For years, telecom operators have invested heavily in fibre, 5G and network modernisation. These investments have been essential to support new services, improve network performance and meet growing customer demand. But many of the challenges limiting growth today have little to do with the network itself.
Many of today’s challenges are operational rather than technological.
Customer, billing, service and network information often remains fragmented across BSS, OSS and other systems. Product portfolios are becoming more complex. Customer expectations continue to rise. Internal teams are under pressure to move faster, serve better and improve efficiency, often while working across disconnected tools and processes.
At the same time, AI is creating new expectations across the telecom industry. Operators are exploring how it can create business value through better customer experiences, more efficient operations and stronger commercial outcomes. Yet many AI initiatives still struggle to move beyond experimentation and generate business value because the foundations underneath them are not ready.
The data is fragmented. The processes are disconnected. The benefits are difficult to realise.
In my view, network investment will remain essential, but differentiation will increasingly depend on how effectively telecom organisations operate.
For telecom operators, the key question is no longer whether they should invest in digital platforms, data and AI as most already are. The more important question is how quickly they can translate those investments into measurable business value.
Turning AI investment into value requires two connected priorities. Operators need reliable, connected data that gives AI sufficient context to support decisions and actions. They must also identify the points in existing processes where better information, recommendations or automation can remove meaningful friction.
AI initiatives struggle to create business value when they are treated as isolated technology deployments rather than changes built on connected data and embedded in real business processes.
1. Building a trusted data foundation
Telecom operators already hold vast amounts of data, but it is often fragmented across multiple systems and organisational silos, making it difficult to create a complete view of the customer.
Customer data may live in CRM. Billing information may sit elsewhere. Network and service data may be managed through separate OSS and BSS platforms. Support interactions, commercial history and field activity can also be spread across different applications. The result is that no single team has the full picture.
If the underlying data is incomplete, duplicated or poorly connected, AI initiatives are less likely to produce meaningful results. Creating a trusted data foundation becomes a key step in the AI journey.
Platforms such as Salesforce Data 360 can support this work. With enhanced identity resolution, real-time customer intelligence, predictive insights and conversational access to data, Salesforce is helping operators bring disconnected customer, billing, service and network data together. This enables organisations to better identify churn risks, support more personalised engagement and provide AI with the context needed to improve customer and commercial outcomes.
But technology alone does not create a trusted data foundation.
The real work lies in understanding how data is structured, where it comes from, how it connects across systems and how it can be made usable for both people and AI-powered experiences.
How Stellaxius helps
We help operators connect customer, billing, service and network systems, resolve fragmented identities and create the trusted data foundation needed to support AI initiatives that go beyond pilot projects.
2. Applying AI to Real Business Challenges
Connected data creates the potential for better decisions and actions, but it does not determine where AI will produce value.
This is where telecom operators need to look closely at their existing processes.
Where do teams lose time? Do handoffs create delays? Is information still being checked manually? Are employees making decisions without the full context? And where does complexity prevent a better customer experience?
In telecom, these questions often appear across quoting, ordering, billing, customer service or field operations. These processes frequently span multiple systems and teams, which creates friction across the customer lifecycle. As organisations seek to leverage AI, they must deal with legacy architectures, disconnected workflows and operating models that make it difficult to scale across the business.
Salesforce capabilities across Communications Cloud, Field Service, Data 360 or Agentforce can support these end-to-end processes. Recent innovations include AI-assisted quoting and ordering, telecom-specific billing and support capabilities, autonomous scheduling and AI-generated technician pre-work briefs.
However, the point is not simply to introduce AI for the sake of it.
The real opportunity is to embed AI into the flow of work. Sometimes that means enabling autonomous actions. In other cases, it means helping human agents, sales teams, service teams or field technicians make better decisions with better context.
For example, AI can help teams identify the right next action for a customer, provide agents with relevant context during service interactions, help technicians prepare for visits, or simplify complex quoting and ordering decisions. In each case, the value comes from making the process easier, faster or more effective.
How Stellaxius helps
Stellaxius helps operators identify where AI can remove meaningful operational friction, in quoting and ordering on Communications Cloud, in Field Service so technicians arrive with context, in Data 360 and Agentforce so teams get trusted information at the point of decision and configure Salesforce to deliver it without adding complexity.
From AI ambition to business value
The central challenge is no longer access to AI technology. It is the ability to operationalise it. That requires operators to connect the data needed for a defined outcome, address the process constraints around it and determine how AI will support decisions or actions in day-to-day work.
Salesforce’s developments in Data 360, Agentforce, Communications Cloud or Field Service point towards a more connected and intelligent future for telecom operators. But the value will depend on how effectively each organisation connects these capabilities to its own operational reality.
For telecom leaders, the questions are becoming clearer:
- Where can AI create the greatest impact across quoting, ordering, customer service, field operations and other critical business processes?
- What barriers are preventing us from scaling AI beyond individual use cases and pilot initiatives?
- How do our data, systems and processes enable or constrain that ambition?
Answering these questions well will put operators in a stronger position to move beyond AI experimentation and turn it into simpler operations, better customer experiences and sustainable growth.
Ready to explore what this could look like for your operation?
Share your challenge with us and we’ll explore how we can help address it, including a working demo where it makes sense.
Reinaldo Ribeiro is Director for Telecom, Energy & Utilities at Stellaxius, bringing over 20 years of experience leading business and technology transformation initiatives. Combining deep telecommunications expertise with strategic advisory and Salesforce leadership, he helps organisations simplify operations, improve customer experiences and realise measurable value from their technology investments.