Author: Gary Barton

As an analyst on the Current Analysis Business Network and IT Services team, Gary covers Business Telecoms Services for the UK and Ireland, with a particular interest in SME and public sector services. Gary’s responsibilities include updating and maintaining Current Analysis’s competitor assessments for the major telecoms companies operating in the UK and on a Pan-European basis.

AI-Powered Network Portals: SLMs, Proactive Observability, and Root Cause Analysis

by Gary Barton, posted in Network
Research Director, Enterprise Technology and Services

Summary Bullets:

  • Multiple small language models (SLMs) are likely to be more affective than one big large language model (LLM).
  • AI can offer proactive root cause analysis informed by multiple data sources.

Agentic AI has dominated the tech headlines in recent months and was the hot topic at this year’s MWC event in Barcelona (Spain). The technology will play a significant role in revolutionizing indirect sales and customer support processes across pretty much all verticals. It can also play a major part in one of the most important challenges facing telcos at the moment: automating their networks.

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BT’s Launch of Global Fabric Platform Has Not Answered the Question: Is BT Still Global?

by Gary Barton, posted in Big Data, Cloud Enable, Communicate
Gary Barton – Analyst, Business Network and IT Services

Summary Bullets:

  • BT’s comments on its global future have been at best uncertain and have left significant room for speculation that a divestment is coming.
  • BT also has plenty of reason to hang on to the BT Global division, including around 1,000 MNC customers, and it is investing in delivering global network-as-a-service (NaaS) capabilities from 140 PoPs.

Speculation over the future of the multinational corporation (MNC) unit BT Global (formerly BT Global Services) is not new. But recent comments in its financial results, for the year ending March 31, 2024, have set the fires of speculation a roaring once more. Speculation has been further stoked by a BT Focus 2024 analyst event that was both very UK-focused and again non-committal beyond several suggestions that it is exploring its options.* The winds of global competition are certainly blowing against service providers and that BT absolutely must consider its future go-to-market approach, but, despite a few missteps, BT has also been one of the more global service providers.

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BT’s AI Partnership with AWS Brings Internal Benefits and Suggests a Path to Enterprise Facing AI Relevance for Telcos

by Gary Barton, posted in Big Data, Cloud Enable, IT Leader
Gary Barton – Analyst, Business Network and IT Services

Summary Bullets:

• BT’s partnership with AWS gives internal BT divisional stakeholders a flexible path to generative AI (genAI) that should lead to customer-facing benefits and operational efficiencies.

• There is potential for the model used for this partnership to be adapted into an enterprise genAI solution with BT playing an aggregator role.

BT has announced the launch of BT GenAI Gateway, an internal genAI and large language model (LLM) platform delivered based on AWS technology. The solution has been built in partnership between BT and AWS, is hosted in AWS infrastructure, and makes use of AWS’ Amazon Bedrock (API access to genAI) and Amazon SageMaker (machine learning tools) solutions. Via the Bedrock platform, BT will have access to genAI foundation models (FMs) from companies such as AI21 Labs, Anthropic, Cohere, Meta, Mistral AI, Stability AI, and, naturally, Amazon itself.

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Colt and Proximus’s Wholesale API Trial Highlights the Importance of Industry Standards Bodies in Achieving Automation

by Gary Barton, posted in IT Leader, Network

Gary Barton – Analyst, Business Network and IT Services

Summary Bullets:
• Colt and Proximus partner for a proof of concept (PoC) focusing on API collaboration based on the MEF’s Lifecycle Service Orchestration Sonata designed to enhance carrier-to-carrier automation.
• GlobalData expects wholesale providers to embrace API technology to enhance and automate inter-network functionality with the end target of delivering automated end-to-end services across multi-vendor networks.

Colt Technology Services and Proximus recently announced they have collaborated to trial a new PoC designed to enhance carrier-to-carrier automation. The collaboration was the first of its kind between the two providers and focused on provisioning network services between the UK and Belgium. The crucial aspect of the trial is that it was able to support Proximus’ Wholesale E-Access service and Colt’s On Demand Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) platform across both networks on an end-to-end basis.

