One of the key communications trends covered in the SmartCom Summit 2020 talk show and trend report is CPaaS (Communications Platform as a Service). Although still relatively unknown, CPaaS is the fastest growing part of business communications as it allows communications building blocks to be embedded in applications, creating the low-friction and user-friendly experience crucial in todays online world. Popular examples of CPaaS are the messages or calls you get when your Uber driver is trying to locate you, 2FA security messages when you go online, or appointment reminders from your doctor’s office or hairdresser to make sure you show up on time.
The SmartCom Summit 2020 trend report which was just released highlights a number of interesting CPaaS trends:
- The Covid-19 pandemic is accelerating digital transformation and causing a shift in how businesses consume communications services, creating an opportunity for telecommunications service providers as a key channel for enterprises [CPaaS Market Monitor June 2020, 451 Research]
- CPaaS SMS, Voice and Video business is expected to grow 39% per year from 2019 to 2023 [Worldwide Communications Platform as a Service Forecast 2019-2023, IDC Sep 2019]
- Of the SmartCom Summit community 60% think healthcare will be the sector most to benefit from secure communications building blocks (CPaaS) [SmartCom Summit Talk Show Jun 30 2020]
Two companies eyeing the CPaaS opportunity for telcos, Ribbon Communications and iBasis, both founding members of the CPaaS Acceleration Alliance, joined the discussion in the talk show and contributed to the trend report with their visions of this shift in the industry.
With the growing popularity of CPaaS, especially among agile enterprises who have different requirements in terms of education, SLA, integration services, among other things, more and more telcos are interested in the opportunity to use CPaaS to monetize their core assets and offer extra value to their enterprise customers.
Examples of telcos that recently started offering CPaaS to their enterprise customers, in varying forms, are AT&T, Etisalat, KPN, Telin and Proximus.
Please check out the SmartCom Summit 2020 trend report (use coupon code SUMMITGUEST for free access) to learn more about CPaaS and the opportunities for agile enterprises and telecommunications service providers, read about some telcos that are already offering CPaaS, and find out how a telco can easily add such services to their portfolio by partnering with the right technology and service providers.
Or watch the CPaaS discussion of the talk show, or the entire talk show.
About the author
Rob combines a strong technical and commercial IT background with 18 years of cloud communications experience as an entrepreneur, consultant, trainer/coach, analyst and business developer. His heart is in innovation and growth, working with scaleups and corporates to bring new technologies to market.
In 2016 he co-founded The Next Cloud because he believes the exciting world of business communications, with programmable telecoms, APIs, CPaaS and AI, is too important to leave to the Big Tech companies and deserves a local and people first approach. Optimal customer experience, new business models, but also solving our society’s real challenges by combining the strengths of corporates and innovators in new ecosystems.
Over the past 30 years Rob (co-)founded various technology companies, including one of the leading Dutch hosted voice providers (before hosted voice became the new normal). Today, he works with some of the world’s leading technology providers on innovation and growth, especially in the rapidly changing world of cloud communications.
