In Focus

Sunit Vakharia

Chief Technology Officer
U GRO Capital

The critical goals of implementing technology are innovation, secure operations, and ease of business.

There is an adage that every adversity brings a unique opportunity. The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that there is a degree
of truth to it.

There is no doubt that the implication of COVID-19 has put tremendous stress on organizational budgets, focus areas, and operating policies. However, as the scale of this unparalleled event unfolds, many organizations are also developing new business models and strengthening their virtual capabilities to create fresh revenue streams.

In a recent interaction with Better World, Sunit Vakharia, Chief Technology Officer, U GRO Capital, shared insights around the current mindset of technology leaders and the importance of technology-led solutions to navigate the current crisis. (U GRO Capital is a highly specialized, technology-driven lending organization that focuses on providing customized, sustainable solutions to small and medium businesses.)

Excerpts from the interview:

Better World: How has COVID-19 impacted your business? How have you leveraged technology to achieve business resiliency?

Sunit Vakharia: While the unpredicted COVID-19 epidemic has threatened our sense of normalcy, it has also pushed people to innovate and reimagine the conventional business models.

At U GRO Capital, we’ve utilized the current situation as an opportunity to scale our business digitally. U GRO Capital provides loans to small and medium-sized companies. We extensively focus on technology and analytics as enablers to onboard our customers and disburse money as and when required by them.

Technology has played a pivotal role in expanding our operations and customer base during the COVID-19. Even before the spread of the pandemic, we were equipped to deal with a fully remote working situation. We’ve been using remote collaboration tools such as Skype for Business, and Microsoft Teams, among others, since the commencement of our operations in 2018. All U GRO employees can work from anywhere, and there is no location constraint for anyone, helping them stay connected and manage client expectations. Similar engagements have been done with our vendor partners. All our technology developments and meetings with partners happen in an agile way over online platforms, and I am happy to share that significant efficiency has been observed in this new operating world.

We continue to build and deploy digital platforms. All aspects of sourcing new customers, servicing, and collecting documents are being done digitally. This has been the basis of our philosophy. We rolled out the digital KYC verification and digital document collection process during the days of the pandemic-induced national lockdown when our executives could not visit customers. These digital processes are clear differentiators for us.

Through our platform, we ensured that the entire communication and verification process runs through our video solutions. From the photograph of the factories to geo locations, customer coordinates, survey inputs, and the related verification, all procedures can be completed through this platform. This solution has helped us onboard our customers digitally and curtailed our visits to customer premises. We use statistical predictive models to assist, understand, and underwrite our customers better. Through AI-driven models, we assess our customers’ business requirements and offer the best product for their long-term growth. We have incorporated machine learning and analytics capabilities in our assessment solutions to drive exceptional customer experience.

Nevertheless, there are a few requirements that cannot be completed digitally, for instance, submission of post-dated cheques or specific covenant necessities. Still, I am sure, over time, we will devise solutions for that as well.

Better World: How have IT spending priorities changed due to COVID-19?

Sunit Vakharia: U GRO Capital’s management provides tremendous support and encouragement to foster innovation and to build scalable yet secure platforms. COVID-19 has pushed enterprises to leverage tech and to find new ways to empower their stakeholders. They are focusing on more unique capabilities to facilitate remote working.

In the current scenario, technology leaders will continue to evaluate infrastructure, applications, and security for supporting their employees, partners, and customers. Many technology spending priorities are being rationalized from the perspective of the new normal. Focus on digital transformation has been amplified, and enterprises are swiftly turning to automation and analytics to make smarter decisions. At U GRO, our focus will continue to be on innovation, and we are working towards developing new business lines and automating end-to-end supply chain processes. We are also planning to introduce a unique secured loan product very shortly. We’re building platforms in such a way that makes sure our core platforms remain constant while our ecosystem gets evolved incessantly.

Sunit Vakharia

Chief Technology Officer at U GRO Capital

Sunit is a senior strategic executive with over 19 years of rich experience in technology implementation. He has an exceptional understanding of the financial ecosystem, analytics, and data-based insights.

Sunit is a constant learner and has essayed various roles on the strategic IT leadership and execution fronts, notably in solving business problems through technology delivery, program management, business transformation, and client relationship management.

Before U GRO Capital, he had worked for global multinationals such as HSBC, Merill Lynch, SAS, Accenture, and ICICI Bank.

