Achieving a designed customer experience across multiple delivery platforms: A telco perspective

'Customer experience' is a term that covers a wide range of activities that take place between suppliers and users of products and services. LaSalle and Britton define it as 'a holistic experience which involves a person - as opposed to a customer - as a whole at different levels and in every interaction between such person and a company' (2003). This research considers a key aspect of such an holistic experience: that which is embodied in the product or service under consideration. In the context of increasing mobile technology convergence, the paper considers new approaches that focus on developing the necessary underlying enablers and common interaction flows that are required to deliver a designed experience, taking into account the increasing number of mobile operating systems and service delivery platforms. Ultimately these models move towards allowing users to 'co-create their own unique experiences' (Pralahad and Ramswamy, 2004). The convergence between IT and telecommunications domains presents a unique challenge to product and service designers. Services are increasingly accessible via multiple delivery devices and delivery networks. This trend has been seen most recently in the advent of Internet based services being delivered via mobile phones where 'mobile service delivery and technologies have become the glue between previously secluded 'telecom' and "IT' domains' (Karrberg and Liebenau, 2006). At the same time network operators are trying to tighten their relationship with their customers by offering 'sticky' services aimed at raising the barriers to customer mobility. These two trends lead to a new design challenge: how to design a recognisably consistent and compelling product customer experience that applies over all delivery services, operating systems and networks. Solutions to this problem have to date been either technology led, focussing on integrated delivery platforms, or reliant on rule-based design. Crucial to this analysis is the 'role Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item

Creation of value with open source software in the telecommunications field

Tese de doutoramento. Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores. Faculdade de Engenharia. Universidade do Porto. 200

The regulation of telecommunication in the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland

This paper reviews the application of national antitrust law and the implementation of the European Union's telecommunications directives to the markets in the United Kingdom, against the declared policy objective of raising national competitiveness. It illustrates the complexity of the systems that have been created over three decades, with complex and interlocking regulatory, self-regulatory, judicial and appellate bodies, interacting with the parliamentary systems to form a regulatory state. Where markets have failed, or thought likely to fail, the state at different levels (UK, national and municipal) has supported studies and subsidized the provision of broadband Internet access. The regulator, using its sectoral antitrust powers, agreed with British Telecom to functional separation, transferring the enduring bottleneck of local access to a separate subsidiary. While the UK describes itself as a regulatory leader this is difficult to evaluate, given the number and the frequencies of changes, nonetheless the claim seems very difficult to substantiate. --Governance,Competitiveness,Regulatory state,Great Britain,United Kingdom

Ericsson : TV is a new game : diversification strategy for TV & Media business

The thesis hereby presented in the form of a case study aims to address the challenges faced by the multinational Ericsson throughout the process of developing a diversification strategy for the TV & Media business and the strategic options made associated to this diversification maneuver. The case study functions as an educational tool since it allows students to apply the strategic frameworks and theoretical concepts learned in class to a real business situation. Ericsson is a Swedish multinational company operating in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) industry, being a provider of communications technology and services and operating and investing in several business areas, among them the TV & Media business. The corporate business strategies followed by Ericsson, as well as the strategic options taken regarding the TV & Media business, and the analysis to the diversification strategy, as well as to the strategic options taken, constitute interesting topics for discussion in strategy courses, supported by the theoretical concepts and strategy frameworks proposed in the literature review. The proposed reflection focuses on the analysis and evaluation of the strategic decision to diversify into the TV & Media business and the strategic options taken, particularly, the development of the business area through an acquisitions strategy