Amdocs claims industry’s first 5G-native charging system

In a launch that will “provide companies with flexibility across both their IT and their networks”, Amdocs has released a product in association with its subsidiary Openet to support convergent monetisation of new services across standalone 5G and beyond.

Amdocs said that, historically, communications service providers (CSPs) have maintained many business support systems (BSS) platforms, supporting different lines of business with dated requirements. This, the firm said, limits their evolution, creating siloed environments for post-paid and pre-paid, fixed and mobile, 3G/4G and 5G, among other platforms. In the 5G and cloud-native era, such silos are becoming unsustainable, and a new paradigm is required.

Amdocs Charging, which combines capabilities in charging and business support systems. is designed to address these challenges, bringing together Amdocs charging offerings with those from Openet. This combined offering with a microservices-based platform is accessed through the Amdocs CES22 suite. The system is said to be able to drive rapid time-to market for innovative services, which can monetise a wide range of new network currencies, helping companies get a return on the investments made on 5G to date.

The products’ features are regarded as being ready for emerging, diverse and large-scale use cases. These include the metaverse, virtual reality (VR), extended reality (XR), private enterprise networks, edge computing, network slicing and vehicle-to-vehicle applications across consumer and business verticals.

It is said to be able to offer more control, reduces operational costs, and improves time-to-market through a single catalogue and diverse services environment. Open application programming interfaces (APIs) and an open and modular approach are included to ensure enhanced support across OSS, BSS and the network, as well as partner efficiencies, regardless of supplier.

Synergistic policy and charging control are said to be able to create new monetisation models leveraging network exposure functions (NEF) and network data analytics function (NWDAF).

“The coming together of Amdocs and Openet charging capabilities under Amdocs Charging marks a significant milestone in evolution of the monetisation portfolio of the largest vendor in this segment,” said John Abraham, principal analyst at Analysys Mason.

“Amdocs Charging will be complemented by Amdocs’ broader monetisation portfolio, which positions the company well to flexibly address 5G and beyond in a cost-effective manner.”

Anthony Goonetilleke, group president of technology and head of strategy at Amdocs, added: “We live in a hybrid world of connectivity that spans 3G, 4G, 5G and Wi-Fi, and maximising the monetisation potential – while delivering on the promise of 5G and beyond – is critical to driving new revenue growth.

“Amdocs has made significant investments in our mission-critical, scalable, cloud-native charging platform to deliver unparalleled convergent experiences that drive service innovation, while removing the traditional boundaries between IT and network.”

Service providers, including two tier-one operators in North America, are already using Amdocs Charging to unite disparate monetisation efforts across their IT and network.