Top skills

  • Strategic Leadership
  • People Management
  • Process Improvement

Honors/Awards

  • Most Valuable Business Partner
  • HSBC Technology Winner
  • HSBC Technology Runner Up

Education

  • Strategic Thinking and Leadership, University of Pennsylvania – The Wharton School Leadership Management Training
  • Bachelor of Engineering, Instrumentation, University of Mumbai

We use multiple digital channels to facilitate customer interaction, and this will continue to be a focus area for us.

Better World: Where are you on your cloud journey? In case of multiple clouds, does orchestration pose a challenge?

Sunit Vakharia: We are a cloud-native architected organization. We have zero presence on physical infrastructure, an approach that will remain applicable in future. We do not feel the need to build a private cloud for our business. We operate on a self-service model, and hence do not need any physical infrastructure. The SaaS model works best for us. However, we may explore the possibility of using a hyper cloud approach for some of the use cases. This is largely because, at times, a specific cloud becomes expensive for certain use cases.

At this moment, we do not need to orchestrate multiple clouds, as we are using a single public cloud provider. In the near future, if a need arises, plenty of orchestration tools are available in the market.

Better World: As a technology leader, how critical is it to balance the short-term revenue requirements against long-term technology implementations?

Sunit Vakharia: There is a strong understanding of what needs to be prioritized. The current COVID-19 situation is undoubtedly complicated. It requires leaders of all departments, and not just technology, to make a thorough evaluation of all investment decisions because ultimately, you’ve to run business.

The critical goals of implementing any new technology are innovation, secure operations, and ease of business. Their importance can vary for different organizations, depending on their nature and scale of business. Many young enterprises make the mistake of implementing a technology solution because someone else is doing that, which is wrong and misleading. All technology implementation decisions should be finalized after getting answers to these questions: Is it making sense for my organization? Will it help my customers and the business we operate? Will it help in driving our future aspirations and the business goals we intend to achieve in the next quarter?

For instance, at U GRO Capital, we did not make investments in Blockchain technologies, which is exciting, yet some time away from the overall ecosystem maturity. So, we will not look at such pieces now and can explore them at a later stage when it makes real-life business sense for us. But what we want to do is to enable our customers and the sales team to work efficiently, keeping in mind the social distancing measures; and limit the physical visit and interaction during the collection of documents or at the time of money disbursement.

U GRO Capital’s customers are small enterprises, and we do understand that they need handholding. So we need to implement solutions that are relevant and more comfortable for our customers to understand and use.

Better World: You mention security as a key focus area for enterprises. Can you share some of the initiatives taken by U GRO Capital to enhance your information security architecture?

Sunit Vakharia: We’ve invested in the Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) platform. It is a cloud-based endpoint protection platform, which is designed to overcome the confines of legacy security solutions. The platform protects entire traffic from malware attacks, ransomware attacks, and other potential threats coming through either the web or emails, as those are already predicted. We are also implementing industry-leading Enterprise Threat Protector DNS for controlling what can be accessed on our networks. Besides, a Data Loss Prevention (DLP) solution from Microsoft has been deployed. That means all the emails that typically come to us are getting monitored, thus ensuring that our teams do not get spam emails.  It also helps us detect and block sensitive data transmission.

We are also working to implement a privileged/password access management (PAM) solution, which means anyone who wants to access our infrastructure, our database, or the applications need to request access. The request will come for approval to our information security team, which will review it and open up the entrance to the network border. PAM solutions ensure that there is no illegal access through the internet. Through PAM, all network access, control, monitor, and infrastructure can be audited. This enables us to see the tasks or actions done by a specific individual.

Information security is a continually evolving area, and we will continue to invest in solutions to strengthen our IT security defense on an ongoing basis.

MORE FROM BETTER WORLD

The CIO blueprint for digital transformation

The CIO blueprint for digital transformation

The unprecedented COVID-19 has triggered major upheavals and compel organizations to accelerate their digital transformation plans to get future-ready. Suddenly, the Chief Information Officers (CIOs) ‘ role has fast evolved from a technology leader to a cross-functional business leader. If it was not entirely apparent before the pandemic, then it is now pellucid. Businesses depend on them to continue to manage disruptions, build resiliency, deliver an exceptional customer experience and seamless business continuity. CIOs have an enormous responsibility on their shoulders today, much greater than pre-pandemic times. And hence need a strong strategic blueprint to achieve successful transformations.

