ABI Research believes startups and small OSS/BSS vendors are winning against the big guys. OSS Line asks, why?
I’ve bemoaned the lack of OSS startups in the past. But maybe things are changing now. Why?
The opportunity for OSS/BSS to solve problems and generate more revenue has never gone away. Even if network tech had stopped at DSL and SONET, the opportunity for better software systems would have kept the big players busy for many years, as well as providing niche opportunities to smaller vendors.
Today, the emerging virtualization and software defined stuff being rolled out results in almost a clean break for OSS. An inventory system designed for fixed lines and switched networks, or even plain old IP over carrier Ethernet, has little to offer CSPs who are re-architecture their network and services around software. That leaves a big hole for startups to fill, while Big OSS are still busy delivering the transformation projects they signed-up 5 years ago.
ABI Research confirms this trend.
“The telco network is starting to provide opportunities for much smaller companies and even startups are now winning business against the established giants: Ericsson, Huawei and Nokia. The 15 companies we have profiled illustrate a completely new way of developing network technology. In some cases, they have even won business against Tier-1 vendors, which are 100 times their size, have 100 times their R&D budget and have a formidable sales organization,” said Dimitris Mavrakis, Research Director at ABI Research.
The new wave of startups go directly opposite the established norm of following industry standardization. Some of them are 10-people companies and rely on open source projects to win business. Frinx, inManta, Metaswitch, Netrolix, NFWare and Yotta Communications are a few examples of startups that would have no place in the market five years ago.
These findings are from ABI Research’s Telco Cloud Hot Tech Innovators report.
Read more at Telecomlead and go buy some reach at ABI Research.