I have always believed that no matter where you are, what position you have, and what job you do, if you don't have enough motivation, expectation, and love in your heart, you can't develop a strong sense of mission and responsibility, or a sense of happiness.
Recently, I finished reading The Way to Happiness, and I was very touched by a passage in the book: "The busy running type is a slave to the future, the hedonistic type is a slave to the present, and the nihilistic type is a slave to the past." In the operator's work we have experienced from the golden decade of the communications industry to bring the "golden bowl", the industry encountered a "plateau platform period" of the copper rice bowl, and even the whole society "everyone to be put to death after the fast" of the "paper rice bowl", whether it is a business or in which individuals are feeling the enormous pressure and resistance.
So, some people chose the "hedonism" type of survival, day after day in the unit to mix the day; some people chose the "nihilism" type of survival, immersed in the past glory, lying in the book of credit on the life; there are some people chose the "busy running around" type of survival, open endless meetings, not enough to do the report, write the program, although busy all day long and do nothing. It is so, there is my last article written in the "four kinds of people" - those who want to go and can go eventually chose to leave here, those who want to go but can not go all day complaining about the system, those who do not want to go can not go dim day, the rest of those who can go but do not want to go to the pain of the struggle ... ... ...
I. What are operators going through?
Borrowing the classic opening line from A Tale of Two Cities, this is the best of times, this is the worst of times. For operators such as traditional enterprises that naturally rely on the demographic dividend, scale dividend, the future days may not be good. Whether it's from the media, or the user's criticism, or employees have left, all the signs are indicating that the industry has long fallen from the "altar" of the elephant running fast, and has become slow, slow and even a bit of a mess.
But that wasn't the case ten years ago. Thirty years ago it was even less so.
The opening sentence of The Great Leap Forward: The Thirty Years of China's Telecommunications Industry reads: "From economic bottleneck to social leader, from the last in the world to the world's first in the total number of subscribers, China's telecommunication industry in the thirty years of reform and opening up has realized a great leap forward that has attracted world attention! How did all this happen? This book vividly reproduces the brilliant history of China's telecom industry in the past 30 years of reform and opening up, choosing two meaningful points in time, 1978 and 2008, the former being the key year when China officially blew the trumpet of reform and opening up, and the latter being the key year of the golden decade of the telecom industry.
Between the lines, you can read how brilliant China's communications industry has experienced, and can feel the practitioners of that kind of confidence and honor. The times have changed dramatically, with the former giants producing more impressive business results than ever before, but losing out on political status and the industry's image.
When we talk about carriers today, what comes to mind? It is the glittering performance on the financial statements, or the confusion and anxiety in the face of competition inside and outside the industry; it is the pride and joy of completing a 4G, 4G network, or the depression and heartache of pipeline, low-value, and marginalization; it is the self-confidence and complacency of completing as many KPIs as possible, or the unexpected departure of the grass-roots level.
Is the operator really doing something wrong? Probably not.
Look at the times! This is a constant struggle with peers, but helpless by the OTT copied the back road of the times; a everywhere full of opportunities, a closer look at the time but full of crisis; a traditional big organizations lose power disintegration, personal freedom to connect the full rise of the times ......
This is a only change is not broken the big time. In this era, competitors have changed, the rules of the game have changed, user habits have changed, everything that was once taken for granted has suddenly changed drastically. Voice, SMS these traditional business is accelerating the decline of traffic, although it has become a new growth point, but had to face the huge pressure of "speed up and down". It can be said that in this era, operators are like trapped beasts, want to struggle but full of powerlessness, want to change but afraid of uncertainty, want to break through but can not find a breakthrough ......
The only way left is probably the three words: go out.
Second, what should operators do?
For operators now, there are only two ways out, either to plow the inventory of customers, digging a greater value point; or to open up new markets, looking for a breakthrough in the industry. On the fine-tuning of the stock market, there have been too many articles in this regard, and I will not repeat here. I want to focus on the new market.
1. Where are the new markets?
A few days ago, Kevin Kelly, the godfather of the Internet and tech business prophet, gave a 3-hour talk at Stanford University about his insights into the major tech business trends of the next 20 years. I was intrigued by one of the insights; he said that no matter what industry you're in now, the business you're in is a data business.
Data!