However, there are several challenges that CIOs need to overcome to unlock the real value of digital transformation of their organizations. These may include integrating new technology with existing legacy applications, shortage of digital and information security talent, and re-invent IT with new operating models, among others.

In this backdrop, it is a must for CIOs and organizations to devise a careful transformation strategy keeping in mind the factors such as business requirements, customer-specific needs, employee engagement models, among others. (See: CIOs’ digital transformation focus accelerates recovery for IT firms)

Let’s look at some of the essential elements that CIOs must keep in mind before embarking on the digital transformation journey.

Assess your business needs

While it is true that digital transformation can bring maximum and sustainable benefits, it is also true that every organization’s technology needs are different. For instance, some of the transformation programs are specifically designed to manage accounting related issues, while others may involve automating operational processes and customer interface channels.

It becomes critical for organizations to do not to compare apples with oranges. So, understand your unique needs, consult with other C-level executives, prioritize and analyze the approach at the most granular level while preparing your digital transformation blueprint.

Develop a strategy for effective change management

In our interactions with many technology leaders last year, it became evident that having a robust change management strategy is of utmost importance for any digital transformation blueprint. The executive leadership must take accountability and drive an effective change management plan before undertaking any digital transformation route.

Jaspreet Singh EY

Jaspreet Singh, Partner- Cybersecurity, EY

“Today’s enterprises need to secure access to their organizational resources, regardless of the user or application environment. This means that the biggest challenge is about adapting to the modern distributed workplace and embracing a mobile workforce while protecting people, devices, and data, irrespective of their locations.”

Rajesh Aggarwal

Rajesh Aggarwal, Head of IT, Aamor Inox

“Digital transformation is a journey rather than an endpoint. Every aspect of the journey needs to be assessed well. A successful transformation strategy leverages the value of diverse processes, people, and technologies. Organizations need to democratize IT to make it accessible for all stakeholders.”

While it is understandable that unprecedented events such as COVID-19 leave no time for organizations to prepare well for suden operational changes, CIOs need to provide directions and act as a glue `to successfully transform their IT architectures.

Ensure that you have a good-formulated plan to convey the change in the organization, its impact on processes, the advantages it brings, and the necessary training plan to make your people ready.

Build a robust governance framework

In the present distributed workforce scenario where organizational networks may have several unidentified access points, security and governance cannot be taken lightly at any cost. Every digital transformation initiative should incorporate plans to have full network visibility into applications, devices, cloud platforms, and other aspects.

CIOs should collaborate with other business leaders to define a relevant and robust governance framework that proactively manage and mitigate risks and forefront innovation.

Choose partners, not vendors

Always ensure you are working with partners and not just vendors when deploying a new technology solution. Training your internal teams to understand and maintain control over new technologies and solutions is very important.

This must-have digital transformation blueprint element will let you test and experiment with new ideas and get detailed information on all your future technology requirements.

Integrate smartness in your digital transformation roadmap

Digital transformation has become a much broader concept than just incorporating digital prowess in every aspect of the business. Data is the new lifeline for organizations. In such a scenario, technologies such as artificial intelligence, automation, and smart analytics should be seared wherever required to meet the desired outcome with speed, agility, and secured infrastructure.

The new operating model should enable businesses to identify alternatives. It should equip organizations to harness the potential of various cutting-edge technologies to deliver stakeholder expectations, augment collaboration and efficiency.

Sandeep Sudarshan Subex

Sandeep Sudarshan, Head, Business Solutions and Consulting, Subex Limited

(more…)

Tipping point for 5G networks likely in 2023, says Report

Tipping point for 5G networks likely in 2023, says Report

Despite an aggressive push, the 5G technology could take about five years from now to demonstrate compelling use cases. According to a new 5G report from consultancy major PwC, the year 2023 will be a defining year when 5G is likely to hit a tipping point. Titled, Making 5G Real, the report highlights that the networks’ performance will significantly improve in countries like the US where 5G has already been launched.

According to PwC, in the US, 80% of the population is expected to have 5G coverage accessible at home or work by July 2021. However, the performance of 5G networks remains uneven.

This, according to the consultancy major, is mainly because carriers and device manufacturers are facing a massive challenge to push the consumer upgrade cycles and meet deployment milestones.

There is no doubt that 5G will inevitably make deeper inroads into the network ecosystems and open up new exciting revenue streams for telcos and enterprises. However, its snail-paced growth is a big worry that the industry is currently wrestling with.

