As mentioned in a previous post, I’ve been following a growing effort in the telecom industry to inspire development of network application programming interfaces (APIs). Several recent announcements convince me even more that it’s both a real trend, and one the satellite industry should be watching.
APIs allow developers to easily integrate software they create with other applications and platforms. As communication networks become increasingly software defined, network APIs allow enterprise customers and third-party developers to create software that brings additional benefits, including capitalizing on advanced 5G features.
This month Deutsche Telekom AG (DT), T-Mobile (a DT subsidiary) and hubraum, DT’s tech incubator, announced they are hosting their first ever global API competition. Developers from around the world are invited to create new business solutions for customers leveraging APIs in five key areas: Automotive, Broadcasting, Government, Healthcare and Industrial.
Network APIs are not new, but they have mostly been limited to working in only one provider’s network—or network of networks like DT--thus gaining proprietary benefit for that network operator. However, for network APIs to achieve full benefit for the user they should work across multiple networks.
Enter Korea’s three biggest telcos: Korea Telecom, South Korea Telecom and LG Uplus, which announced they have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to work together on a common API standard which they expect will lower developer barriers and shorten the time to market, while also boosting the benefits to Korea’s national infrastructure.
Makes sense, but what if a car company wants its apps to work in Korea and Japan and Idaho and Kenya?
Just last week, Ericsson announced it was joining with many of the world’s largest telecom operators, including América Móvil, AT&T, Bharti Airtel, Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Reliance Jio, Singtel, Telefonica, Telstra, T-Mobile, Verizon and Vodafone to form a new venture that would “combine and sell” network APIs on a global scale. According to Ericsson, Vonage and Google Cloud will partner with the new company, providing access to their ecosystems of developers and partners.
If I sound like a cheerleader, I don’t mean to. There are plenty of challenges ahead in technology, operations and business models. In the new company mentioned above, for example, Ericsson gets half the revenue and all the other companies split the other half. Is that a viable and scalable model or just a meta version of a proprietary one? We’ll see. But just imagine if global connectivity--including satellite--could be actively controlled in a way that allows the application to optimize the connectivity for its needs within the constraints on the transport technology. Connectivity needs for all customers—consumer, government and enterprises—could be optimized to maximize user experience and network value.
