RosettaNet Press Release
Industry Leading Companies AT&T, Nextel, TeliaSonera and Vodafone Join RosettaNet Global Telecommunications Council

RosettaNet E-Business Standards Enable Greater Supply Chain Collaboration Through B2B Integration in the Telecom Sector

For Release July 28, 2004

Santa Ana, CA, USA

RosettaNet, the technology industry’s leading e-business standards consortium, today announced the addition of AT&T, Nextel Communications Inc., TeliaSonera and Vodafone to the organization’s Telecommunications Industry (TC) Council.   The TC Council, which is comprised of global network operators and equipment suppliers, was launched in June 2003 by founding members BT, Cisco Systems, Deutsche Telekom, Ericsson, Motorola, Nokia and Siemens.  

A proven industry standard with thousands of implementations worldwide, RosettaNet makes it possible for companies across multiple sectors to thrive in today’s global marketplace.   By providing the infrastructure – standards and enablement services – for integrating critical supply chain business processes, users realize real world business benefits derived by improved operational efficiencies and dynamic trading partner networks.

Over the past few years, telecommunications companies have been heavily involved in RosettaNet as a result of the synergies that exist between the technology and telecommunications industries, including their shared supply networks.   The primary focus of the TC Council is to take a leadership role in driving adoption of the RosettaNet standard within the telecommunications industry sector and related supply chain ecosystems.  

“RosettaNet is pleased to welcome AT&T, Nextel, TeliaSonera and Vodafone to the consortium’s Global Telecommunications Industry Council,” said Jennifer Hamilton, president of RosettaNet.   “The impressive slate of founding TC Council Members will be further enriched by this new contingent, represented by leading companies with the commitment and influence to drive efficient change in the industry.”

"Members of the RosettaNet TC Council are industry leaders who share a strong, common vision and willingness to collaborate in the area of e-business standardization," remarked Matti Heikkilä, vice president, strategy and business development, Nokia and chairman of RosettaNet’s TC Council. "This dynamic leadership, coupled with close integration of manufacturers, service providers, operators and sales channels, will result in lower operational costs in the telecom industry while also increasing overall market value. By enabling business transformation through supply chain collaboration and support for RosettaNet e-business practices, we can effectively drive positive change through the emergence of new business models."

Building on the past business-to-business (B2B) integration success realized by the high tech industry, the TC Council is set to leverage RosettaNet's proven e-business processes.  For example, the TC Order to Cash Milestone Program is currently investigating basic order management processes between suppliers and network operators. Planned next steps for the RosettaNet TC Council include extending the standard to support more complex telecommunications business processes.

RosettaNet and the TeleManagement Forum (TMF) recently announced a partnership to advance the greater use of e-business capability in telecommunications procurement and service provisioning. RosettaNet TC Council Members and representatives from the TMF identified two initial domains for collaboration: "Network Infrastructure Build-Out," where work will focus on the specification and development of automated interfaces between service providers and their suppliers; and "Provisioning Flow Through" where efforts will center on automation of service provider to enterprise customer interfaces. The addition of standardized electronic business communications capabilities between service providers and their customers will further increase efficiencies and reduce the costs of deploying future telecom services.

“Business trends in the telecommunications industry call for standards that support new services, faster innovation and use of information in products,” said Jean-Claude Delcroix, vice president of research, Gartner, Inc. “As market dynamics continue to fuel complexity around product and service delivery in the telecom sector, tighter business integration and interoperability between trading partners will become key points of differentiation between competitors.”

Established in 1998 by a group of 40 leading Information Technology firms, RosettaNet is now represented by six Global Industry Councils, including Electronic Components (EC), Information Technology (IT), Logistics (LG), Semiconductor Manufacturing (SM), Solution Provider (SP) and Telecommunications (TC). The Executive Committee for RosettaNet, including equal representation from each Council, provides strategic and operational direction for the consortium and global organization. Member companies representing the 2004 Committee include Amkor Technology, Arrow Electronics, Cisco Systems, DHL, Exel, Hewlett Packard, IBM, Intel Corp., Microsoft, National Semiconductor, Nokia, SAP, Sony, Sun Microsystems and Viacore.

For more information on how to become a member of RosettaNet’s TC Council, contact Donald Tsusaki, Executive Director (on loan from Siemens) at +49 89 722 28481, or e-mail donald.tsusaki@rosettanet.org .

About RosettaNet

RosettaNet is a non-profit consortium dedicated to the collaborative development and rapid deployment of open, Internet-based business standards that align processes within the global trading network. More than 500 multinational and regional companies in the information technology, electronic components, semiconductor manufacturing and telecommunications industries participate in RosettaNet’s strategic standards and services development. Fortune 1000 companies worldwide have implemented RosettaNet standards, conducting B2B operations that value billions in annual revenues.