Whether it's the burgeoning mobile internet or the multitude of people who are changing the world, they're all accessing information through their carriers' networks.
At a big data industry presentation in Beijing in March 2014, Jack Ma, founder of the Alibaba Group, gave his keynote speech - "Humanity is moving from the IT era to the DT era. the IT era is based on self-control and self-management, while the DT era, it is the technology that mainly serves the public and stimulates productivity."
We all know that in this year's Double 11 Global Carnival, Alibaba Tmall took less than 12 hours to break last year's record 57.1 billion yuan of transaction volume, and finally locked the record at 91.2 billion, of which 71% were wireless transactions, and the number of countries and regions that generated transactions worldwide reached 205.
What's behind the huge turnover? Is Ali's increasingly powerful supply and logistics system? Or is it the total decline of traditional retail? In fact, it's neither. I thought the back of this reflects Alibaba's powerful data analysis and mining capabilities. In such a shopping festival, the most important question is how many goods the merchants have to prepare? And this can be done through the platform historical sales of big data, predicting the demand for goods, providing merchants with the basis for inventory, to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of inventory.
And in the era of department stores, shopping data can only be counted manually and may not be accurate, but Alibaba will leave everyone's historical shopping and browsing data on the cloud. So Taobao can be more than just an e-commerce platform, it's a big data platform for customers.
Tu Zipui, vice president of Alibaba Group, cited an easier-to-understand case when talking about the concept: Can you predict which areas of the country will have more second-child births? According to the traditional data statistics, it is estimated that we can only rely on the population census, urban and rural counties around the statistical department of the layers of reporting, not only will there be bias and will lag. But in Alibaba, you only need to count which regions have experienced a surge in sales of maternity products, which is not only true but also more convenient.
The same goes for carriers. You think carriers are just providers of communication pipes? In fact, perhaps it's also a service provider of information adaptation. In the past, the files, folders, desktops, and all that stuff we used stayed local. I remember the time when the best backup tool was probably a removable hard disk or a Blu-ray disc or something like that. And when we entered the internet age, the data was on web pages and in links. Now the cloud has tags, traffic, news, and all sorts of information we need. Cloud and data are the key words of this era. Knowing that all of this information is transmitted through the carrier's network is the same as information about goods sold from Taobao, except that the information itself, its sender and receiver may be the focus of our concern.
And so, proactively pushing the right information to the people who need it is a big data service that carriers can provide.
2. How big is the new market?
Wu Jichuan, chairman of China Cloud Computing Technology and Industry Alliance, once pointed out that: big data is the foundation of cloud computing services, is the most basic element of framing the cloud platform, there is no analyzing big data on massive information, there is no possibility of obtaining valuable information for all information consumers.
So in the business world, big data has begun to become the business of many companies. The 2015 White Paper on Big Data Transactions in China shows that the market size of China's big data industry is expected to exceed 10 times the size of this market last year by 2020, expanding from 76.7 billion yuan in 2014 to 822.881 billion yuan.
On August 19, 2015, the State Council executive meeting passed the "Outline of Action on Promoting the Development of Big Data", which may mean that big data in China will gradually step into the right track and enter the era of top-level design, which will undoubtedly accelerate the further development of the economic development engine.
From the operator's point of view? Taking China Mobile as an example, we have more than 820 million users, 1.1 million 4G base stations, more than 10B of data in the operation analysis system, and our 10086 has a huge number of users calling every minute, in fact, all of these actions are generating a large amount of data every day. So how big is this data and what is the effect of centralizing it?
Some people have done calculations, a provincial company a day's data to hundreds of P, these data are concentrated in a point of transmission to the China Mobile (Gui'an) big data center, the need to rebuild a CMNET, that is, the backbone of the China Mobile Internet.
So in a sense, operators have an endless supply of data mine, standing on the gold mine is better than no mine to dig, which is my judgment that operators may be in the era of big data "bottoming out" one of the basis.
3. What are the other uncertainties?
While the future is promising, it is after all a brand new field. In a new field there are bound to be new rules of the game, and there will be a corresponding process of adaptation to the rules.
In the past few years, the concept of Big Data has sparked countless controversies and discussions in the industry, and has even long appeared in Gartner's Emerging Technology Maturity Curve (also known as the Emerging Technology Hype Cycle Report). The reason is very simple: a new technology is mostly talked about as a concept, and although it is repeatedly exposed in the media, there are few application cases.
