Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Honing The Enterprise & Wireless Link

From: NEXTEL-1
Date: Fri, 16 Jul 2004 11:40:17 -0400

Honing The Enterprise & Wireless Link
July 16, 2004 9:41am
Wireless Week

Wireless carriers are trying to expand their enterprise business
services repertoires, courting customers with the promise of
higher-bandwidth data networks that can support expanded communications
applications.

However, they also are finding that government agencies and larger
corporations are initiating IT integration projects in which wireless is
just one member of the technology chorus. Hoping to expand their reach
into an enterprise world that is increasingly melding wireless with
wireline technologies, carriers are looking to hone their partnerships
with major systems integrators.
Such is the case for Nextel Communications, which recently inked a
partnership with systems integrator Science Applications International
Corporation (SAIC). The reasoning is simple: To gain a stake in larger
corporations and sectors, Nextel needed to be able to offer more than
just a wireless play.

"We were engaged in a lot of different opportunities where we were
selling wireless services, and we realized that there were system
integration companies that were actually managing a much larger
relationship with the end customer for more than just wireless
services," says Susan Nelson, Nextel's vice president of alliances. "We
wanted to be included in more opportunities. We were expecting very high
growth, and in order to get high growth we need new markets."

SAIC made an attractive partner, bringing its established client list in
the financial and manufacturing verticals, among others. Nextel, in
turn, offers SAIC a stronger wireless service element. "We are an
extension of the system integration partner, and they don't want to be
in the wireless business and the device business, and they are looking
to partner as well," Nelson says.
Likewise, AT&T Wireless has developed a stable of systems integrator
partners, which has helped it court larger government sector contracts,
according to Kent Mathy, executive vice president of AT&T's business
marketing group. For example, in late 2003 AT&T Wireless landed a
contract to supply wireless data systems to six of the 14 airlines that
deliver mail for the U.S. Postal Service, and for each one AT&T used a
systems integrator partner, he says.

"The federal government is probably farther down the road in this model
than the private sector," Mathy says. In the case of a government agency
wanting a converged voice and data system, the agency may have concerns
about security or the need for wireline applications, and "that's when
it's an ideal situation to work with a systems integrator partner."

The growing presence of wireless in enterprise integration has not gone
unnoticed by systems integrators such as IBM. In the past, enterprises
have kept wireless and wireline integrations as separate projects, "but
recently — and I would say this has been in the past year – they are
starting to mix it up," says Dean Douglas, vice president of IBM Global
Services.

Pitfalls Of Partnership Still, if wireless carriers can't maintain some
element of control, these integration projects can present problems. The
alliance agreement is critical to set out the ground rules covering
pricing, service support responsibilities and branding – and it isn't a
one-size-fits-all arrangement.

"We have a relationship with our partners, and also we state we want a
relationship with the end customer. Or in some cases maybe we don't care
— because they [the enterprise] have never been a customer of ours in
the past, and the partner has taken the lead and brought us in," Nelson
says. "We're actually seeing things both ways."

Mathy, too, says the agreement is vital in setting out the
responsibilities for AT&T, the integrator and the customer. "If we are
uncomfortable with the arrangement, we will be very clear to set that
issue on the table with the end customer and make sure that they
understand what the arrangement will allow us to do and not do," Mathy
says. "It is not uncommon in the course of that conversation for the
arrangement to be tweaked, once the customer understands how this is
going to play itself out."
AT&T has even passed on an integration project because the terms were
not workable, he adds.

Indeed, while the wireless carrier may be one provider to the
integration project, it is not in a subservient role to the systems
integrator, Douglas says.

"A lot of times when folks look at subcontractors versus prime
contractors, they almost look at it as a lord and serf relationship. But
it's not — it's really a symbiotic relationship," he notes. "The fact is
that the subcontractors do have to perform and they have to perform in a
sensitive way. But we have more of a peer relationship with many of our
own partners as opposed to looking at them as the subcontractor and
everything rolls downhill to them."

Competition Conflicts? Becoming a subcontractor to a systems integration
partner also could pose problems if the partner uses multiple wireless
carriers based on coverage or service offerings — for example, tapping
Nextel for push-to-talk but another carrier for data services. Nelson
notes the answer again is to spell that out in the contract.