Multiple factors delaying expansion

There will be several variables that will define the capabilities of 5G networks. The successful use cases of 5G are still minimal and likely to emerge at scale only in the next three to five years. For instance, one of the hyped use cases of 5G, the fully autonomous car, is yet to mature, and most automobile manufacturers have pushed their timelines in this regard.

While the COVID-19 pandemic could be a reason for the delay in 5G rollouts in many countries, it is also true that countries such as India see no immediate need to make heavy investments in the 5G networks. This is mainly because a significant section of their subscribers is from the low-budget category.

The robust networks and availability of mass 5G devices will play critical roles in making this blazing technology available for the masses. The 5G device ecosystem could also take much longer to mature than many industry onlookers may think.

The rollout of different generations of mobile networks has always taken many years to mature. However, with 5G, expectations were rife that the technology would become mainstream sooner because 5G standards were adopted faster due to better interoperability with the previous network standards.

Even in the countries where 5G has been launched, the customer experience is not up to the mark till date and needs a lot more polishing. The devices are a tad expensive and also consumes more power than the 4G devices.

Enterprises should use this time wisely

Most organizations worldwide are currently in various stages of deploying new technologies, enhancing their service delivery, revamping communication strategy, and improving operational efficiency. There is a more significant push toward enabling new industrial applications such as robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), IIoT, and AR/VR. Evolved 5G networks will be critical for businesses to run applications based on these technologies. (See: Here’s how 5G could be a catalyst for IIoT and Industry 4.0)

While the technology itself could take up to five years for mass adoption, PwC cautions enterprises that they might risk rushing into the wrong 5G investments or failing to act soon enough. They recommend that businesses use this time wisely to transform themselves for new 5G services such as the internet of things (IoT) and monitoring and assurance solutions. (See: CIOs to focus on network transformation for business continuity)

Since most enterprises are already undertaking digital transformation journeys,  it would be a good idea to integrate their 5G strategic goals and brainstorm how 5G could help them improve their products and services once the technology is mature.

Here’s how 5G could be a catalyst for IIoT and Industry 4.0

Here’s how 5G could be a catalyst for IIoT and Industry 4.0

Over the last few years, the industrial internet of things (IIoT), as a key constituent of Industry 4.0, has gained much ground, transforming how businesses manage their manufacturing operations. IIoT includes several advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), analytics, and blockchain to help enterprises move towards lean manufacturing and automated processes. Now, with the advent of 5G, the potential of IIoT could be harnessed even better.

5G has so far largely garnered attention in the consumer market. However, the capabilities of 5G are increasingly recognized in various business markets. There has been a greater push from organizations as well to democratize the availability of digital, especially in the wake of COVID-19 related disruptions.

With reduced latency and blazing speed, the fifth generation of wireless technology has an enormous potential to bring agility, speed, and mobility to many conventional strategies in areas such as predictive maintenance, demand forecasting, and anomaly detection. (See: Telcos eying the edge opportunity for 5G growth)

Need for reliable power

The majority of IIoT use cases are currently based on wired connections, which are insufficient to address manufacturers’ various sensitivities. The quality and dependability of connectivity determine the success of any implementation. Modern production units primarily use Wi-Fi technology to support IoT connectivity, which consumes a lot of power and relies heavily on stable wired connections for backhaul and data offloading. There are limitations to the legacy networks that affect the scaling-up of the manufacturer’s digital transformation goals.

For instance, large-scale IoT transformations cannot be entirely dependent on Wi-Fi. Even cellular technologies such as 2G/3G and LTE are either slow, have latency issues, or use large amounts of energy to support IIoT. This is where a technology such as 5G could be a gamechanger!

When propelled with 5G speed and AI-based analytics, manufacturers can predict problems, analyze them in real-time, and minimize production downtime.

5G enables manufacturers to build high-precision assembly lines where all IoT devices and robotic processes could be perfectly in sync with each other, on a real-time basis. According to Wipro, one of India’s top IT Services firms, due to the high capacity, wireless flexibility and low-latency performance of 5G, IIoT deployments in the manufacturing segment stand to gain considerably. 5G has the potential to enable high-speed connectivity without the cost and complexity of fiber optic cables. And this makes 5G a natural choice for high precision manufacturing environments.

In addition to providing a robust network, 5G’s built-in security features can also help manufacturers integrate covered layers into the basic network architecture and ward off security issues if any.

