VanderHeyden talks convergence and competitive landscape: Part II

Nokia-Siemens Networks has been officially operating for a little more than three months, and even though the company is the world's number two telecommunications equipment supplier, it has some lofty goals for North America. Currently Nokia-Siemens occupies the sixth place in terms of suppliers in North America, but according to company CEO Simon Beresford-Wylie the equipment maker wants to attain "a global position in North America." He made the comments last month at the Canadian Telecom Summit in Toronto. During the event, head of Canadian operations Mark VanderHeyden sat down with Report on Wireless and Network Letter editor Perry Hoffman to talk about the company and its future role in the Canadian market. In Part I of the Q&A, he spoke about Nokia-Siemens' wireless product portfolio, the evolution of wireless equipment and the viability of another wireless service provider entering the market in Canada. Part II of the Q&A presents the company's view of network convergence and the advantages of Nokia-Siemens in the Canadian market. Perry Hoffman: Wireless is obviously a component of a broader network strategy. Is it table stakes to be able to offer a fixed mobile convergence product? Mark VanderHeyden: Certainly, I believe it has to be and it should be. You need to talk about wireline as well because most of the players that want to be in the market do have a wireline infrastructure of some type. At the end of the day they have to look at building IP at the core of the new wireless network and the wireline network also has to evolve and move into that type of infrastructure. As well, you will want to have management of services that are common across the table. So you need a good IMS portfolio, you need the strength on the core, and applications and services that can operate between the networks. PH: Does that make it difficult for smaller equipment companies to be big players? Will they be marginalized or swallowed up in the future? MV: We're finding with some of our applications on the converged network that some of the smaller players with unique capabilities can, with their applications, work into an open architecture. So we do see a bit for some of that. The operators are obviously going to have to make their own choice. It's our belief that a vendor that has more than just the access point products, but a broad range and can help integrate into a broader strategy will do well and we're better suited to do that. We can bring the experience of building networks globally and within North America into Canada because we can tap into that same resource base, re-use the capabilities of those people and we can help them start building. We can go as far as completely managing the network for them. PH: You talked about this event being the coming out party for the company in North America. Perhaps you could talk more specifically about some of the opportunities here in Canada. MV: With respect to Voice over IP networks and broadband access, I think that there's still a lot of evolution and growth to happen there, and as a strong player in those areas, we come to the marketplace with a lot of skill and a lot of global knowledge of being able to expand those. Our IP transport products and WDM products are very good. We have a very strong services portfolio, right from basic network implementation all the way to managed services. Once we're bringing that to our customers and they understand our competencies in North America and how we can specifically execute in Canada, I think they will see us a credible vendor. PH: Any concerns that the company will have trouble winning business in Canada because Nokia-Siemens is so big? MV: I like our starting point to be honest. I feel almost like we are a start up company with a big venture capital behind us, with all the products and capabilities that are proven and being deployed elsewhere, so it's exciting. It's a highly effective, highly skilled team, people that know what they're doing. We're bringing in people from Helsinki, from the US, we're hiring within Canada to build a world class team and begin the engagement. So when we look toward the future and where we want to be in a few years, I like the fact that we have a large company behind us. I want to be sure that we can be reactive to the needs of our customers, be able to work at the pace that they want to work at and that we can have an effective influence on unique needs that the products might need. PH: Are there any advantages that Nokia Siemens has over its rivals and what would make Nokia Siemens the vendor of choice? MV: Outside of what I think is truly an impressive and differentiated product portfolio, I think the other is our desire to be successful in Canada. When you're new and coming in, you're a little bit hungrier. You're doing work in your house, sometimes the contractor that's overly busy might not be as attractive as the guy who you know does excellent work and would really like to do the work. I want to do the work. I think that'll show in the attitude that we have with our customers, our responsiveness and what we can do for them: they will have our primary attention. I'm here to compete, to win and to be one of the top vendors, and it'll show in the way we do business. PH: Can you talk about where the Canadian operation is going to be revenue wise, sales wise in terms of the global organization? MV: On a very general basis, Nokia Siemens is number two globally and in many countries number one or number two. We are number six in North America. We're not that well known in North America overall. Given that we want to be number one, we need a strategy to do that and a key pillar to that strategy is getting a much higher market share in North America. Canada is one of the four regions of the North American organization and we're being expected to do our part, to contribute to put the North America region as a significant region and help the company be number one. I have some internal targets that I'm not going to go through but we are being counted upon and there will be a focus to help the Canadian team to achieve that.

VanderHeyden talks convergence and competitive landscape: Part II

News | 07/12/2007 1:23 pm EDT

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