Integrated life-cycle power asset management for telecom operators (June 2010)

Wireline and wireless telecom operators are always looking for ways to optimize and reduce power asset capital expenditures (CapEx) and operational expenditures (OpEx). They are also investigating automation and data systems integration to facilitate and optimize planning, provisioning and operations not only for better return on investment (ROI) but also in preparation of the industry's massive employee retirement wave to start in 2012. An analysis of telecom power asset management information systems reveals that numerous data silos co-exist within telecom operators: AC and DC power inventory, space, distribution, costing, job tracking, alarming, ticketing, maintenance, ERP, etc. All are still generally fed through a manual entry process; delaying information availability and jeopardizing data integrity. This results in long reaction time, delayed projects, increased network downtime, redundancy of procedures and an overall waste of resources. This paper describes the case of a Tier 1 Canadian telecom operator that recently implemented a life-cycle power asset management solution to address these challenges. The immediate benefits were a reduction by 70% of the power planning process time for the same number of projects while absorbing over 2 years a 33% staff attrition in the engineering/planning department. In depth analysis and motivations are presented in this paper along with supported data gathered over the course of implementation.