It’s a simple one, really: Spend a few zillion less on attack ads against each other and more on building out and resolving issues in your networks and with your handsets. That way the vast majority of the U.S. that uses one of the two services, AT&T and Verizon top executives and their multimillion-dollar Madison Avenue pitchmen and women included, can endure fewer dropped calls and enjoy more actual coverage in more areas, not just on those cute little red/orange/blue-splotched “coverage maps” in the TV spots but in real life. Continue reading
Nextel
NEC looks to crack the B/OSS code
Standard
As reported in Billing & OSS World by Editor in Chief Tim McElligott, NEC is acquiring NetCracker for about $300 million. And as Tim said, “Given the fate of mid-tier independent software vendors over the last three years – those at the $100 million mark or more – it was a matter of when, not if” Waltham, Mass.-based NetCracker would be acquired. Another great friend and colleague in this business, Elisabeth Rainge, program director of network software at IDC, accurately assessed the deal as having far more to do with the alliance between Alcatel-Lucent and the Cramer division of Amdocs or ALU’s acquisition of Motive than it does the acquisitions of similarly sized competitors such as Granite Systems by Telcordia, MetaSolv by Oracle or Syndesis by Subex.
Absolutely. This deal is another example of a company that has made its mark mainly through equipment and services acquiring a B/OSS leader to stop missing out on major network equipment contracts because it brings no OSS to the table. Continue reading
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