Industry Thought Leadership

As we enter a fully connected era, digital infrastructure is facilitating economic growth. The telecoms industry is in a crucial stage of digital transformation as new technologies emerge to drive a high quality user experience. A Better Connected World is dawning and the potential opportunities for the telecoms industry, which is the primary enabler of industry digitization, are beyond our imagination.

After almost 30 years of expansion, Huawei is now a world-leading ICT solutions provider. Today it is establishing business alliances and industry alliances, leveraging open-source communities, and running its own developer platform. Huawei is committed to working with its partners to build an open, cooperative industry ecosystem that delivers success for all.

At Mobile World Congress 2017 (MWC 2017), recently concluded in Barcelona, Spain, Huawei lead a number of activities including joint exhibitions, keynote speeches and industry forums, under the theme of “Open ROADS to a Better Connected World”. During the event, more than 100 operators and partners from around the world demonstrated new innovations and ideas jointly developed with Huawei. The company has also engaged in a dialogue with industry partners about the future of the telecoms industry and best practices to help operators achieve new value-driven growth.

Connectivity is now a basic necessity. Carriers are enablers of the digital transformation for many industries. They are joining hands with industry to build a Better Connected World. Carriers are shifting from “investment-driven” to “value-driven” model. They now attach more importance to user experience, service and delivering greater value to end users. Huawei is committed to becoming a business partner for carriers. We enable their digital transformation and business success and help them find value-driven new growth.

Defining the key themes and trends affecting technology growth for the year ahead
This year, Huawei Global Digital Transformation Forum - a highly-anticipated MWC kick-off session focused sharing on four of today’s biggest themes: 5G Innovation, ROADS to New Growth, Network Value Maximization and Operations Transformation. The forum sessions provided a platform for operators to share industry-wide challenges, strategies, and best-practice digital solutions. Here, Huawei has united the industry’s greatest minds in exploring ways to sustainable growth in a common ecosystem of opportunities and profits.

The ROADS (Real-time, On demand, All online, DIY, and Social) experience is key for carriers to go digital. To help operators lead in the digital age, Huawei is also delivering All Cloud solutions, enabling them to transform to a dynamic and on-demand approach that will allow them to rapidly expand and meet customer demands.

By 2025 there will be 100 billion connections globally, 85% of all enterprise applications will move to the cloud, 100% enterprises will use cloud services, and the penetration rate of industrial intelligence will exceed 20%. The strategy of global telecom operators is changing from being “investment-driven” to being “value-driven”. Huawei will team up with operators to embark on the value-driven ROADS to new growth. Huawei is dedicated to working with partners to build a sustainable digital business ecosystem.

Opportunities for Growth in Emerging Markets
As we enter a fully connected era, digital infrastructure is facilitating economic growth and emerging markets are on the cusp of a major transition towards digital economies. The Global Connectivity Index (GCI) published by Huawei in 2016 reported that for each GCI score point increase a country improved its innovation capacity by 2.2%, competitiveness by 2.1%, and productivity by 2.3%. Operators around the world are in a unique position to invest in these emerging markets to capitalize on huge ICT industry potential, untapped demographics, and national ICT strategies.

Huawei is prepared to lead a key role as an all-round strategic partner to countries looking to advance economic and social development. The company is committed to creating value for communities by collaborating with operators to help them maximize network assets, deploy home broadband and indoor digitalization, and drive connectivity to enhance the user experience, while promoting economic and social growth.

“By 2025, we will see 2 billion more people with mobile connections, and another 500 million broadband homes. Our commitment has always been to enable world’s operators to build roads to new growth.

The Content Gold Rush
Back in the day, for operators, the voice market was worth about $800 billion US dollars, and the data market was worth $1.2 trillion. Looking forward, the video market will potentially generate additional revenue of over one trillion dollars for operators. This includes about $650 billion from entertainment video and $18 billion from communications video. Vertical industries will have video everywhere, and that market will be worth about $350 billion. In the future, video will become an integral part of our lives and our work, opening up enormous market potential for operators.

Content and video are redefining the telecom industry. For operators, video is not really a matter of choice; it’s clear now that video is becoming a new basic service. It’s a matter of fact, and it will open the doors to huge growth potential. Operators have to get it right with their video business.

2016 was a watershed year for mobile operators. On average, data accounted for more than 50% of total operator revenue from mobile services. Video and video-related traffic contributed 25%. We estimate that, by the year 2020, video’s contribution to operator revenue will surpass 50%, and will drive up the revenue generated from all data to more than 70%. For mobile operators, that means their role needs to change. They can no longer limit themselves to being mobile network operators, but be digital content players too.

Telecom operators face a lot of challenges when developing their video business. The biggest challenge is fragmented content. Around the world, there are more than 1,000 content providers, 600+ telecom operators, and 100+ content operators. Video content is diverse and abundant, but it’s very difficult to aggregate and distribute to consumers in a given country or region.

If we ever hope to address the demand for universally available content for all consumers and households, then content providers need to change, telecom operators need to change, and content operators need to change too. Everyone needs to make some changes. Only by becoming truly consumer-centric can they make content universally available to all mobile and household users.

In conclusion, we can say that video can become the power behind new growth for operators.

Road to 5G
On the Road to 5G, telecom operators to focus their preparations on three areas: infrastructure, operations, and ecosystem development. The formula for success in the telecom industry: Success = infrastructure x operations x ecosystem. 5G will require two major changes: Going from network-centric to application-centric, and from person-centric to thing-centric—a significant paradigm shift. To prepare their infrastructure for 5G, operators need to begin the end-to-end cloudification of their architecture.

Huawei’s role as the “soil” and “energy” in the ICT ecosystem of a budding smart society. In this role, the company aims to serve as a platform for growth, and support strong alliances that push the industry forward and promote ongoing social progress. Huawei is building an open, dynamic cloud ecosystem with a competitive suite of products, open architecture, and open Application Program Interfaces (APIs), all designed to provide its partners with added convenience.

Adhering to the principles of “openness, collaboration and shared success”, Huawei held joint exhibitions with 100+ operators and partners at MWC 2017, compared to 70+ last year. At its main exhibition booths, Huawei showcased its growth plans, business models and latest developments in themed areas: ‘Maximizing Network Value’, ‘All Cloud to Support 5G’, ‘Agile Digital Operations’ and ‘Cloud-based Digital Services’, including a complete range of All Cloud solutions (All Cloud core/wireless/bearer network solutions etc.). Furthermore, customers and partners had the chance to visit the Huawei Consulting & Services VIP Showcase, Digital Transformation Dialog Center, Innovation City Exhibition and the Huawei Consumer Area to exchange views with Huawei or to experience Huawei’s products and services.

Huawei is fully prepared to lead a key role as an all-round strategic partner to customers in their digital transformation journey, and to countries looking to advance economic and social development. Huawei is keen to listen, share and contribute to the ICT industry to achieve its Open ROADS to a Better Connected World.