forum Digital Transformation Asia 2018 in Malaysia earlier this month, CenturyLink shared its direction to strengthen its presence and expand the business in Asia-Pacific. The move is in line with its global expansion strategy announced this year at its annual Analyst Forum. In Asia-Pacific, CenturyLink has over 2,000 employees, on-net presence in 12 countries and sales presence in six key markets (i.e., Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan and Singapore). With the existing resources in the region, the carrier plays to its strength by focusing on inbound MNCs as well as Asian-based enterprises expanding beyond the region. It focuses in certain verticals, including OTT/content, media, entertainment, financial services, energy and utilities, retail and manufacturing sectors. Continue reading “TM Forum Digital Transformation Asia 2018: CenturyLink Strengthens Asia-Pacific Business” →

TM Forum Digital Transformation Asia 2018: No Longer Optional for Asian Carriers

by Alfie Amir, posted in Communicate, IT Leader
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Digital transformation is no longer an option for emerging market carriers today.
  • It is not just about adopting new technologies. Carriers must also transform to drive sustainable change.

This year’s TM Forum Asia event took place in Malaysia on November 13-15 with ‘digital transformation’ as the main theme. While the topic is not new in the industry, it is actually the right time in Asia. For many years, carriers have been offering enterprise solutions such as cloud, mobility, UC&C, and IoT and positioning themselves as digital transformation enablers in the market. However, many carriers in the emerging Asia markets are still quite behind with their internal journeys. These carriers are still stuck with their legacy infrastructures, processes, and mindset. Continue reading “TM Forum Digital Transformation Asia 2018: No Longer Optional for Asian Carriers” →

Xpand: Can the Provider Expand?

by Alfie Amir, posted in Communicate
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

• Xpand is Axiata’s enterprise arm providing network-based services to Asian regional enterprises.

• There is still a big gap between Xpand and other regional/global carriers.

You may have heard of Axiata, but most likely not Xpand. Axiata is a telecom group with stakes in eight countries across emerging Asian markets (Celcom, Malaysia; XL, Indonesia; Dialog, Sri Lanka; Robi, Bangladesh; Smart, Cambodia; Ncell, Nepal; Idea, India; and M1, Singapore); while Xpand is the carrier’s regional enterprise arm providing network-based services such as connectivity, cloud, UC, mobilitym and IoT. Xpand positions itself as a one-stop shop for all communication solutions to MNCs and regional enterprises in Asia, This places the provider in the same market with other Asian and global carriers such as Singtel, NTT Communications, Tata Communications, Telstra, VGE, PCCW Global, and Bharti Airtel. Continue reading “Xpand: Can the Provider Expand?” →

Anti-Bot as Additional Protection Layer in IoT

by Alfie Amir, posted in Internet of Things, Secure
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Security remains a key inhibitor in IoT, driven by the convergence of IT and OT.
  • IoT providers should consider bundling anti-bot offerings into their IoT solution as an additional protection layer.

Security and privacy have been the key topics in IoT. They are also the main inhibitors slowing down IoT adoptions by enterprises. As seen in the figure below, GlobalData IoT research conducted in 2017 with 281 Asian enterprises showed that security and privacy were the second and fourth biggest challenges for them with their IoT deployments. Continue reading “Anti-Bot as Additional Protection Layer in IoT” →

Amdocs Microservices360 Gives Service Providers the Flexibility to Expand Their Enterprise ICT Portfolios Modularly

by Alfie Amir, posted in Cloud Enable, Internet of Things
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Amdocs Microservices360 gives carriers the flexibility to expand their enterprise portfolio modularly and offer integration between services.
  • he platform has various microservices and supports the latest technologies, such as open source, DevOps, pipeline automation and cloud deployment.

Amdocs shared Microservices360 and other solutions at its recent Asia-Pacific event (for more about the event, please see: “Amdocs APAC Summit 2018: Enabling Carriers to Drive Enterprise Digital Transformation,” July 23, 2018). Microservices360 supports open source technologies, the DevOps lifecycle and Red Hat OpenShift for CI/CD pipeline automation and flexible deployment (on-premises or cloud). The microservices include catalogue, order, payment and partner management. While the focus has been on carriers’ consumer segments, the platform can also enable carriers to expand and enhance their enterprise portfolios. Continue reading “Amdocs Microservices360 Gives Service Providers the Flexibility to Expand Their Enterprise ICT Portfolios Modularly” →

Inmarsat: Filling IoT Coverage Gaps for ‘Always On’ Applications

by Alfie Amir, posted in Internet of Things
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Satellite providers have key roles to drive IoT market especially in filling the coverage gaps in remote areas
  • Satellites are mainly used for backhaul network, not so practical as the last mile access due to its technical limitations such as latency and physical dimensions

While some satellite providers are entering the IoT space and compete against the mobile operators (for more, please see Cable and Satellite Companies Pushing into IoT: Can They Win Against Mobile Operators?, July 6, 2018) other satellite providers such as Inmarsat are partnering with carriers to fill the IoT coverage gaps in areas beyond cellular network can reach offshore oilrigs, airplanes in transit, remote environmental monitoring, and vehicle and people tracking. Based on GlobalData’s IoT Deployment Database, there are more than 100 satellite-based IoT deployments tracked, with an installed base that almost doubled in the last two years. This also reflects the IoT market trend shown by GlobalData IoT Project Insight 2017 (n=924) where 17% of IoT deployments today are on fleet management (the third highest after equipment management and building management). In some cases, the satellite network is also used in cellular areas, but offered as network diversity to offer higher availability for mission critical applications such as payment terminals in petrol stations. Continue reading “Inmarsat: Filling IoT Coverage Gaps for ‘Always On’ Applications” →

Bosch IoT: Strong Potential in Manufacturing, a Huge and Rapidly Growing Sector in Asia-Pacific

by Alfie Amir, posted in Internet of Things
A. Amir

Summary Bullets:

  • Bosch has strong potential in manufacturing, automotive, and transportation sectors, which are the high-growth verticals in Asia-Pacific.
  • The provider needs to expand its cloud partners and strengthen its security solution to address the main IoT challenges of Asian enterprises in those sectors.

Bosch is not the first name you would think of when talking about IoT or even in a wider ICT topic. The brand is more synonymous with industrial equipment and household appliances. However, with 6.2 million IoT connections and more than 250 deployments, Bosch is considered as one of the key players in IoT space. It started its initiatives in IoT as early as 2008, when the company acquired Innovations Software Technology. Fast forward to 2018, Bosch Software Innovations has acquired three companies to expand its IoT capability, launched Bosch IoT Suite (available on third-party clouds) and Bosch IoT Cloud, and opened its IoT Lab and IoT Campus. Continue reading “Bosch IoT: Strong Potential in Manufacturing, a Huge and Rapidly Growing Sector in Asia-Pacific” →