Automation in Telecommunications: The State of Play

Telcos face daily challenges to optimize their networks and services, and to deliver the highest levels of customer experience and satisfaction. Today’s automation tools, drawing on artificial intelligence, machine learning and the Internet of Things make it significantly more straightforward for operators to rise to those challenges. But how widespread is the implementation of these technologies? As part of our #DestinationAutomation campaign, we at Comarch carried out a survey to find out.

Let’s meet the automation telecom survey 

We looked at the telecom automation of sales, marketing, network maintenance and operations, customer experience, service fulfillment and assurance, across the areas of the Internet of Things, AI, ML, cloud computing and 5G. Our respondents came from across the telecommunications sector, both geographically and in terms of size.

In the field of automating network monitoring and AI, we wanted to find out whether companies had already implemented IT systems for automated network incident detection and analysis. We also asked those who did not have such systems whether they planned to implement them, and when.

Because it is no longer to manage field service operations manually in any meaningful sense, we paid particular attention to automation in this area. Our survey asked not only about the implementation of field service management automation, but also about the level of use in this area and the split between automated FSM and any manually tasks that may still be carried out in this respect.

Ways automation helps the telecom industry

It’s clear that 5G is going to be a game-changer, so we wanted to know about the uptake of automation telecom technologies in this field. We asked about the extent to which large companies (which manage their own networks) have automated processes for network management.

In addition, our survey covered the implementation of cloud services and the provision of such services to all kinds of customers. We were especially keen to learn how much importance telcos placed on the ability to offer these services.

In terms of IoT sales automation, respondents were asked whether they already use an IoT product or service catalog, and about the process of on-boarding new IoT clients in this respect. We wanted to learn about any potential correlation between company size and IoT sales automation.

Finally, we looked at business intelligence for telecommunications, with specific focus on gathering and using data to optimize process and results. We wanted to know about the levels of automation for data collection and analysis, and to understand how telcos of all sizes perceived the importance of dedicated reporting tools for business intelligence.

To find out how our respondents answered these questions and more, download and read the full survey report here.