Fresh thinking
“Inside every router on the Internet, there is processor, which has some little-known and most magical properties. As each layer of atoms is laid down upon the silicon substrate, a Tibetan monk nearby prays that it will serve its new network masters well. Then, as the assembled equipment is packaged for customer delivery, traces of […]
The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) has recently issued an important report on Demand Attentive Networks (DAN). (For details and to download a free copy, click here.) I believe this report reflects a major telecoms industry structural shift, from a supply-push to a demand-pull model, which may in turn trigger a significant industry restructuring. I […]
How the broadband farmers and cowmen can be friends The farmer and the cowman should be friends, Oh, the farmer and the cowman should be friends. One man likes to push a plough, the other likes to chase a cow, But that’s no reason why they cain’t be friends. – Oklahoma! by Rodgers and Hammerstein A previous post explained […]
When a human feels a persistent pain, they go to the doctor, who will attempt to diagnose its cause. One of the great advances in medicine was the ability to cheaply and non-invasively see inside the body using X-rays, resulting in rapid and accurate diagnosis. When a telecoms network is sick due to poor performance, […]
A pointer to the future A few years ago I wrote a white paper predicting that communications services like telephony, email and messaging would evolve to service the needs of enterprises wishing to interact with their customers. A small harbinger of that future just arrived in my inbox today.
I have been working with several clients in the SDN/NFV space, all of whom are trying to make sense of the transformation to the ‘software telco’. The challenge they all face is that our future distributed computing needs are qualitatively different in scale compared to the past. That in turn dictates that a whole new skill […]
London, 27th March 2014 The Fit-for-Business Broadband Workshop is a one-day event for executives and industry leaders responsible for buying, operating and developing business broadband services. We draw together the state-of-the-art in network performance science together with new insight into broadband economics and regulatory policy.We have already issued VIP invitations to select industry members, and are […]
I have uploaded an introduction to high-fidelity quality attenuation analytics to SlideShare. Communications Service Providers are seeking to increase their profitability and return on assets. To achieve this, they need to know when they must buy more network capacity. Insufficient (or misconfigured) capacity results in poor customer experiences that drive churn, whilst excess capacity wastes money. These investment decisions […]
The US appeals court has rightly thrown out an attempt by the Federal Communication Commission to impose common carriage regulation on broadband ISPs. Both the language and conceptual tools being used by both sides to argue their case fail to reflect the actual nature of broadband. Specifically, historical ideas of ‘carriage’ for physical objects are […]
Over the past few months, I’ve had a number of conversations that have crystallised for me why broadband truly matters, and why I am in this business. I would like to share those thoughts with you. There is a famous quote from management guru Peter Drucker: “The purpose of business is to create and keep […]
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