Blurred Lines’ was one of the best selling and most controversial pop tracks of 2013, and it also sums up the increasing state of play in wholesale.
As carriers continue to explore fresh growth opportunities outside of their traditional core competencies, there is increased potential for direct and indirect sales channels to clash. In its latest report, Ovum has in particular predicted a year of heightened conflict between wholesale and enterprise sales channels. The analyst firm warns that stricter segmentation for wholesale and enterprise customers is required moving forward and that assigning specific accounts to each group will enable a more positive customer experience.
Some organisations have already responded to this through major restructuring, in particular by aligning their wholesale units to report into their enterprise counterparts. This trend was perhaps best symbolised in 2013 by the restructuring of Vodafone, which positioned its wholesale unit under the Group Enterprise division. Although this is not presently the case for many of the Tier 1 carriers operating in the market, enterprise does appear to be in the driving seat moving forward.
The potential for internal conflict doesn’t end with just wholesale and enterprise. Less mature market opportunities such as M2M are also helping to blur the lines. Again while some organisations chose to establish a dedicated M2M business unit, others have aligned M2M under either wholesale or enterprise.
In a business where pre and post sales channels are an essential life source of
the industry, can carriers afford to become embroiled in organisational politics and internal competition?
