With the soaring competition among the telecommunication companies, it has become

imperative that the Telecommunication companies offer the best cutting edge service in order
to get an advantage over the others. In doing so, the companies are in a bid to put in the very
best services for satisfy each customers specific need. When these are taken away from them
creates dissatisfaction among the customers, hence has resulted in many customers using
more than a single telecommunication network hence the need for quality, accessible,
sustainable and affordable network usage. All these could not be actualized without proper
network maintenance which is the import for the study. In other countries worldwide, one of
the major challenges confronting the industry as observed by the Green Power For Mobile,
Best Practice Guide West Africa (2013:4)
Nigeria and Ghana in West Africa have reached a mobile subscriber base of over 107 and 25 million
respectively, driven by strong growth in mobile penetration and mobile network coverage (coverage of
80% of the population). Nigeria and Ghana combined have a total of 35,000 sites of which 50% are
located in areas without commercial grid power, and mostly in rural and remote locations often with
difficult accessibility for smooth and effective operations. Therefore, operation and maintenance of the
network remains a big challenge affecting the cost of operations, network availability and reliability of
mobile telecommunication services.

This thesis has two main goals. Besides the ultimate goal of seeking to propose a more
efficient method of scheduled network maintenance with the aim of improving the system, it
also examines the existing network maintenance culture.

Nowadays, globally, the companies outsource their maintenance works to a third party
company to overcome the problem of rampant network failure. Outsourcing sub-contracts to
third party entities seems to have had a special attraction for telecommunication companies
because it offers an efficient and also has an overall value for money advantage.

Sprint outsourced its network maintenance to Ericsson in a seven-year deal. The deal allowed
Sprint to offload the costs associated with running its network. The deal also made it possible
for Sprint to also transfer 6,000 employees to Ericsson. Ericsson then took responsibility for
the day-to-day operations, maintenance, climbing cell towers and other items. Speaking on
the matter, t he Sprint's president of network operations and wholesale, said on a conference
call that Sprint still owns its network and is responsible for strategic plans and investments.
He added that the goal was to improve the quality of the network and deploy next-generation
technologies.

Sprint

will

keep

its

customer

service

operations

(http://www.zdnet.com/article/sprint-outsources-network-maintenance-andoperations-to-ericsson/:2009)

Tigo Ghana also revealed a partnership with Ericsson in order to provide quality network
service delivery and maintenance. According to Tigo Ghana, Ericsson will manage all Tigos
network maintenance as well as boost connectivity nationwide. Tigo Ghana CEO Roshi
Motman said the partnership would culminate in the improvement of the companys network
as well as increase its penetration in the countryside. Motman said the partnership will
guarantee network quality and optimisation, which is crucial for customer experience. Tigo
Ghana is going to leverage on their expertise to offer our customers a reliable and seamless
network experience.
Motman explained that although, like other telecom companies the network is core to their
operations, companies like Ericsson are market leaders and renowned for telecommunications
services.
Motman believes the partnership will give Tigo Ghana the opportunity to focus on delivering
the quality experience for its customers and managing the network.

It will also guarantee network quality and optimisation which is crucial for customer
experience Roshi emphasised. Ericsson will manage all maintenance and operations of Tigo
Ghanas active network among others.

The maintenance concept for capital goods has gained more importance as availability and
reliability has become a significant issue for manufacturing companies and service
organizations. Among maintenance policies, Condition Based Maintenance has become
prominent by supporting right-on-time maintenance based on tangible reasons. Condition
Based Maintenance is a developed proactive maintenance strategy which increases
availability of capital goods while eliminating over-maintenance cost.
Aiming to increase availability and reduce scheduled and unscheduled downtime, ASML

started to develop and use predictive tools. Local offices initiated condition monitoring and
these initiatives resulted in local improvements on down time. ASMLs objective is to
develop a sustainable solution by bringing the locally developed monitoring tooling
knowledge into sustainable toolset of means and methods.
This master thesis aims to develop data driven decision support model which alerts the user
before the failure occurs, and indicates the remaining useful life (RUL) of capital goods
by using condition-based data.

No

other

industry

touches

as

many

technology-related

business

sectors

as

telecommunications, which, by definition, encompasses not only the traditional areas of local
and long-distance telephone service, but also advanced technology-based services including
wireless communications, the Internet, fiber-optics and satellites. Telecom is also deeply
intertwined with entertainment of all types. Cable TV systems, such as Comcast, are
aggressively offering local telephone service and high-speed Internet access.

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) is a term that is used to help describe
the relationship between the myriad types of goods, services and networks that make up the
global information and telecommunications system. Sectors involved in ICT include
landlines, private networks, the Internet, wireless communications, (including cellular and
remote wireless sensors) and satellites.

