A new business strategy for teleoperators: opportunity for modern broadband access technologies

The paper concerns business strategies for a teleoperator company in the area of new transmission technologies providing broadband communication facilities to end-users-typically private homes and small companies. Practical applications may include multimedia, LAN interconnection solutions, fast fixed (not dial up) access to electronic services, integration of networks (e.g. POTS, cable television), etc. From the teleoperator point of view, this provides a huge number of new business opportunities, demanding new skills and new approaches to the business itself. The product is no longer a communication line but a whole communication solution concept, derived from users needs and applications. Creating a competitive business out of a multiservice broadband network requires, in addition to the solution of large number of technical and legal problems, economical, easy to use and maintain systems for accounting and network management. The topics mentioned above are discussed in the paper. Solutions are derived from the experiences in the province wide network development project in the Satakunta Region (Western Finland). The network solution described is under implementation and partially in use. Wider use of the solutions will be piloted in the public health care sector in the autumn of 1998