Billing World, DMR Consulting Group Report on Billing System Functionality Due Out in March Project Seeks to Provide Telephony Carriers, Resellers With a Head Start for Choosing a Vendor

In March 1997 the first annual Billing World magazine report on billing system functionality will become available. The report, created in conjunction with DMR Consulting Group, will list vital features and other pertinent data for 20 vendors, each offering an off-the-shelf system for wireless and/or wireline service providers. The following article provides some depth into the purpose, criteria and format of the report. One would imagine that only highly specialized professionals would read an esoteric magazine such as Billing World. Actually, that's only partly true. We've come to understand during our nearly three years in existence that our readership can be divided roughly into two camps: those who can recite the English language equivalent of USOC codes, and those who think client/server refers to bartenders at the post-conference cocktail party. This is not to put down the latter group-after all, they are one of the main reasons we are here-rather, it is intended to give a little perspective. The off-the-shelf, convergent billing software industry is no longer the immature, ignored segment of telecom it once was, yet a large percentage of people still stand on the steep slope of the learning curve. Surprisingly, this includes many employees from the billing firms themselves.

We know this because the less educated call us fairly often. In fact, several times a week Billing World fields a call from a CLEC, PCS carrier, reseller or some other entity looking for a billing system, customer care front end or mediation device. Usually, we give them a few numbers and wish them luck. With this report, we hope to provide a better service to our readers.

The Report Parameters and Inclusion Criteria

The parameters for inclusion in the report are as follows: vendors must provide and have installed in at least one implementation off-the-shelf software for sale to wholesale/retail carriers or resellers to bill for wireless or wireline telephony service. Wireless could entail billing for services such as GSM, CDMA or TDMA PCS, analog or digital cellular, prepaid wireless, ESMR or paging. Prepaid-only providers, such as National Telemangement Corp. or Boston Communications, were not included. Wireline services encompass local or long distance facilities-based telephony, resale of those services, VPN or cable telephony. Companies offering primarily service bureau operations were not included in this effort, although they will be next time. There are hundreds of billing systems currently employed worldwide for telephony services. Many are home grown and not for sale outside of the carrier that created the software. The report did not include these systems. In addition, many billing systems have no North American implementations and have no intentions of ever tapping that market. As a magazine with roughly 80 percent of its readership living on this continent, we also excluded those vendors from inclusion in the report. Barring a barrage of critical phone calls from dissatisfied readers, this criterion will remain for all follow-up efforts.

Research to uncover the universe of vendors meeting the above criteria lasted a month, and pulling information from a variety of sources. These sources included: news reports from magazines and newspapers, press releases and wire reports, Internet web sites, past exhibitors to Telestrategies' Billing '9x trade shows, companies with past correspondences with Billing World Magazine, and word of mouth. A list of 43 vendors emerged.

We sent letters to each of these companies along with a detailed questionnaire/survey form. At least two follow-up calls were made to each company. In the end, 20 vendors remained (see list below).

Not Quite Alpha to Omega

The report does not contain a complete listing of billing software firms involved in or targeting the U.S. market. We intentionally left out companies that focus on service bureau offerings, choosing instead to concentrate on the off-the-shelf product set and for this reason you will not find companies like CBIS, ITDS, Proxima or CTI in the text. In retrospect, that was shortsighted on our part. Next year, these firms will be included in the report. Also, several of the billing companies we contacted decided not to participate. Some were in the middle of product upgrades and did not want us to promote the older version, some could not return questionnaires in time, and others simply saw no value in supplying Billing World and DMR Consulting Group with the information we needed. Lastly, there is the possibility that we simply overlooked a provider. If your firm is a member of the latter grouping, we apologize and promise to try to include you for the next go-round.

Many the most recognizable names in the industry responded with both time and effort. An on-site visit was not a prerequisite for inclusion in this report, but the report staff made several such trips. What was hammered home during these in-house visits is the absolute need for a functional GUI front end. Without one, the best processing and rating system in the world could still be a liability to a convergent carrier. Because we did not field-test every system, we will not attempt to rank the products. This would be a daunting task anyway, as you will see in the report. Comparing billing systems is often an apples-to-oranges proposition, with many filling niche roles for certain services. Having a robust POS or inventory system (or at least links to one) is very important for a wireless billing firm, but not so [critical] for wireline. If you are billing for local service in a bundled product environment, you'd better pick a system that can apply partial payments correctly.

Some carriers start small and intend to grow, while others start small and intend to stay that way. Some will offer multiple services, while others only one. Some service providers are starting from scratch while others will need a big conversion effort. There is no one system that does it all better than any other because ratings would be based on individual needs. With those caveats in mind, consider the study a functionality listing rather than a ranking. The first annual Billing World/DMR Consulting Group Billing Vendor report sticks to a Joe Friday mentality: just the facts.

The role of DMR Consulting Group

A few of the firms expressed some discomfort that DMR Consulting Group was to play such a major role in the project, and one declined to participate based solely on this fact. Let me explain DMR's role. Billing World selected DMR to aid in the creation of the report based on two criteria: its experience and impartiality. First, the firm has extensive experience in selecting billing systems for carriers, having been hired to do just that for dozens of service providers. In order to garner such work, the firm must aggressively protect its impartiality; therefore, while the DMR has worked closely with companies such as Saville Systems and Kenan Systems in the past, no formal partnerships or otherwise binding relationships exist between DMR and any billing vendor. Other integration firms such as Logica resell billing systems in addition to performing integration services. Second, the firm has assured Billing World that it has no intention of building its own retail billing system in the future. If the situation were otherwise, Billing World would have found another partner.

