Case Briefing - 50 Billion connections in Network Society

The case briefing was done for the 16 teams today morning by Prof Venkat. It talked about the 50 billion connections in the Network Society. In today's society there are about 5.3 billion mobile subscribers of which one-tenth are smart phone users. It is expected that in the next 5 years, of the 5.3 billion mobile subscribers most will be using smart phones. This explosion in smart phone usage is going to drive data usage more aggressively and cause voice usage to drop significantly.

For many of the network providers to be competitive they need to more than just channels through which to send data. They need to stop acting as "dumb pipes" and provide more value service to customers. Today AT&T, Verizon and many of the top network providers are facing this challenge and are already seeing their market saturating in North America and Europe. For them to increase their revenue they need to target developing countries as well as find new ways to target customers in developed countries.

We are already seeing the converge of three industries - mobile + broadband + cloud. This new industry would be the industry of industries and would revolutionize the IT and telecom companies. It would provide value to transportation, logistics, retail and utility companies.

Ericsson's challenge remains that they want to be at the convergence point of mobile + broadband + cloud. They clearly understand they are leaders in the 1st two industries but are still learning about the cloud market, as its' in its infancy. Also the building blocks are in place, such as LTE/4G will provide them better mobile and broadband coverage.

Some of the questions posed to the participants was how would Ericsson capitalize globally, keeping the above information in mind, in the Healthcare and SmartGrid markets in the next 5 years. What should they do next? That the million dollar question we all want answered!!