Globally, in the broadest possible sense (based on ICT), the telecommunications industry will
be about a $5.4 trillion sector in 2014, up from $5.0 trillion for the previous year. (This figure
includes equipment and related services, as well as subscriber revenues and other business
revenues.) The United States market will be about $1.3 trillion for 2014, up from $1.2 trillion

in the previous year. These estimates come from the Telecommunications Industry
Association (TIA).

There were approximately 6.9 billion wireless service subscriptions worldwide as of mid2014, according to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). This is immense
growth from about 4 billion at the end of 2008 and 1.41 billion in 2003. However, the actual
number of individuals holding those subscriptions is somewhat less, at approximately 5.7
billion (according to Plunkett Research), as many people have more than one
subscription. This would indicate 79 people having subscriptions per 100 global population.

The ITU estimates global landlines at 1.15 billion as of mid-2014, down from 1.21 billion
in 2009. This is only 16.5 landlines per 100 global population. Clearly, the growth in
telecommunications is in wireless access and Internet usage in general.
Several major factors are creating deep changes in the telecommunications sector today,
including: a) a shift in business and commercial telephones to VOIP (Voice Over Internet
Protocol) services, that is, telephone via the Internet; b) a shift in residential and personal
telephone use from wired services to wireless; c) intense competition between cable and
wired services providers; d) soaring growth in the amount of data and video accessed via the
Internet and over wireless devices for information and entertainment purposes of all types;
and e) the continuing evolution of advanced wireless technologies, including more
smartphones and wider availability of 3G services and 4G services. Simply put, a growing
number of telecommunications service users prefer to make their phone calls, download data,
view entertainment and otherwise access the Internet via smartphones and tablets, not fixed
telephones or PCs plugged into the wall.

Ingenuity, innovation, cost control and a reasonable approach to spending and investment will
help to move the telecom industry ahead while it goes through these evolutionary
changes. New cellular, cable, satellite, VOIP and wireless technologies promise continuous
rapid advancement in this sector while posing a massive threat to traditional landlines. The
cost of a cellphone call has become a bargain worldwide. Meanwhile, competition among
handset makers is more intense than ever. On the higher end, cellphone manufacturers are
adding advanced new features to smartphones on a regular basis. These phones now contain
significant computing power and memory, to the extent that todays smartphones easily have
more computer processing power than a PC of 15 years ago, at a fraction of the size and
weight of a PC.

Improved cellphone service has prompted tens of millions of consumers to cancel their
landlines altogether, eating into traditional revenue streams at AT&T and Verizon, among
others. Meanwhile, wireless access to the Internet threatens traditional DSL broadband
revenues.

As more consumers recognize the promise, and good value, of phone service using VOIP,
millions of households and businesses worldwide have signed up for less-expensive VOIP
service as an alternative to landlines, often through their cable providers as part of a bundle of
services. A handful of firms, such as Comcast, lead the VOIP market, along with relatively
young companies like Skype (acquired by Microsoft in 2011) and Vonage. Savvy consumers
realize that some VOIP services are free, such as certain international calls on Skype or Viber.

At the same time, local phone companies, led by Verizon and AT&T, are laying fiber-optic
cable directly to the neighborhood, and even into the home and office, in order to retain

customers with promises of ultra-high-speed Internet connections and enhanced

entertainment offerings online. This is the big telcos way of fighting back against cable
companies. If cellphone owners are dropping their landlines, while VOIP over cable takes
even more landline customers away, then the best weapon that traditional telcos can use in
their battle for market share is very high speed Internet. AT&T and its peers are focusing on
bundled service packages (combining wireless accounts, very high-speed Internet access and
entertainment such as video on demand and TV via IP, in addition to VOIP or landlines).

For the future, both landline and cable companies will develop innovative new value-added
services that are accessed online. For example, consumers might respond well to bundled
services that monitor home security or adjust home energy usage, or services that monitor the
movements and needs of elderly family members at home via landline or cable. The right
value-added services, controlled via smartphones, remote wireless sensors and/or the Internet,
could get consumers hooked, with the potential to build new revenues and stop customer
turnover.

Mergers, acquisitions and other industry changes redefined telecom in recent years. AT&T
and SBC merged (changing the name of the merged company to AT&T, Inc.), and MCI
merged into Verizon. Sprint and Nextel have combined to create wireless giant Sprint. Qwest
merged into CenturyLink (formerly CenturyTel). The competitive landscape is shifting
dramatically due to such mergers.
In addition, government regulations are evolving quickly, which will bring even bigger
changes to business strategies. Overall, the telecommunications industry is in a state of
continuous technological and economic flux driven by intense competition and new
technologies.

This entry was posted on November 11, 2014 by NOTadmin.