How will the new entrant telecommunications operator benefit from being new?

Following the general worldwide trend of deregulation and privatisation of the telecommunication market, the South African Government issued an Invitation to Apply for the second public switched telephone network (PSTN) licence. The second national operator will be issued with a PSTN license to provide competing services. The entry of such a new entrant operator (NEO) into the territory currently occupied by a monopoly incumbent operator (IO) will be built on a sound case for doing the business. This paper examines how the NEO will benefit from being new. First, the NEO has no prior commitment to any particular technology, and thus benefits from starting with a greenfield for its operating support systems. Second, it can leverage modern information and communications technology (ICT) tools such as automated mapping/facilities management/geographical information systems (AM/FM/GIS) and data warehousing to facilitate its task. The challenge is for the NEO to build the correct ICT platform that will deliver a cost-effective, value-added solution to the customer´s needs since these needs are significantly different from the incumbent´s offerings.