In April 2022, twimbit, in partnership with F5 networks and Kyndryl, organised the 2^nd ‘Asia pacific Telecom Summit, 2022: The next frontier.’

Our CEO panel included two of the top CEOs from the leading telecom companies, Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison (IOH) and Telekom Malaysia (TM). These speakers are Vikram Sinha – President Director & CEO of IOH, and Imri Mokhtar – Managing Director/Group Chief Executive Officer of TM.

During the session, Manoj Menon, Founder and Managing Director at twimbit, ignited the keynote conversation around the growth opportunities and challenges that telcos foresee for themselves. We at twimbit have helped summarise the key takeaways from this session.

Key priorities that telcos are setting for themselves

#1 Continue to focus on core connectivity while exploring the adjacencies

Core connectivity remains vital for growth, as noted from the CEO’s priority list. There is a clear aspiration to close the digital divide first, with a strong emphasis on enabling connectivity for all. Whether it is covering unserved places with 4G or providing fixed-mobile connectivity to every household, connectivity is key. It is also fundamental, a base for building adjacencies on top of it, be it digital payments or entertainment, or any other digital service.

Telcos see favourable growth-oriented opportunities in the adjacent services market. And there are three broad reasons why telcos strategically consider including non-connectivity services in their portfolios:

1. It is the disruptions caused by technology and incoming digital demands from both enterprise and retail.
2. Telcos want to leverage their advantage in terms of a broad footprint, allowing them to be at the forefront, curating happy experiences for their customers.
3. Serving customers with multiple services helps in better retention rates while also providing an opportunity to increase revenue per account. Moreover, healthy margins generated from the core business could help a telco flourish its non-connectivity business by further investing them into adjacencies.

#2 Optimising costs through synergies and modernisation of networks

Telcos aim to optimise costs while retaining high profitability through the adoption of synergy value, especially in the case of in-country mergers. Maximisation of resources supports maximisation of growth. Besides that, Imri also highlighted the challenge of aligning CAPEX levels with any unprecedented growth in data consumption. It is not just increasing CAPEX but also ensuring the least amount of impact at the pricing levels for the customers. Hence, this calls for network modernisation as a measure to bring down the cost to serve.

Some of the toughest decisions that telcos are making

#1 People transformation and building the right operating business model

Disruptions caused by the pandemic era have stipulated every industry to rethink how it operates. People transformation and change management has become very crucial amidst this transition. People transformation is nothing but a change in their mindset. It is essential to understand that people transformation is beyond aligning the leadership bench; it extends to educating every stakeholder about the shift and the telco’s newly established priorities and vision.

Not only that, the conventional operating models have become irrelevant. Instead, the post-pandemic period urges a collaborative atmosphere amongst various ecosystem players. Finally, the organisational structure that was once comprised of divisional and functional siloes now needs to change by including more cross-functional teams to drive the overall impact. The decision making should also become more inclusive with a shift from a top-down to a bottom-up approach.

#2 Attracting the digital talent

Another area that telcos are focusing on is attracting digital talent and simultaneously training existing employees. As telcos transform their journeys towards being tech companies, it is crucial for people aiming to work in the tech industry to understand the telcos’ vision. Therefore, to ensure the right messaging to attract digital talent and provide them with the tech culture they need, incorporating a digital subsidiary, which is more tech than telco can help in achieving its purpose – to attract this digital talent.