Swisscom and Ericsson machine-to-machine partners

Switzerland’s largest operator Swisscom and Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERIC) have launched a partnership to develop the M2M market.

  • Switzerland’s leading operator to address needs of enterprise customers from different industries with machine-to-machine (M2M) offering from summer 2012
  • Ericsson Device Connection Platform is brought to market with a business model providing a low initial investment in technology and a fast time to market
  • Swisscom sees long-term potential of up to 100 million connected devices and machines in Switzerland

Swisscom will offer enterprises, from different industries both in Switzerland as well as Swisscom customers abroad, services to leverage efficiencies along their customers’ value chain from production to distribution. Swisscom’s M2M offering is based on Ericsson’s market-proven Device Connection Platform, which allows for cost-efficient management of a large number of connected devices and machines. The first trials will start in February 2012. The commercial introduction of services is scheduled for the summer 2012.

Several hundred thousand machines are already connected in Switzerland. Swisscom predictions indicate that this number will grow significantly in the coming years, and that in the long run, the addressable market will comprise up to 100 million connected devices and machines in Switzerland alone. Industries that benefit from M2M communication are typically utilities, government, transport and healthcare, but the potential for its use extends well beyond that.

Urs Schaeppi, Head of Swisscom Corporate Business Unit, says:
“We are entering this partnership – in which Ericsson supports us not only with its M2M connectivity platform, but also with its extensive experience of the worldwide M2M market – with the clear ambition not only to be first in an emerging market, but also to provide our customers with the kind of superior offering they are used to from us.”

“Our ambition is to provide enterprise customers with a scalable, easy-to-configure-and-maintain, telecom-grade solution that helps them to leverage the full potential of their M2M connectivity and gain a competitive advantage.”

Swisscom’s early mover advantage, as one of Ericsson’s first Device Connection Platform customers, gives them the potential to address new revenue streams. The Device Connection Platform cloud service will allow Swisscom to grow flexibly according to demand from its enterprise customers from different industries. The pay-as-you-grow business model allows the operator a fast time to market. Ericsson’s M2M solution is industry-agnostic, and can easily be adapted to different industries’ and customers’ needs.

Anders Runevad, Head of Region Western & Central Europe, Ericsson, says: “We have built out our leading position as an M2M solution provider to operators worldwide and now we are partnering with Swisscom in one of the world’s first large-scale M2M market introductions. We have connected billions of people to date with mobile networks. Now we are starting to address the Networked Society with our vision of more than 50 billion connected devices – primarily from M2M connectivity in all kinds of industries – by 2020 worldwide.

Compared with today’s end-user-focused SIM card subscription management, operators need to streamline handling of data traffic, charging, billing, maintenance and upgrade of their M2M solutions in a much leaner, cost-efficient way in their networks. Since the M2M market is very diverse in terms of customer requirements, operators need an industry-agnostic platform that supports them in easily creating specific or customized types of service offerings. The different kinds of customers lead to varying demands on, for example, bandwidth and quality of service.

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