Finding Services and Business Models for the Next-Generation Networks

The new R&D organization

Entrepreneurs have to face two different challenges when dealing with new technologies in new or existing markets. The first one is to become a renovator, which implies having a strong R&D to be able to create something new. The second is the business model. Most of the entrepreneurs do not have a specific profile, as they are not business development managers. Besides, business models hardly support any R&D effort. The need for immediate ROI wipes away the classical R&D models with long-term scope. Therefore, there is a need to find new ways of funding research activities.
This is the case of the technologies in the mobile industry which are opening the doors to new application scenarios that will revolutionize the way in which individuals have access to network capabilities anywhere, following the concept of "mobility". Now, the important and differentiating feature of this particular market is that delivery is not generated by the unilateral setting of a product or service derived from a company, but from the integration of interests from different industry players to establish "win-win" relationships where the management of reciprocity is the basis for viable solutions to end customers.
The group of agents that interact in this situation would be, in the first place, the network operators whose business is determined by the use or traffic that is generated on their network. This leads them to the need for multiple layers of value that are built to give meaning to their infrastructure. Therefore, one’s business model must be very open to negotiation, even generating sponsorship of any R&D that may materialise in the context of the value proposition that reaches the end user, sometimes with their participation to create a system of “intelligent decisions”. Later, we will detail the business model of these operators within the global system, related to the other agents that build that market reality. Secondly, the technological start-up companies, who build the software that facilitates the further development of applications in the face of finding customers. This requires a bond of vertical integration forward and backward, i.e., approaches and liaison with operators and applications companies, they therefore, play the role of a "hinge" in the market. The business model will also be presented in a scheme shared with other agents.
And finally, content and applications companies generating opportunities and needs around a catalogue of applications that represent the "visible face" of the business described above, and composing the "tip of the iceberg" (see Figure 2) where the accumulation of