Telcos Need Stronger Frameworks for New Content-Driven Services, Report Finds

Operators must strengthen and revise their content delivery capabilities for
new technologies, says Light Reading's Services Software Insider

NEW YORK, July 23 /PRNewswire/ -- Telecom network operators must vastly
improve their content delivery infrastructures to support innovative service
bundles, personalized services, and new business models such as
advertising-funded content delivery, or risk being marginalized in the
emerging digital content ecosystem, according to the latest report from Light
Reading's Services Software Insider (www.lightreading.com/servsoftware), a
paid research service of Tech Web's Light Reading (www.lightreading.com).

Content Delivery Platforms: The Next Big SDP Dilemma examines the potential
roles for network operators in emerging content delivery value chains and the
range of content delivery infrastructure functions needed to support those
roles. It discusses and analyses the operators' need to strengthen and revise
their content delivery capabilities for new technologies and tighten
integration with common service-layer systems. The report analyses the impact
that market change and new operator requirements will have on the vendor
community, especially the myriad small mobile content delivery technology
vendors. Finally, the report identifies and analyzes 16 leading technology
suppliers in this emerging market sector.

For a list of companies analyzed in this report, please visit:
http://img.lightreading.com/ssi/pdf/ssi0708companies.pdf

"Network operators recognize the revenue-earning potential of digital content
services, but they've typically approached content services in a highly
opportunistic and fragmented way, with different parts of their organizations
seizing the initiative for particular types of content service, each often
supported by its own 'siloed' service delivery platform," says Caroline
Chappell, research analyst with Light Reading's Services Software Insider and
author of the report. "It's clear that operators will need a sharper set of
content delivery functions that will not add cost or detract from an
operator's flexibility by perpetuating functional silos."

Telecom operators have to move quickly to rationalize their content delivery
frameworks or risk losing significant revenue opportunities, Chappell warns.
"The large vendors engaged with operators on these programs have begun to work
on their content delivery strategies and have acquired technology companies
for help, but there's still much work to do to secure the operator's role in
this market," she says.

Key findings of Content Delivery Platforms: The Next Big SDP Dilemma include:

-- Content providers are setting the pace in content service creation,
developing new "off-portal" content services that operators are finding
difficult to challenge
-- The mobile Internet has begun to free itself from operator's constraints,
allowing mobile devices to access the Internet through browsers, rather than
an operator's WAP portal
-- Operators need their content delivery infrastructures to support a "three
screen" (PC, TV, and mobile) capability
-- Operators should consider outsourcing value chain roles and infrastructure
functions

Content Delivery Platforms: The Next Big SDP Dilemma provides critical insight
and analysis for a range of industry participants, including:

-- Telecom network operators needing insight into new revenue opportunities
that are emerging in the content delivery sector, and which framework
technologies will provide the best options for maximizing these new revenue
streams
-- Technology suppliers assessing the most likely prospects for growth and
development in the content delivery platform sector
-- Content suppliers looking for a detailed analysis of how network operators
are likely to emerge within the content delivery value chain, and how their
changing roles will affect the economics of digital content delivery
-- Investors looking for insight into the impact that content delivery
frameworks will have on the telecom services sector, and which companies are
best positioned to succeed

Content Delivery Platforms: The Next Big SDP Dilemma is available as part of
an annual single-user subscription (six issues) to Light Reading's Services
Software Insider, priced at $1,295. Individual reports are available for $900
(single-user license).

To subscribe, or for more information, please visit:
www.lightreading.com/servsoftware. For more information on all of Light
Reading's Insider services, please visit www.lightreading.com/research.

To request a free executive summary of the report, or for details on
multi-user licensing options, please contact:
Jeff Claudino
Director of Sales
Insider Research Services
619-229-9940
claudino@lightreading.com

Press/analyst contact:

Dennis Mendyk
Managing Director
Insider Research Services
201-587-2154
mendyk@heavyreading.com

About Light Reading
Founded in 2000, Light Reading (www.lightreading.com) is the ultimate source
for technology and financial analysis of the communications industry, leading
the media sector in terms of traffic, content, and reputation. It reaches an
extensive audience of executives and technologists within the telecom and
enterprise networking communities, as well as the financial/industry analysts
and investors who track these sectors. Light Reading was acquired by United
Business Media in August 2005, and operates as a unit of UBM.

About TechWeb
TechWeb (techweb.com/aboutus), the global leader in business technology media,
is an innovative business focused on serving the needs of technology
decision-makers and marketers worldwide. TechWeb produces the most respected
and consumed media brands in the business technology market. Today, more than
13.3 million* business technology professionals actively engage in our
communities created around our global face-to-face events Interop, Web 2.0,
Black Hat and VoiceCon; online resources such as the TechWeb Network, Light
Reading, Intelligent Enterprise, InformationWeek.com, bMighty.com, and The
Financial Technology Network; and the market leading, award-winning
InformationWeek, TechNet Magazine, MSDN Magazine, Wall Street & Technology
magazines. TechWeb also provides end-to-end services ranging from
next-generation performance marketing, integrated media, research, and analyst
services. TechWeb is a division of United Business Media, a global provider of
news distribution and specialist information services with a market
capitalization of more than $2.5 billion.
* 13.3 million business decision-makers: based on # of monthly connections

SOURCE Light Reading's Services Software Insider

Jeff Claudino, Director of Sales, Insider Research Services, +1-619-229-9940,
claudino@lightreading.com; or Press/analyst contact, Dennis Mendyk, Managing
Director, Insider Research Services, +1-201-587-2154, mendyk@heavyreading.com