re: BT Aims to Finish 21CN in Late 201121CN (or at least the PSTN replacement part of it) was never about the business case; it is about BT's survival.
After many years of non-decision (the last instalment of which was called Project Mauritius) BT was finally forced to take action by Ericsson's threats to withdraw support for the AXE10. Up to that point BT knew they would have to act to replace the PSTN at some point, but they could still choose when to do it.
When they lost that choice they went for a project whose aim was to replicate the PSTN as precisely as possible, but using technology that didn't yet exist. If I were a BT shareholder, I'd have been more than dismayed.
They then continued their string of errors by selecting way too many vendors, (over) confident that they could also act as the system integrator. They didn't stop tinkering with the network design, so that the OSS development folks couldn't get on with their (immensely challenging and huge) job until late in the game.
Moreover, the project was very much a Wholesale initiative, which was seen by Retail as a waste of time and money (i.e. replicate an existing and declining capability using new and risky technology).
21CN really is a shining example of how not to transform a network. I pity the 21CN Global Venture customers...
re: BT Aims to Finish 21CN in Late 2011Well, for sure it's a lot easier to sit in the peanut gallery than actually trying to transform a 30 million line network.
After many years of non-decision (the last instalment of which was called Project Mauritius) BT was finally forced to take action by Ericsson's threats to withdraw support for the AXE10. Up to that point BT knew they would have to act to replace the PSTN at some point, but they could still choose when to do it.
When they lost that choice they went for a project whose aim was to replicate the PSTN as precisely as possible, but using technology that didn't yet exist. If I were a BT shareholder, I'd have been more than dismayed.
They then continued their string of errors by selecting way too many vendors, (over) confident that they could also act as the system integrator. They didn't stop tinkering with the network design, so that the OSS development folks couldn't get on with their (immensely challenging and huge) job until late in the game.
Moreover, the project was very much a Wholesale initiative, which was seen by Retail as a waste of time and money (i.e. replicate an existing and declining capability using new and risky technology).
21CN really is a shining example of how not to transform a network. I pity the 21CN Global Venture customers...