By Tim Young, Editor-in-Chief, Pipeline

Optimism about the new location and venue for TM Forum’s “Americas” show was high on everyone’s mind in the months and weeks leading up to this year’s event. There seems to be an eternal hope that, even in tough economic times, a show like this one will buck the trend and attract more attendees and, specifically, more service providers. Can a fresh destination do that? Not alone, but I can say that departing frigid temperatures in Chicago for the promise of “68 and Sunny” boosted my optimism about the show before I even hit the lobby of the Rosen Shingle Creek. So, let’s consider what else has beckoned us to Management World Orlando this year.  

Let me begin by saying that any organization that can successfully move a show across the country and still bring in the same numbers as the previous year's event has accomplished something noteworthy. The numbers also suggest that this show remains relevant and important to the information, communications and entertainment industries, and maintains a loyal following while attracting new companies to the expo floor and new participants to Forumville, which offers “the opportunity to see and experience the world of TM Forum,” and includes the Catalyst Technology Showcase, Content Encounter, Prosspero Pavilion, and more.

In the October issue of Pipeline, Keith Willetts, Chairman and CEO of TM Forum, wrote, “Management World Orlando is the best place to get a solid understanding of the new communications industry, its challenges and concerns, and solutions to keeping everyone in the new value chain happy.”

The year’s event has again drawn an impressive lineup of keynote speakers. Jerry Brace, Senior Vice President, Information Technology at Rogers Communications, will be “discussing the important place IT has in enabling the quad play future.” Dr. Hossein Eslambolchi, Chairman and CEO of Divvio, will be presenting his vision for how new technologies will transform the world and our daily lives. Eric Pulier, Executive Chairman at SOA Software, will deliver his keynote speech with the engaging speaking style that has earned him public speaking opportunities at premier technology conferences around the globe, and Madhusudhan (Madhu) Mysore, Chief Officer – Customer and Services Operations for Tata Communications, will be discussing Tata Communications’ operating model in times of economic downturn.

This year’s theme of “Create, Deliver and Monetize Digital Services” is explored in the three summits, which cover the entire services lifecycle and explore the core areas of interest that TM Forum and its members are looking to advance over the next 5 years.

The Transformation Summit will focus on reducing costs and helping providers become more agile at developing new services. It will address the challenges facing the mainstream telcos, mobile and cable players who are now looking at instituting a bigger-picture transformation to ensure their future success. This summit will feature presentations on core frameworks, including TM Forum’s Business Process Framework (eTOM), Information Framework (SID), and Application Framework (TAM).

The Digital Commerce and Advertising Summit will focus on how telecom, cable, advertising, and media/entertainment are coming together in new and interesting ways to deliver innovative new services. It’ll try to answer questions like “How is advertising going to begin to translate to new forms of revenue in the digital world?” and “How do you create service delivery capabilities to deliver this new content in an effective and efficient way?” This summit will look closely at where we expect the major revenue growth to take place over the next five to 10 years and the key challenges that are going to delay it or make it more difficult to realize that growth.

The Revenue Management and Customer Experience Summit will focus on how to actually make money from these new digital services and how to ensure customers are happy. As we all know, if your customers aren’t happy, no one in the value chain makes money. This summit will also showcase hot topics such as billing, charging, rating, revenue assurance, and how to proactively manage the customer experience.

At Pipeline, we’re pleased to see TM Forum inviting players from cable sector to the table and creating variations in the conference programming to encourage exploration and discussion among the leading communications providers from all fields. We applaud TM Forum for taking the frameworks that have allowed the telcos to automate their processes and expand those to accommodate new services and types of companies.

Training courses on topics such as NGOSS SOA, Service Delivery Framework, Next-Generation Billing, Revenue Assurance Maturity Model and Next Generation Network Management are another staple of TM Forum’s events.

Another big draw here is Forumville with the real-world demonstrations of proven and implemented technical frameworks and business solutions.  We look forward to exploring this display of market-ready deployments, to experiencing the convergence of communications, media and entertainment, cable and other sectors, and to talk to the visionaries that inspire and deliver these solutions.

Within Forumville is the Catalyst Showcase, which is considered to be TM Forum’s technology proving ground, and has been tailored to appeal to a wide range of attendees so that the projects will demonstrate technical substance and also highlight how they can deliver real business benefits and positively impact the bottom line.

Also under the Forumville umbrella is Content Encounter Phase 3, which is a continuation of the very successful Content Encounter exhibits from Management World Americas 2007 and Management World 2008 in Nice.  The event is sure to be interesting, as it provides a venue for real-time interaction with the future of many fascinating aspects of the future of communications.  Content Encounter Phase 3 will be explored, in depth, in tomorrow's Show Daily.

In addition, the Expo holds a great deal of promise this time around, as it has in years past.   Look for Pipeline’s highlights from the expo floor in tomorrow’s Show Daily.  With a reported 35 percent increase in company participation over last year’s event, the atmosphere on the show floor should be more vibrant and engaging with something for every attendee.