Not without challenges

Swedish telecom equipment maker Ericsson, while agreeing with the superior capabilities of 5G to support different manufacturing use case, raises a pertinent challenge of a disconnect between three perspectives among manufacturers: the understanding of cellular capabilities, how they enable different digital solutions, and finally how these solutions address manufacturers’ actual pain points.

Besides bandwidth, the other major challenges that any IIoT deployment faces is interoperability, lack of compliance on the part of IoT manufacturers, and limited user awareness. In 2021, as we see 5G rollouts expanding in major countries, telcos worldwide would explore various collaboration routes to address the above-listed issues as well.

Globally, mobile network operators such as AT&T, Deutsche Telekom AG, Sierra Wireless, China Mobile, Verizon have been collaborating with manufacturers to test and showcase 5G capabilities for IIoT manufacturing and improve the overall factory environment. 

Rajesh Aggarwal joins Aamor Inox as Head of IT

Rajesh Aggarwal joins Aamor Inox as Head of IT

Rajesh Aggarwal

Rajesh Aggarwal

Aamor Inox has roped in Rajesh Aggarwal to head the company’s IT department in India. Aamor Inox is a leading maker and exporter of cold-finished long products in specialty stainless steels in India.

In his new role at Aamor Inox, Rajesh will be responsible for designing and implementing the cybersecurity policy and executing the ERP.

Prior to Aamor Inox, Rajesh Aggarwal was with the JBM Group, where he was responsible for designing and executing the IT business strategy. He has earlier worked with companies such as Jindal and Jagsonpal Pharmaceuticals.

Rajesh has more than three decades of rich IT management experience in developing, designing, and implementing IT business solutions, and has a deep understanding of ERP systems.

In his earlier role, he has carried out a re-implementation of SAP ECC (6.0), implementation of Industry 4.0, and upgradation from SAP ECC(6.0) to SAP HANA, among other things.

Rajesh is an MBA in Finance from IGNOU. In his free time, Rajesh enjoys reading spiritual books and listening to music. Better World wishes him every success in his new role.

About Aamor Inox

Aamor Inox claims to be India’s most advanced producer of “specialty stainless steel” long products. It produces materials in a wide-ranging steel grades like Austenitic, Ferritic, Martensitic, Heat Resisting, Duplex and 17-4ph steels in various heat treatment conditions including Quenched Tempered, Annealed, Solution Annealed, etc.

A capability to manufacture 60,000 tons stainless steel bars per year makes the company one of India’s largest privately held stainless long products companies,.

For other recent C-Track movements, click here.

AI, ML see rapid uptake in measuring customer loyalty

AI, ML see rapid uptake in measuring customer loyalty

The COVID-19 has transformed the way businesses function. In the wake of social distancing measures that are likely to remain in place for an extended time, a large pool of customers are swiftly moving toward new-age digital and mobile marketplaces. Moreover, the tendency has transitioned from just brand to purchase experience, quality of service, and customized needs. This has driven top CRM players to realign their AI-based offerings in line with the growing enterprise need to measure customer loyalty effectively.

According to a McKinsey report titled “The Quickening,” e-commerce has experienced the same amount of growth in three months during the COVID that would have erstwhile taken ten years. Due to this, consumers are going with fitting, reliable brands and have the products and services they are looking for.

Microsoft has also echoed similar sentiments in its blog. According to Microsoft, COVID-19 has greatly changed consumer behavior, and consumers are now buying more online and gravitating toward contactless pickup of purchases. It adds that retailers who invest in digital technology are better positioned to deal with this new shift and stay connected with existing customers while also attracting new ones. Use of AI and ML to measure customer loyalty has become increasingly relevant for businesses.

Battle of the giants

Understanding this new shift in consumer behavior, global CRM leader Salesforce has introduced a new brand loyalty management solution that will enable its customers to strengthen customer trust and engagement. The latest offering has been introduced, keeping in mind the rapidly evolving unique enterprise needs to reward and retain their customers amidst the global pandemic.

Starting in February 2021, Salesforce will integrate the new brand loyalty solution with Salesforce Digital 360, Service Cloud, and Tableau, allowing enterprises to offer a customized loyalty experience across the entire customer journey.

Salesforce said that the solution would help enterprises of all scales and sectors to launch more customized experiences. According to the company, enterprises can leverage this solution to expand their loyalty programs to stay current with customer expectations. It can also help drive business value by creating loyal, lifelong customers. (See: How will AI impact enterprise ecosystems in 2021? )

Salesforce, though, is not the only CRM leader trying to capitalize on this new opportunity. Microsoft too is continuously looking at making its Microsoft Dynamics 365 more evolved and enable its customers with deep, intelligent insights.

