It's time for telcos to build their cloud possible

In our latest TMT Predictions report, Deloitte called COVID-19 a catalyst for the trends we were seeing in the TMT industry. Now, nearly two years in, we still can’t escape its impact. But we do expect 2022 will be far more than recovering from the pandemic.

Takeaways for the telco sector in Australia and New Zealand

US$160 billion – that’s the economic boost our latest TMT Predictions report estimates for Asia Pacific region if businesses increase investment in, and take greater advantage of, cloud-based technologies. Especially in preparation for and in response to external disruption.

In fact, we’ve identified the telecommunications, media and technology (TMT) sector to be one of the most disrupted between now and 2024, as a result of both external market and internal business forces. With disruption comes opportunity... the rate at which speed and agility can be leveraged will set organisations apart – this will be critical for businesses to survive and thrive.

Regional business leaders who participated in the TMT predictions identified several core organisational benefits associated with implementing cloud technology: 86% of respondents indicated that by implementing cloud, they were better prepared to respond to future challenges and needs within their respective organisations; 72% stated they were already experiencing benefits in operations efficiency; closely followed by the ability to expand to new customer segments and revenue and profit growth.

These trends indicate that business leaders are expecting investments in cloud technology to have an impact on the future bottom line, by helping to streamline everyday business operations today. The highest ranked use cases for cloud adoption in the TMT sector included digital channel enablement and communications with customers, cloud technology infrastructure, AI/ML, data analytics and personalisation. You can read more about these trends in our TMT Predictions Report (link below).             

Big challenges, even bigger opportunities

Whilst the TMT sector is one of the leading sectors across the Asia Pacific region in terms of cloud adoption and readiness, approximately 40% of respondents self-identified as being either ‘unprepared’ or ‘hesitant’ to adopt the cloud. The highest ranked challenges included security issues, complexity with migrating legacy systems to the cloud, regulation governing cloud adoption and operations, cost of migration and skills shortages. 

Reassuringly, we know that embracing cloud solutions effectively can tackle these challenges head on. The cloud represents a ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ opportunity for TMT organisations to be uncoupled from legacy technology infrastructure, and create compelling career paths and employment opportunities for their staff. Our Cloud Imperative report summarises the immediate steps organisations can take to benefit from cloud: 

1. Develop a cloud strategy with clear aspiration, business value-led targets and a roadmap for execution
2. Drive Board and C-suite executive awareness and fluency of cloud-enabled business transformation
3. Understand lessons learnt from leading global telecommunications organisations on their journey to the cloud to identify paths of acceleration and risks to manage
4. Form strategic partnerships with one or more hyperscalers and leverage their available cloud migration investment funds to support the journey to the cloud
5. Identify joint ‘go-to-market’ opportunities to work with the hyperscalers and take new products and services to the market together
6. Map the career paths made possible by cloud adoption, so staff can clearly see the opportunities for their development and stay rather than stray to reap the rewards.

Cloud is increasingly going vertical

In our latest Tech Trends Report 2022, we found that the centre of gravity around digital transformation has shifted from meeting the IT needs of an industry-agnostic organisation, to meeting the unique strategic and operational needs of each sector (and even subsector). Hyperscalers and SaaS vendors are working with digital system integrators and clients to provide modularised, vertical-specific business services and accelerators that can  be easily adopted and built upon for unique differentiation. As this trend gains momentum, deploying applications will become a process of assembly rather than creation – a shift that could reorder the entire value stack. Business processes will become strategic commodities to be purchased, freeing organisations to focus precious development resources on critical areas of strategy and competitive differentiation.

Telcos + hyperscalers: what next?

There seems to be some uncertainty as to whether telcos and hyperscalers can co-exist in future. Yet telcos have deep, trusted partnerships with businesses across ANZ – and have successfully partnered with many of them on their digital transformation journey to date. Several telcos are also working closely with hyperscalers on migrating their own systems and infrastructure to the cloud to transform their technology estate, data and customer interactions. 

There are lots of opportunities to identify innovative intersects between their own clients’ needs, and the capabilities available at speed and scale through the hyperscalers. Here are some examples of how telcos can jointly invest and partner with their clients:

• Contact Centre Modernisation – Helping clients modernise their legacy on-premises contact centres to leverage advanced automation, scale, AI/ML and ongoing personalisation innovation made possible through platforms such as Amazon Connect and Google
• Intelligent Edge – Helping clients manage the explosion of their IoT sensors, data and development of solutions at the site where the data is generated through intelligent edge platforms and insights
• Software-Defined Networking – Helping clients leverage commercial advantage, operational performance and efficiency by leveraging software-defined networking concepts and solutions and redefine their communications networks.  

The future is looking brighter than ever, and it’s time for players in the sector to build their cloud possible. Are you ready for the future? Let’s go!

Read our latest reports:

TMT Predictions 2022 | Deloitte Australia | Technology, Media & Telecommunications

Tech Trends 2022 | Deloitte Australia | Technology, Consulting services and reports