"Typically we have an advocate within each of our partners, and we
identify those things up front," she says. Usually it is an issue of
coverage rather than services, so the contract can allow the systems
integrator to bring in a competitor who can fill in the coverage.

Similarly, AT&T has worked on integration projects where it is not the
only wireless carrier involved, but Mathy says that situation doesn't
occur as frequently now.

"The coverage of our GSM/GPRS/ EDGE network now is fabulous, and so that
becomes less and less of a concern," he says. "If the customer is in a
situation where there are multiple wireless suppliers and they have a
lead systems integrator, we will work in that situation just fine."

More Partnerships Look for the number of systems integrator partners to
grow among carriers. Mathy notes that in addition to its government
sector focus, AT&T is eyeing integration partners in financial, health
care, insurance, food and beverage and high-tech manufacturing sectors.

"We are constantly looking for new partners, but frankly we go through a
pretty exhaustive conversation and set of screens to make sure it makes
sense to both parties," Mathy says.

Nelson, meanwhile, says Nextel has forged strategic relationships with
IBM, EDS and Unisys and is looking for more such arrangements. "It's
dependent on whether they have a stronghold in education, higher-ed or
K-12, and we work with them to identify where they are putting their
resources," Nelson says. "Amazingly it is pretty spread out, so that's
why we are continuing to look for alliances."

For its part, IBM has made formal announcements of strategic
relationships with Nextel and Sprint, but it also has agreements with
several of the other major carriers to get the right mix, Douglas says.

"We don't have an extraordinary bias against any of the carriers. The
fact is that our relationship with our clients requires that we be
agnostic. Any good systems integrator is going to be agnostic," he says.

Going forward, the trend is toward more complex enterprise
communications environments. Douglas says to look for VoIP, blending
wireline and wireless systems, as well as higher-bandwidth cellular data
along with Wi-Fi, Wi-MAX and other wireless technologies. That will
bring in even more players, and in that ecosystem wireless carriers need
to invest in their enterprise support technology — and be willing to
cooperate as much as they compete.

"We think that the most valuable partners we have are the ones that are
willing to collaborate and cooperate not just across the network
infrastructure piece, but are doing the right kind of services
capabilities and products in place to support ultimately the enterprise
client base," Douglas says. "It's a very, very different business
supporting enterprise than it is supporting consumers."
Consortium Adds Wireless To Integration Picture

Karen Brown

With wireless playing more of a role in major enterprise integration
projects, an effort is under way to create some consistent guidelines to
direct the work.

The Integration Consortium, an international group of IT outfits seeking
to provide standards and support for the enterprise market, formed a
wireless committee to examine how wireless can be brought into the fold.

"There are a number of companies that see a very tight link between
enterprise application integration and wireless integration in the
enterprise," says Ben Reich, COO of Orsus Solutions and chairman of the
new committee. "And the reason for that is just a professional reason.
Technically speaking, wireless integration today is an extension of
enterprise application integration in the sense that you are really
connecting different applications in the enterprise."

The committee aims to tackle issues that involve switching from cellular
to Wi-Fi systems and maintaining a solid connection. "It's also the
applications side of it – and that is bringing the wireless applications
into the fold of enterprise applications today and trying to connect
them as seamlessly as possible into the enterprise application," Reich
adds.

The committee also will have to work with different carrier strategies.
In Europe, the carriers are developing managed service offerings that
mix wireless airtime and applications. In contrast, in the United
States, "mostly what we see is integration projects with the carriers,
and these are carriers that want to sell airtime and have an integration
arm that deals with enterprise applications in order to increase the
airtime that the enterprises are using," Reich says. "We see less of a
managed service type of approach, but we do see some."

The newly formed committee hopes to have its agenda and goals ready next
quarter.
"As vendors we want to spread the word of wireless integration coming
into the fold of the more traditional integration that has been there
for the past 20 years," Reich says. "We'd like to get carriers into the
committee and customers so that we can build a strategy for
standardizing this connectivity across the enterprise."

Copyright © 2004 Reed Business Information - US

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