Indian telecom story not ready for slowdown!

Indian telecom story not ready for slowdown!

Sudhir Narang, managing director, BT India

Jatinder Singh

Monday, December 29, 2008

VnD: What are your views on the current meltdown in the industry?

Sudhir Narang: BT believes that it is very important that businesses and governments' strategies are not derailed by the current economic climate. We must continue to create sustainable value. As the BT CEO Ian Livingston says "You don't look at 18 months of recession when you make decisions about 18-20 year investments." This definitely calls for a relook at more robust and resilient global financial system, so that such crises does not occour again, this definitely is a man made catastrophy. A new system should have risk management at the top and be moulded to reform and take global economies in their march to the next frontier.

VnD: TRAI, in a recently held summit said that the Indian Telecom industry has strong enough to grow in this period of slowdown. What is your take on that? Do you think that the slowdown would create any impact on the Indian telecom industry? And what would be the reasons?

SN:I have every reason to believe that the Indian telecom story is not ready for a slowdown, we are yet to tap the mammoth potential at the base of the pyramid through rural telephony, M commerce is just gaining acceptance and the data market is steadily gaining shape. In terms of subscribers, it is matter of months before India steps into pole position in terms of subscribers globally. What should not be construed as a slowdown is the maturity of markets in metros and Tier 1 cities. While subscriber numbers have slowed there has been a rapid rise in the use of value added services.

In our business of voice & data connectivity through managed services, customers have realized that communication services is a major ingredient in their competitiveness and are relooking at the way they manage that, we are happy to note that the blur between Network & IT is gaining increasing awareness and many CIO's/CTO's are reaching out to BT to help them manage technology and communication more effectively through convergence. A Networked IT Solutions company provides the next-generation solutions that address the blurring of the traditional boundaries between Network and IT services.

In today's globalized economy, IT services are becoming increasingly dependant on networks to deliver processes and applications. On the other hand, communication services are shifting to application-based platforms to enable collaboration beyond both geographical and functional boundaries. The resulting integration of network and IT based services will require a new breed of service organization which can address these new merging requirements.

VnD: What are the new business models and initiatives that need to be taken care of from telecom companies and vendors in this period of slowdown? What would be the major challenges?

In such situations, disruptive innovation and innovation in general leads to new operating models, on a broader based platform Outsourcing is the general answer. In the Network IT industry, companies are now embracing concepts like SAAS, pay- per use/click model, Virtualisation, Cloud computing etc. The answer lies in Innovation.

BT has branded itself to be a Business Operator: With our resilient and far-reaching global IP platform (21CN) and innovative IT solutions, we aim to help India Multinational companies with their non-core but mission critical business needs (communications & IT) so that they can focus on their core business. We have the financial resources, track record and momentum to be our customers/ potential customers' long term partner.

VnD:As an organization, how exactly this slowdown has affected your growth plans, profits and business objectives? What kind of growth do you foresee by the next fiscal?

India has been performing very well, recording 40% growth, and has a target of generating $20-50 billion in the next year. India across APAC is leading the rest of the pack. As a result of the economic downturn, more customers are looking to further reduce costs through business process improvements, creating new opportunities for BT Global Services. Our customers, like ourselves, will focus on their core business and seek to outsource their non-core activities, not only to control costs but also to help them win in their markets.

They need to address strategic business issues such as leveraging the global economy, creating a flexible, agile workforce, collaborate closely with all their key stakeholders and become more sustainable. We are looking at helping our customers as we work with them to unlock the hidden values with focus on business outcomes by focusing on the customer's value chain.

©Source: Voice&Data