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Telcos Need to Define Their Own Role Within the AI Value Chain

by Gary Barton, posted in IT Leader
G. Barton
G. Barton Research Director

Summary Bullets:

• Telcos can use AI both internally and in customer facing-roles to achieve differentiation.

• There is an opportunity for telcos to help enterprises adopt AI and become AI enablers – both for large enterprises and the SMB market.

“Nobody knows how AI will impact networks!” so said the CEO of one of the world’s largest telecoms technology vendors at a recent industry event. In this statement lies the potential opportunity and the potential challenge for telcos in becoming major players in the AI boom.

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What Should Enterprises Look for in a Managed Services Provider?

by Gary Barton, posted in IT Leader

Gary Barton – Analyst, Business Network and IT Services

Summary Bullets:
• Technology complexity and skills shortages are leading more enterprises to look towards managed network and security solutions

• Enterprises should look for flexible, reliable providers who can offer a full range of managed and professional services from day zero to day two

GlobalData’s conversations with enterprises over the last two years have highlighted a growing trend towards managed network services – a trend that is borne out by GlobalData’s Market Opportunity Forecasts. This trend is true even among large and multinational enterprises in the US who have traditionally favored a DIY approach. Enterprises have indicated multiple reasons for this move, primary among which are complexity and skills shortages.

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Colt’s Completed Lumen EMEA Asset Grab Gives it Scale to be a New Force in the Enterprise and Wholesale Markets

by Gary Barton, posted in Network
Gary Barton – Analyst, Business Network and IT Services

Summary Bullets:

• The acquisition doubles Colt’s EMEA network capacity, gives it 10+ subsea cable systems and landing stations, and cements its position as a leading partner for hyperscalers in the region.

• Colt has achieved growth and stability through a laser-tight market focus – the scale of this acquisition will challenge that stability.

GlobalData previously covered Colt’s acquisition of Lumen’s EMEA assets when the deal was first announced (for more, please see: Colt to Acquire Lumen’s EMEA Assets, Significantly Driving Its Growth Trajectory and Edge Strategy, November 9, 2022). This blog provides an update now that the deal has been completed.

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MWC 2023: Nokia Rebrands as Nokia, but with a B2B Twist  

by Gary Barton, posted in IT Leader
G. Barton
G. Barton Research Director

Summary Bullets:

• Nokia’s rebrand is designed to move further away from its mobile device and, to a lesser extent, CSP infrastructure heritage as well as to better position it to appeal to enterprise customers.

• Nokia has identified key medium and long-term trends and how it can play a role, but its B2B strategy needs to be more clearly defined.

Deciding to alter a brand as established as Nokia is not an easy decision, but the solutions vendor has done just that. At the start of 2023’s MWC event in Barcelona (Spain), the vendor has launched a new logo – albeit still with the same name. Nokia’s rational for doing this is clear and understandable: As recognizable as the blue Nokia logo is, it is also irrevocably associated with the company’s heritage as the dominant player in the pre-smartphone mobile handset market.

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Digital-First Customer Experience Adds the Next Layer of Intelligence in Customer Contact

by Gary Barton, posted in Communicate
G. Barton
G. Barton Research Director

Summary Bullets:

  • Enterprises should consider the digital-first customer experience as a central pillar of their transformation strategies building on the work of omnichannel.
  • Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) tools can unlock greater value, reduce costs, and improve the customer journey.

The internet and smartphone have driven a phenomenal pace of change in the way that customers interact with businesses since 2008. Multichannel evolved to accommodate the new channels of contact such as instant messaging, SMS, social media, and mobile apps that have become available to customers alongside voice.

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Need to be Sustainable and Efficient? Look to IoT, AI, and the Edge

by Gary Barton, posted in IT Leader
G. Barton
G. Barton Research Director

Summary Bullets:

• Even if the macro-economic environment has made sustainability less of a focus, enterprises cannot ignore the need to collect data and be efficient.

• Efficiency and sustainability require an interconnected and integrated ecosystem of technologies.

The impact of inflation and a tightening global economy have realigned the priorities of many enterprises. One of the ‘victims’ of this shift in priorities has been ESG. While ESG remains important to enterprises (remaining in the top five of the key themes impacting businesses in 2023), it has slipped behind factors such as trade disputes, digital transformation, and regulatory compliance.

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