Unlocking the Future of Telecom and Beyond: A Deep Dive with Oracle Communications

In today’s rapidly evolving tech landscape, telecom companies and enterprises face increasing complexities and opportunities, especially in 5G, cloud transformation, and AI. During a recent conversation with Andrew De La Torre, Group Vice President of Oracle Communications, I explored how Oracle positions itself as a leader in addressing these industry shifts and delivering solutions that push boundaries.

Oracle Communications: A Hidden Gem in a Tech Giant

When most people think of Oracle , databases, enterprise applications, and cloud solutions likely come to mind. But as Andrew noted, Oracle Communications is somewhat of a “hidden gem,” focusing primarily on enabling telecom carriers and enterprises to navigate the challenges of building and managing 3G, 4G, and 5G networks, along with billing and operational support systems.

Andrew shared, “We make products that you wouldn’t typically associate with Oracle, from network solutions for carriers to session border controllers for enterprises.” This focus allows Oracle Communications to offer solutions integral to telecom infrastructure and adaptable to large enterprises with complex communication requirements.

Prioritizing Cloud Transformation and Real-Time Communications

One of the most exciting topics we discussed was Oracle's role in the next wave of cloud transformation. Enterprises have long been migrating their workloads to the cloud, but as Andrew pointed out, they now face more complex challenges. "Now we're seeing enterprises not only hosting their core services in the cloud but also looking at how they can integrate emerging AI capabilities such as transcription services and sentiment analysis," he explained.

Oracle’s solution to these challenges comes through its session portfolio, anchored around its session border controllers (SBCs). As Andrew described, “Our cloud-native session border controller allows enterprises to embed these session assets directly into the cloud, simplifying the networking and communications they need for hybrid and multi-cloud environments.”

What this means for large enterprises is a more streamlined approach to managing their increasingly intricate networks while benefiting from emerging technologies like AI. Oracle is helping companies adapt to today’s demands and future-proofing their operations for the next generation of services.

5G and Industrial Applications: Bringing Real-Time Solutions to Life

5G has been the buzzword in telecom for years, but questions around return on investment (ROI) and monetization still linger for many telecom operators. As Andrew acknowledged, “There’s definitely a moment of pause in the carrier environment as they assess the ROI on 5G investments.” Despite these concerns, Oracle remains deeply committed to 5G, recognizing its transformative potential across industries.

One of Oracle’s strategic priorities is demonstrating how 5G can power new industrial applications. “We’re working on creating industrial applications that leverage 5G as the connectivity fabric,” Andrew shared. These applications range from public safety solutions that provide real-time situational awareness to connected restaurant systems that offer out-of-the-box simplicity for businesses in the food and beverage industry.

These innovations highlight the practical, real-world uses of 5G that go beyond consumer-facing services. Oracle’s focus on industrial verticals, such as public safety and healthcare, underscores the value of 5G for mission-critical applications that demand low latency, high reliability, and real-time communication capabilities.

Public Safety: The Power of AI and Real-Time Communication

Public safety has become a cornerstone of Oracle Communications' enterprise communications platform. Andrew highlighted their work on real-time situational awareness solutions for first responders, noting, “Our public safety solution is transformational because it allows command and control centers to get real-time updates that improve decision-making during emergencies.”

A particularly exciting development is integrating Oracle's enterprise communications platform with its generative AI capabilities. Andrew explained, “We’ve been using vision AI services to analyze real-time media streams for image recognition.” In public safety contexts, this enables applications to detect weapons or other threats automatically in video feeds, providing critical information to first responders in real-time.

The possibilities don’t stop there. Similar AI-powered capabilities in healthcare can detect when a patient falls in a hospital room and immediately alert the care team. These innovations underscore Oracle’s commitment to enhancing public safety and healthcare through advanced communication and AI technologies.

Monetizing the API Economy: Unlocking New Revenue Streams for CSPs

Another major opportunity Oracle is pursuing is the API economy. With networks becoming increasingly open to developers, Communications Service Providers (CSPs) can now expose their networks through APIs to generate new revenue streams. However, as Andrew noted, “As an industry, we’ve been too focused on creating APIs at the network layer and not enough on how to expose and monetize them effectively.”

Oracle’s response to this challenge is its Digital Business Experience solution, which simplifies the process for carriers to create, expose, and monetize APIs as products. “Our goal is to help carriers deliver APIs as products in a way that’s fast and efficient, without needing complex system integrations,” Andrew explained.

By offering pre-integrated stacks and reference integrations, Oracle enables carriers to market quickly and efficiently, opening up new possibilities for revenue generation through API monetization. This innovation helps CSPs take advantage of cloud-native, AI-driven services while reducing the barriers to entry for developers.

Looking Ahead: What’s Next for Oracle Communications

As we wrapped up our conversation, Andrew offered a glimpse into Oracle Communications’s horizons. The company is gearing up for key events, including customer strategy sessions in Paris and major industry forums such as Mobile World Congress and GTW.

Andrew noted that the next 12 months will be particularly exciting as Oracle continues to develop new connected solutions for various industries. "We've got five other industries we're working with, in addition to public safety and food and beverage, and we'll be announcing more about these soon," he hinted.

For Oracle Communications, the future is about continuing to build on its existing successes while pushing into new areas of innovation, especially in cloud, AI, and 5G.