Jazztel: Getting Ready for Heavy Growth
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There is one key feature that perfectly defines Jazztel' s situation today: in a worldwide
market facing global recession, this Spanish alternative operator is growing, and it is
growing fast. Despite the intense competitive environment driven by the economic
slowdown, Jazztel has managed to broadly over achieve its targets. In the third quarter
of 2009, for example, the operator got 52,281 new ADSL subscribers, placing the
current base at 529,122 with a 53% increase over the same period in 2008.
With those figures, Jazztel is the company with the highest growth rate in the Spanish
broadband market and it has reached a market share of 5.4%, which compares to the 3.7%
figure from one year ago. And the company' s business plan is very ambitious. After
obtaining a positive EBITDA in 2009, their forecast is to get into the black figures in
2010, establishing the path for sustainable profitability. For that purpose, the company
aims to reach one million broadband subscribers in the future.
It is in this context where the partnership between Jazztel and Huawei comes to the
forefront. With a base of 700,000 ports installed and a subscriber figure of more than
half a million users, the operator' s network would eventually reach its limits. An
improvement and expansion of the network is needed, but at the same time CAPEX and
OPEX must be kept under strict control in order not to jeopardize future profitability.
So the key is not only to provide Jazztel with the latest technologies and network
equipment, but also to support the company in the operation and maintenance of the
network, so that Jazztel can focus on core business activities, such as the launch of new
and innovative services to attract a growing number of customers.
"Jazztel is growing and it needs to make improved market offerings in front of its
competitors", explains José Miguel García, CEO of Jazztel. "We believe that customers
appreciate the quality, price, and value proposition we provide, especially in the current
economic environment. The broadband market is still on its way up; if we continue to
focus on delivering best value-for-money products, we will sustain our growth trend
and Huawei will continue to help us".
The implementation of the expansion plan implies a real challenge for Jazztel. The
operator aimed to control costs related to operation and maintenance of the network.
Huawei will assume full responsibility of network operation activities such as 24x7
network monitoring and operation, field maintenance, multi-vendor network technical
support, and spare parts management. This way, Huawei assumes end-to-end network
operations, incorporating in its own organization Jazztel' s network operation and
maintenance departments. Besides, since the 1st of December, 2009, Huawei is the sole
provider of services for the management of Jazztel' s network.
Contracting of maintenance operations and network management with a specialized
vendor is a standard practice in the telecommunications sector which has proved
effective in improving the quality of operations. The key advantages for the operator
are the increase of operational efficiency, the possibility to focus on core activities,
improvement in network quality, the reduction of management complexity and
in operating costs.
"We are committed to maintain and improve network quality through very demanding
service level agreements and performance indicators", explains Daniel Boluda,
Managed Services leader for the Jazztel project at Huawei. "That way we will not
support Jazztel to improve efficiency and save costs, but we will also support it to
with future changes in the industry".
Furthermore, Huawei is offering relevant quality improvements through integrated
services and OSS solutions. Huawei is committed to transform the current OSS
platform and IT systems in order to manage more efficiently the Network Operations
Centre (NOC) and Field Maintenance teams. Huawei solutions include a complete
of KPIs with a clear focus on measuring and improvement of quality in key areas.
The human touch
One of the main concerns of both Jazztel and Huawei executives has been to secure a
smooth transition to the 59 staff members (from the NOC and FLM teams) that are
being transferred from Jazztel to Huawei. The Managed Services solution provided by
Huawei included an HR proposal that not only guaranteed the existing job benefits to
affected employees, but also gave them many new opportunities. This way, the
integration of these employees, which took place on the 1st of December of 2009, was
done without any incident.
Besides, HR management systems at Huawei are based on widely recognized
international standards and they include evaluation by objectives, ongoing training,
coaching, etc.
The transferred employees, who for the moment are fulfilling the same tasks as they
did in Jazztel, will find the best career opportunities at Huawei, as they are joining the
fastest growing company among telecom providers. Huawei Services has very
ambitious plans for the future and the company counts with these people to a part of
these plans. Professional development and career opportunities at Huawei are,
therefore, very broad.
Long term partnership
The relationship between Huawei and Jazztel dates back to 2005, when Jazztel chose
Huawei to deploy the first fully functional NGN network in Spain.
"I think that one of Jazztel' s strongest points is the very wise investments we made
four years ago", says José Miguel García. "We invested in Huawei NGN technology
and now we have ADSL2+ and DSLAMs in all our central offices. It' s this network
that has allowed Jazztel to attract more than half a million subscribers. We are
constantly exploring ways of enhancing our network, accelerating growth and
improving customer services".
Since then, the relationship between both companies has been very successful and is
based on mutual trust.
The agreement signed in November 2009 between the two companies contemplates
both the expansion of network capacity and the modernization of services. This way,
Jazztel will be able to provide first class services to more than one million customers,
both in broadband and other emerging communication services.
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