Another CRM major SAP has been quite aggressive in leveraging AI and ML learnings to improve customer interactions. In October last year, it launched a new SAP Customer Data Platform to connect every data source in an organization and external data to create unified customer profiles. SAP claims that the tool enables enterprises to provide a complete understanding of customer preferences and behavior.

Technology to play a big role

Most businesses are looking at leveraging advanced technologies and solutions to understand customers’ specific needs. There has been a growing focus on smart solutions based on artificial intelligence and analytics, which can help organizations determine the best ways to engage with specific customer needs and include promotions and offers based on real-time data. For example, a retailer can identify which of his customers are near a store, using geolocation-based notifications or whether customers have used their bonus points or can be offered some new incentives to get them back.

In 2021 and beyond, enterprises, especially, retailers will see the growing adoption of tools based on artificial intelligence to deliver unique customer experiences and drive impactful brand engagements. Top CRM players such as Salesforce, Microsoft,  Oracle, and SAP are expected to add new machine learning capabilities in their CRM offerings to enable their users to automate the customer loyalty measurement process and deliver more incredible customer engagement benefits.

Telcos eying the edge opportunity for 5G growth

Telcos eying the edge opportunity for 5G growth

Top telecom operators are rapidly building strong foundations for future 5G networks. The next-generation wireless technology, which is ten times faster than the current LTE networks, has the potential to transform people, processes, and policies innovatively. Given that many global service providers have turned to bolster telco edge capabilities and putting them at the core of their 5G infrastructure goals.

According to a GSA report, as of December 2020, 140 operators in 59 countries/territories have introduced commercial 3GPP-compatible 5G services. In the next couple of years, 5G is expected to make substantial inroads in many countries, including India.

However, to leverage the real potential of 5G, telcos need to develop new structures that can provide continuous support for high bandwidth and low-latency applications and effectively execute their administration. This is where the Telco edge could help win big!

Evolving business needs

As 5G moves to the mainstream, Internet of Things (IoT) devices such as autonomous cars, connected appliances, and robotic processes, gain the necessary fuel to communicate and share data faster than ever. Swedish telecom equipment maker Ericsson estimates around 5 billion IoT connections by 2025, up by the existing 1 billion connections today. That’s huge! Such a spread connected network will also result in an explosion of data that could strain the existing cloud ecosystems.

The biggest challenge will be: how to manage, process, and deliver this high volume data and support low-latency based real-time applications using prevailing communication networks in a secure, reliable, and efficient way.

Telco edge enables enterprises to lessen reaction processing to milliseconds, thereby eliminating the need to transfer data to the centralized cloud. By taking cloud services and resources together, edge deployments provide benefits such as latency reduction, bandwidth scale, and mobility support, imperative for the next-Gen time-sensitive applications and services.

Edge will enable mobile network providers to move the value chain upward and unlock new revenue streams. It adopts cloud-native technologies to distribute the network infrastructure cost, just like Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offering.

Collaboration route for ample opportunity

With 5G services growth inevitable in the near future, top Indian telecom service providers, such as Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel, and VI are also gearing up to further their edge clouds and leverage it as a new revenue opportunity. India’s service providers can take a cue from many global telcos who are aggressively building a distributed cloud approach.

While ‘edge’ may be uncharted waters for telcos to date, the year 2021 is likely to be a defining year from the telco edge deployment perspective. South Korean wireless telecommunications operator SK Telecom and Japanese Telecom operator KDDI recently launched 5G edge cloud services. American multinational telecom company, Verizon as well is exploring the potential of AI at the Edge of the network to locate and provide necessary real-time support to relevant IoT resources. Companies like Renovo, a connected car startup, and electronics giant LG are among the organizations testing telco edge services on Verizon’s network.

Many other telcos worldwide are screening the automated environments and investing in AI and machine learning capabilities to save OPEX and open-up new exciting revenue streams in the 5G networks.

However, telcos are not the only ones battling for their share in the edge computing market. Global hyperscalers such as Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon are building their edge capabilities and have their unique strengths, such as global reach and high investment potential for R&D.

The year 2021 is likely to see both Hyperscalers and mobile network operators forging strong partnerships to enable AI and Edge use cases.

 

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