Exclusive – Mycom OSI lands O2 Germany E-Plus network integration gig

Network assurance vendor Mycom OSI is set to announce it has won the business to make sure the integration of the O2 Germany and E-Plus networks goes according to plan.

The O2 Germany E-plus merger has not been a rapid affair. KPN accepted a bid of €5 billion from Telefónica for E-Plus back in the summer of 2013, which the European Commission then took a year to approve – pretty quick by its standards. Even then it took another year-and-a-half before Telefónica Deutschland got cracking on the network integration.

The Mycom OSI win would seem to indicate this process is coming to a conclusion. All the operations tech – network, security and OSS – needs to be consolidated and brought up to date. This is obviously very complicated, which is why a dedicated performance management solution was taken on.

“Both O2 and E-Plus independently used Mycom OSI PrOptima performance management systems successfully for many years prior to the network merger, and although we comprehensively evaluated other solutions in the market, Mycom OSI was re-confirmed as the leading solution,” said Marcus Thurand, VP Network Operations, Telefonica Germany, “But in addition, Mycom OSI differentiated with their integrated ProInsight network analytics product and Guided Diagnostics solutions which we plan to roll out soon to help with our planning and operational processes.”

“Telefonica Germany is renowned for its technical leadership but even with Telefonica Germany’s immense technical skill and experience the merger of these two networks and their operational processes is a complex challenge in the industry,” said Mycom OSI President and CTO, Mounir Ladki.

This is a nice win for Mycom OSI, not just for the business itself but as a high-profile network assurance project at a time when telecoms networks around the world are preparing for the fundamental changes that will come with the 5G/IoT/cloud era. Operators aren’t exactly rolling in cash these days so competition will be fierce for any network upgrade/integration business.