As a result, big data is increasingly seen as a talking point for the commentariat rather than a real industry.
In Guiyang, the world's first big data exchange was set up to provide data trading services globally through an electronic system, with a plan to clean up data and trade up to 10,000 petabytes per year in 2020, totaling 3 trillion dollars per year. However, since its inception, this popular organization to summarize the transaction record is only more than 3,000. "There are not many enterprises and organizations that have the will to trade big data." The exchange staff said so.
On top of that, there are several key uncertainties weighing on the development of the big data industry.
A.Insufficient technical capabilities.IT, as a means of back-end support, is realized in large quantities through outsourcing or procurement, so its capabilities in its own software development and big data platform operation and maintenance, application of new big data technologies, and big data analysis and mining are quite limited.
B. Data "walls" exist in large numbers. A lot of data is scattered in different systems, after a long time of "shaft" type operation, has formed a barrier that is difficult to break through. China Mobile, for example, the B domain is mainly business analysis data, O domain is mainly network operation and maintenance data, M domain is mainly management information data, but these three domains of the IT system are responsible for three different departments, the integration of the difficulty, it is difficult to form a "1 1 > 2" data fusion effect.
C. Organizational mismatch. At present, few organizations will set up a special department to centralize various scattered data, not to mention the standardized management and maintenance of these data.
D. Lagging thinking concept. If the disadvantages in terms of technology, capital, and talents can be made up through later efforts, the lack of awareness level will take quite a long time to cultivate.
In addition to the points mentioned above, the security of big data transactions, the reasonableness of pricing, the confidentiality of customer information, all to a certain extent affect the scale of big data business and development space.
Three, the operator to play with big data of the heart and body
Operators in the end how to play with big data? I think we need to answer three questions: First, where is the data? The second is where to put the data? Third, how to use the data?
1. Where is the data?
It is said that we are experiencing a new era of business - the era of sharing economy, consumers are abandoning the traditional, inefficient businesses, and turn into the arms of sharing businesses to get the products and services they want.Uber makes the seat of the car to share better, Airbnb makes the empty house better share, eight ring network to make ideas and design better share ...... Now look, everything that can be shared is value data.
In the age of the sharing economy, what is really being shared is effective supply and demand. Therefore, in the sharing economy, what is more important is actually creating supply and demand scenarios and establishing supply and demand connections.
The same applies to data. With the explosive development of new-generation information technology such as mobile Internet, cloud computing, and Internet of Things, smartphones, tablet PCs, wearable devices, and sensors all over the place are increasingly accessing the operator's network. All kinds of interaction data and sensing data are being generated rapidly from all walks of life. These large quantities, wide-ranging, rapidly generated and updated big data contain unprecedented social and commercial value.
How to effectively mine and reflect the value of data is an urgent problem. In my opinion, the key lies in the establishment of data use scenarios and the construction of data trading platforms.
For example, if an urban planning and design institute needs to assess the commercial value of a new area, it can provide an analysis of the regional population and economic situation through the operator's grid data analysis; for example, if a medical organization needs to stock up on medicines and medical equipment for a certain period of time, it can use the healthcare reporting platform to count the region's medical diagnosis and medication use, and predict the large-scale diseases that can occur in the region. diseases in the region, so as to reserve relevant resources in time.
Importantly, it helps data consumers find the data they need more quickly and efficiently, and facilitates transactions between them.
2. Where to put the data?
Where to store data on such a large scale is also one of the elements that tests the big data industry. It is important to know that not all organizations have enough resources to build their own data centers. And in this regard, carriers can provide just the right service.
The communications industry has a term called "carrier-grade services," meaning that communications services should have uninterrupted operation, high capacity, high stability, reliability and other characteristics. To achieve these conditions, it is necessary to complete the QoS protection mechanism, and one of the important links is the advanced facilities, standardized management of the communications room.
So it can be said that in the data room, communications carriers have an inherent advantage.
Can this be used as an entry point for operators to enter the big data market? Openness and cooperation become the key words for this part. As I said earlier, there are many data and information silos in traditional organizations, and the first step in breaking down the constantly constructed "data wall" is to centralize their storage, management and operation. Therefore, the operator's high-standard data center may only be a necessary but not sufficient condition, to let the data from different areas of the "role of the chemical combination" of the premise is to store these data in the operator's data center.