We regret that DMR Consulting Group's inclusion may have made uncomfortable a small percentage of the vendors contacted for the report. However, Billing World strongly believes that the technical experience DMR Consulting Group brought to the project outweighs what we view as a somewhat overly protective stance by the dissenting firms.

The View from Above

Compiling the company-provided statistics and conducting the interviews for the report shed light on emerging industry trends and interesting facts. Here's five:

1. Give Oracle The Crown: It's fairly well known in the billing industry that Oracle has begun to dominate in the database department. The report backs this up, with a large percentage of the respondents using some version of the product. Many who do not now use some version of Oracle's database have plans to do so in the next year (Saville Systems was the last to port a product, releasing its Oracle-based CBP in November). What is perhaps even more interesting is the reason for this trend... it's not necessarily based on product quality. As one vendor put it, "Oracle is the greatest marketing company on Earth." So while Sybase databases are seen by many as on par if not better from a developer's standpoint than Oracle's product, Oracle's service support is often viewed as superior, some vendors said. Most, however, are simply going with the flow. Oracle has momentum, and customers are beginning to demand its product.

2. Buyer Beware: When shopping for a system, beware the vendor that tells you it can do everything. In-depth questioning of potential vendors is a must-just because a billing vendor says he has a POS component to his wireless billing system doesn't mean it's entirely functional. Does it have cash drawer capabilities? Is inventory updated in real time? Not necessarily-match real life capabilities to functional and business needs. On the other hand, one or two vendors went as far as to actively not recommend their own products, such as customer care front ends or taxation modules. Obviously, the openness of a corporation's culture plays a large roll in how honest a vendor is with its client.

3. Going Modular: Listening to the vendors tell it, it's hard to understand what the customers really want. Some say it's a one-stop-shop system with all the bells and whistles, while others say customers seek modularity and systems that can be built one step at a time. Of the two points of view, the latter has the strongest support at the moment. Amdocs, for example, has 15 different modules that can, in theory if not always in practice, be bought separately. Ironically, another trend here is an increasing reliance on third parties to provide some of these modules. Several years ago, corporate IT departments began to outsource many none-security-related software and hardware design functions; in effect, COTS replaced in-house shops. This trend helped fertilize the recent boom in the billing industry, as all save for the very largest of today's carriers now rarely do billing software design in house, and few of the emerging PCS providers or CLECs would dream of building rather than buying. Now, the billing software houses are themselves looking to integrate products from other software firms into their product suite. Collections, fraud, and taxation modules, marketing analysis and bill design programs, printing, mailing and the customer care front end are all as capable of being provided by the billing vendor as they are of being built or offered by eight different third party firms.

4. NT Gets A Foothold, But Unix Still On Top: A few companies have ported to or built their systems on a Windows NT platform; others are considering the idea. The NT option may get another push next year if Microsoft manages to get version 5.0 on the street, although several beta testers said even Christmas 1998 would be "a miracle" for product release. The IBM AS/400 also has followers, who point to the machine's processing capacity and fault tolerance as strengths. On the topic of processing speed, companies such as GTE Data Services, AMS and Stonehouse Technologies have systems that operate on mainframes. Nevertheless, Unix is the undisputed platform of choice. In fact, a Unix server platform with an Oracle database and Windows 95 or NT Workstation for the clients has become as mainstream as Oprah. With the continuing evolution of RISC-based systems, Unix will continue to hold the throne for all but the largest and the smallest systems.

5. Vertex Filling The Niche: Vendors finding the billing system waters becoming too crowded should perhaps look to providing taxation modules to their former competition. Most vendors targeting the U.S. market link to Vertex for taxation data, with only a few recommending that carriers do it themselves. But while Vertex may be the number one company providing taxation modules and links to billing systems, not all vendors are happy with its price or Vertex's customer service. Short of a change in the complicated U.S. taxation system or the emergence of real competition to challenge Vertex, the taxation module company may be as close to a monopoly as still exists in U.S. telecom today.

The Billing System Functionality Report was produced by Don Tiedeman, Senior Management Consultant, DMR Consulting Group, Deborah Strong, Vice President of Strategic Services, DMR Consulting Group, Marcus Hand, Executive Director Business Development, Technology Services Group, DMR Consulting Group, and Ed Bond, Senior News Editor, Billing World Magazine. The report is available for Billing World subscribers ($195) and nonsubscribers ($295) alike. To order contact Leona White at 703-734-7050.

Companies Covered In the Report:
Access Communications
Alltel Information Systems
Amdocs
AMS
CableData
CBill
Commsoft
Daleen Technologies
EXL Information Corp.
Generic Technology
GTE Data Services
Intasys
Kenan Systems
Kingston SCL
LHS
Moscom Ltd.
Saville Systems
Subscriber Computing Inc. (SCI)
Stonehouse Technologies
Telecoms Resource Group