The Missing Data that Every Mobile Operator Needs

Introduction

Mobile Network operators tout their network coverage to capture new customers in highly competitive markets like the United States. Operators present their network stories in coverage maps or quote crowd sources data companies like Open Signal and Root Metrics in advertisements. They quote speeds and feeds from speed test to show why their network is better than their competitors. However, this generic story does not align with the needs of a new generation of network users. Next generation users need to understand how the network performs at their specific device level. This applies to consumers as well as business users.

Consumers and businesses will need a more granular view of how a network is performing if their businesses and people’s lives are going to depend on it to support use cases like remote surgery or autonomous vehicles. 4G showed us the possibilities of new businesses such as ride hailing services Uber, Lyft, and video applications such as Facetime. Then the pandemic showed us how critical broadband connectivity is to our daily lives. ?4G enabled services such as food delivery through Apps, remote work, remote learning, remote banking, payments, healthcare, and more, all from our mobile devices. Location, low latency, and video were critical enablers for 4G to prevent fraud, enhance security, and win consumers’ trust.

True Possibilities of 5G

The true possibilities of 5G are yet to come. As operators upgrade their wireless networks from non-Stand-Alone (NSA) 5G to Stand-Alone (SA) 5G, True 5G capabilities such as network slicing, precise location, and ultra-low latency will become more widely available. These new capabilities and functions will drive applications and services that we have not yet imagined. The key to delivering differentiated services will be full, continuous visibility and insights into network performance at the device level.

How can operators benefit or capitalize from these new businesses if they themselves are not fully aware of the powers of the network that they are spending tens of billions to build? Today, operators lack full visibility into their network performance despite capturing over 534 Petabytes of data (According to AT&T’S Andy Marcus). They lack visibility into their network from the device side or the consumer side of the network. This missing link is already a part of their supplier ecosystem and will be the key to unlocking new services.

The Missing Data

Device vendors and chipset companies hold the key to the missing data. They can capture data from the time a device boots up or powers on the System on a Chip (SoC). They also have the means to capture data through collectors (software code) available at the chipset level. Data can be captured from every component of a mobile phone. This includes cameras, audio, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, GPU, sensors at the SoC or chip layer. At the Operating System layer, they can capture power consumption data, application activities, thermal impact and more. Then at the service layer, they can restrict privacy access, enable API access, and perform analytics.

Data capture can be executed at different intervals and during various processes. This level of data capture along with generative AI can enable automation previously impossible. It can provide true segment of one insight into your customers, outside on their online behavior.

Chipset vendors can collect data with minimal impact to the users or even without their knowledge. General Data Privacy Rules (GDPR) and other privacy laws limits data sharing or use in countries that subscribe to these rules. As a result of these laws, collected data is not often shared outside of the company collecting the data. The chipset or device company captures data to gain insights needed to optimize their products.

Applications like Meta’s Facebook, Instagram, and others already capture some usage data while people are using their applications or while these applications are running in the background. They package and sell this data to the mobile operators and others. We will discuss this in a future post. However, data captured by application providers is not as granular as data collected by the chipset vendors or even the device vendors. Chipset vendors can capture the most granular data.

While few device vendors share some of the captured data with network operators, it is not a widely used practice and not every operator is aware that this data is available. Device and chipset vendors do not regularly share this information for fear of competitive threats and legal ramifications aligned with data ownership and/or privacy regulations.

Why Now and What’s Next?

Why is this data critical now? The amount of data available is massive, more than several libraries of Congress stacked on top of each other. Cloud computing provides global data collection and storage options at a low cost which was not previously attainable. In addition, Cloud providers also enable access to lower costs, advanced analytics platforms like Teradata’s Vantage to normalize and make sense of this data. The raw data by itself would be meaningless with normalization and cleansing, another area where Vantage can assist. However, insights from this data will enable advanced applications not yet imagined. Improved artificial intelligence algorithms trained on this data will open many new possibilities.

A Win for the Operators

Operators can offer new applications and extend beyond being the network provider. In addition, this data will help operators to optimize network slicing and deliver more advanced and differentiated 5G services at higher profits.

Operators are not known for creating killer Apps. But here is where they can benefit the most. They own the customer relationships that generate the data. They can influence their customers to opt-in to data sharing. They also own the ecosystem relationships with chipset and device vendors. They can enter revenue share models with each vendor to make the data accessible to developers and other creative minds.

According to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), there are over 8 billion cellular subscriptions, in addition to billions of IoT devices. These devices generate Petabytes of data daily. Mobile operators can broker access to this data. For example, a sample data from 1% of devices in the US generates 266 billion rows of data which is over 348 Terabyte of data. Charging a fraction of a penny for access can generate over $30 million annually. Now scale that to 10% of the devices and you can see the potential for billions of dollars in additional revenue just for making data accessible.

To learn more about this subject and other capabilities please contact Teradata.

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