Lift and Shift: How it Impacts the BSS-on-cloud Transformation?

With the technology of 5G comes a huge number of revenue opportunities for Telecom Service Providers (TSPs). But with the numerous benefits of 5G use cases, there are complexities too that aren’t easy to manage unless you are utilizing the BSS that is really cloud-native. Here comes cloud computing into the picture…..

Cloud computing is primarily transforming the way organizations think about their IT infrastructure. Now, the on-premise deployments have become a thing of the past, as more and more organizations are making a move towards cloud or relocating their assets to a colocation data centre.

There are many CSPs who have started shifting their BSS/OSS workloads onto the cloud. This is making them capable to create new service offerings, launching bundled digital products, and even updating costing, promotions, and a lot more. A cloud BSS also allows scaling the services in accordance with the demand of the customers that too while offering cost-effective solutions and a high-quality customer experience.

What it’s like migrating to the cloud?

When organizations migrate their services to the cloud, one of the options that they think about is lift-and-shift that includes picking modular applications and then containerizing them in the belief that they are cloud-ready. Though the approach seems to be great, there are chances that it might fail due to many reasons. Due to this, the TSPs can’t leverage any of the benefits of shifting to the cloud.

What’s the reason behind the failure of lift and shift?

For lift and shift, CSPs need multiple crucial elements to make migration a success. The first element is the security and privacy of data. If the organization isn’t aware of the data protection laws of the state or country, then it’s not possible to effectively implement cloud BSS at different locations. It is very essential for the TSPs to understand what they can and cannot do with the consumer’s data when moving BSS to the cloud.

There are performance challenges too, such as all the premise applications will might not perform well on the cloud. This incorporates policy and charging rules function and even network provisioning. Thus, before you take the plunge it’s better to assess the application performance.

Apart from this, there’s cost escalation that can also be the reason why lift and shift fail. If we talk about the other factors, then there is miscommunication, skill gap, and lack of training that can lead to an increase in cost. Without a proper plan, you can’t carry out a fruitful migration of BSS to the cloud.

Additionally, there’s a lack of expertise that one needs to address before shifting to the cloud. Though the TSPs are highly capable and experienced when it comes to on-premise of traditional BSS services, migrating to the cloud without the help of an expert can lead to disaster. It’s better to talk to professionals like the one you can find at Echelon Edge.

What can you do in order to make it work?

So, the big question is how CSPs can make the lift and shift a success. For this, they need a fully-fledged systematic approach to identify the appropriate platform and to assure a smooth BSS migration. A few things to consider are as follows:

1. Technical Evaluation: The fact is that not all the applications are suitable for the cloud or multi-tenant architecture. Thus, the first thing CSPs need to do is to carry out a technical evaluation of the application to find out whether it has cloud and technical capabilities. There must be a feature-rich deployment stack that can offer consistent customer experiences across operations, configuration, management, provisioning and administration.
2. Evaluate the Cloud Service Providers: It is necessary to analyse the cloud service provider and if it’s right for you or not. In order to select the right cloud vendor, you need to ensure that all the platform components are in place. It’s important to find a vendor who can serve you under your budget and also maintain a strong regional presence while offering enough support to the ecosystem applications.
3. Business & Operational Evaluation: After testing the application and cloud vendor, the next step is to conduct a business and operational evaluation. This can be done through multi-stack and multi-tenant analysis. For example, operators who have operations running in multiple regions or are managing multiple solutions can go for namespace based deployment models for attaining maximum operational efficiency.
4. Cost vs Benefit Efficiency: This is the most crucial aspect of finding the right platform. You need to write down the long-term operational cost and the project implementation. When you weigh up all the parameters, you can easily decide if a particular cloud vendor is a good fit for you or not.

Conclusion:

The lift and shift approach can help the telecom operators to migrate smoothly onto the cloud, though the process isn’t suitable for everyone. It’s better to understand the benefits and drawbacks first and then carry out the process. What is essential for the companies is to determine if they should dedicate time and effort to relocating into the cloud via lift and shift or not.