ICT infrastructures have both connectivity and storage roles, and the data they generate is stored in different endpoints so that it can be used in applications where it has value. And carriers have both connectivity and storage functions.
For the future, the carrier data center will become the center of the network, and building a business-oriented, agile, flexible, and green cloud IT infrastructure will make the carrier data center the driving center of the new generation of ICT infrastructure.
3. How will the data be used?
What is the biggest challenge for carriers now? Is it the lack of end-to-end quality assurance resulting in a user experience that is not good enough? Is it the rapid decline of traditional business due to the impact of OTT business? Or is it the ever-increasing scissor gap between business volume and revenue, and the pressure on investment is getting tighter and tighter? Personally, I don't think so. Our biggest challenge is that users tend to be satisfied with existing services. This can lead us to a serious path dependence, which can also lead to "complacency".
In fact, operators are now facing three important shifts: from a focus on functionality to a focus on the end-user experience; from the provision of voice and bandwidth to the provision of rich, open ICT-enabled converged information services; and from growth based on demographic dividends to growth through application innovation. These three shifts have brought about transformations in business models, operational models, R&D models and technological innovations that will drive the telecom industry from closed to open digital operations.
There are at least three things that can be done to digitize operations: first, inventory data assets; second, build computing power; and third, open data platforms. According to the thinking of the general manager of Guizhou Mobile, Mr. David Mi, the operator's big data development path is divided into three versions: 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0.
Big Data 1.0 is mainly for operators' internal analysis, and the construction focuses on data integration and capability building, laying the foundation for data value exploration, and focusing on supporting precise marketing and precise network construction; Big Data 2.0 is mainly for data value enhancement, focusing on gradually expanding the capability of internal and external data value excavation; Big Data 3.0 is mainly for data realization, focusing on key customers and industries, building a data ecosystem, and gradually highlighting the importance of the data ecosystem; Big Data 3.0 is mainly for data realization, focusing on key customers and industries, and building a data ecosystem. Big Data 3.0 focuses on data realization, focusing on key customers and industries, building a data ecosystem, and gradually highlighting external revenues.
Currently, operators have accumulated a lot of data assets on IT systems and network systems (of course, if improperly disposed of, they may also be turned into a data legacy ......), and the communication network reconfigured through IT technologies such as SDN and NFV will form a new resilient and intelligent network architecture. The IT of the network will require the establishment of a network architecture with a cloud data center as the core, and the data center will become the core of ICT infrastructure. The layout and planning of the data center will determine the future architecture of the network, and also the future competitiveness.
With more than 20 years of Internet development, the "Connected Generation" and "Digital Genius" have grown up to master the future. Compared with the previous generation, their behavioral and thinking patterns of communication, dating, entertainment, consumption, work, and learning have changed profoundly, and their dependence on the digital society and the Internet is inherent, representing the new consumer behavior in the Internet era.
Operators' new business operation system is no longer a simple support system, nor a simple marketing interface online, but a value creation system and ecosystem system that connects operators, customers and partners, and connects networks, applications and content. The traditional offline business hall will be greatly reduced or even disappeared, instead, the user can enjoy all online mode on-demand, real-time customization to enjoy the services, the operator through the big data analysis of customer insights and accurate marketing, to provide more intelligent customer service.
From purchasing products to purchasing services, the rules of the game in the business world are fundamentally changing, and the relationship between merchants and users has just begun from the moment of delivery.
Lawrence Roberts, the father of the Internet, once said, "Since the birth of the Web, we have achieved only increased network speeds, and have made no progress at all in improving network performance and beyond." In this regard, operators are actively building a new type of business operation system from the consumer experience. The new system is no longer a simple business support system and network management system, and it is not simply marketing online, but a value creation system that connects operators, customers and partners, and connects networks, applications and content.
Afterword
For carriers, the golden decade of traditional communications has long since passed, and the platinum decade of innovation and growth may have just begun. Standing at the crossroads of the era of alternation, I am filled with only one thought - "Perhaps I did not catch up with the golden decade of the communications industry, but I will certainly not miss the platinum decade of the era of big data again".