Acquiring towers is only phase one for emerging market towercos. In order to secure the confidence of operators, and thus maximise tenancy ratios, towercos must prove they can provide a full service, often inclusive of power, while consistently adhering to challenging Service Level Agreements that might call for 99.5%+ uptime. TowerXchange spoke to David Meganck, COO at Acsys, market leaders in provision of mechatronic locks and associated time attendance monitoring. Acsys equipment is deployed on over 50,000 sites globally, giving them a unique insight into the front lines of tower management and maintenance where the battle to adhere to SLAs is won and lost.
TowerXchange: Please re-introduce Acsys for any readers who might not be familiar with your company.
David Meganck, COO, Acsys:
Acsys is originally a French company that is now based in China and was originally a military and defense solutions manufacturer. Our programmable locks, padlocks and remotely controlled keys are our main product lines and we are today deployed in various sectors from banking to ports and airports and for utility companies as well as Oil and Gas and retail; there is no limit as to where our solutions can be used as they are very easy to install and require no wiring or power. Acsys has installed solutions in the telecom market since 2007 in Africa and is now present in over 50 countries worldwide.
TowerXchange: Who ‘owns’ the challenge of keeping emerging market towers are functioning 99.5%+ of the time?
David Meganck, COO, Acsys:
The value proposition of the towerco is to insulate tenants from operational challenges, so where towers have been transferred from MNOs to towercos, they ‘own’ the problem.
However, most towercos are lean enterprises. Construction, maintenance and refueling are typically outsourced to subcontractors. Towerco contracts may now be the largest engagements these subcontractors can secure, but the towercos have exacting standards and negotiate tight margins, so performance measurement and management is critical to success. With SLAs ‘back to backed’ to their managed services partners, towerco’s subcontractors ‘own’ the problem too.
Keeping towers functioning 99.5%+ of the time is a win-win-win for tenant, towerco and managed service provider but is sometimes difficult to enforce in the absence of realistic data to confirm it. Traditional methods such as remote site monitoring are not sufficient as they will often stop functioning when the site is down so ‘other’ data is needed to confirm that the site was serviced according to the terms of the SLA.
TowerXchange: Why is adherence to SLAs becoming such an important issue for emerging market towers?
David Meganck, COO, Acsys:
As emerging market towercos mature, perhaps six to twelve months after the handover of new towers, attention turns to the optimisation of the productivity of their O&M subcontractors, and to measuring and maximising their performance against SLAs. Moreover every towerco is in the business of ‘looking better’ than its counterpart so any technology they can use to show prospective new tenants that their sites are run better (which includes showing compliance of vendors with SLAs) is one of those selling points.
One of the world’s largest managed service providers, who shall remain nameless, is believed to have paid out US$35mn for non-adherance to SLAs last year for Africa alone, as they were unable to prove site visits and hence compliance with SLAs; in some cases they were there but access was hindered in the absence of keys or for other reasons but overall in the absence of real proof they are in an ambiguous situation versus the tenant and towerco. Proving adherence to SLAs is a big issue for tenant, towerco and subcontractor. The tenant imposes stringent terms in their SLA, usually driven by uptime, which the towercos then impose on their O&M subcontractor partners. But if there is no technology to measure and monitor site visits and demonstrate the achievement of SLAs, then the frontline O&M vendor can feel alienated and unmotivated and sometimes unwilling to continue.
TowerXchange: Can you share an example of how tower owners can measure and maximise the productivity of maintenance contractors?
David Meganck, COO, Acsys:
One of the world’s leading towercos examined the performance of three different vendors at three sites with identical configurations, identical generators et cetera. Using the time attendance monitoring data provided by Acsys’ mechatronic locks and keys, we discovered a serious disparity in the vendor’s site visits to replace an oil filter, which were timed at 15 minutes, 45 minutes and 120 minutes on each of the three identical sites.
As you might guess, the technician whose visit was only 15 minutes simply didn’t do the job. The technician who was on site for two hours replaced the filter, but hung around for two hours so his company could invoice for more time. The technician who was there for 45 minutes replaced the filter, and promptly moved on to the next job.
From this simple time attendance monitoring analysis, the towerco was able to create a KPI stating that for the replacement of an oil filter on a given type of genset they would only pay for a one hour site visit… this one KPI alone saves the towerco US$80,000 per year
From this simple time attendance monitoring analysis, the towerco was able to create a KPI stating that for the replacement of an oil filter on a given type of genset they would only pay for a one hour site visit. Given the poor quality of fuel in Africa, oil filters that would last six months in the US have to be replaced every four to six weeks as they clog up with sediment, so this one KPI alone saves the towerco US$80,000 per year.
It’s all about data – you can’t run a business with guesstimates!
TowerXchange: Thanks for the example David – that is explains how to measure if a task was completed and how long it should take, but how do you measure how well a task has been completed?
David Meganck, COO, Acsys:
One solution is to leverage smart phone technology. A leading Southeast Asian towerco has now imposed a requirement that all site visitors must have a smart phone. Why? Because Apps like ours enable the gathering of critical performance data from remote cell sites efficiently and at very low cost – our app is free to minimise the barriers to adoption from the user-side.
Using our App, a site visitor can now request and receive a unique entry code for each mechatronic lock he needs to access in real-time through the App or SMS (SMS in case data network is poor), then fix the fence, fill the fuel tank, or replace the filter – whatever the task assigned is. Using our reporting module they take a picture before and after the job to demonstrate that the task has been completed effectively. Our pictures have watermarks that show latitude, longitude, time and date so you can’t upload a fake or even take a picture of a previous task as the camera is native to the App. Moreover our ticketing system integrated with the most deployed event management software in Africa, which also allows the NOC to know when a ticket was issued, and when it was received, and the App’s GPS function will alert the NOC as to when the user has arrived on site providing them with valuable real-time adherence and performance information but more importantly inform their tenants of the support progress, this helps avoid getting caught in escalations.
Acsys’ App is a compliment to our existing solution to make it more complete but also to allow better, more controlled and quicker on-site reporting than waiting until the vendor goes back to his office and sends a report by email.
In order to ensure towercos meet MNO’s challenging SLAs, it’s important they establish strict but realistic KPIs for all their equipment and service partners, monitoring performance, and giving more business to vendors who help them meet SLAs, while phasing out those who don’t. This eventually all translates into improved bottom-line results for everyone
To give another example, a major Asian towerco has a contract with a vendor which requires them to cut the lawn surrounding their towers on a regular basis. As you can imagine, there is no Remote Monitoring System sensor to detect the length of the grass! So using our App the user gathers photos which are then sent back to the NOC and become part of the reporting which is then also connected to the Billing and Procurement department to give everyone a clear overview of what is being spent, for what and without having to rely on the contractor’s words and goodwill only, and that is what makes the difference.
We recently also launched an RFID based tag solution which can be read by smartphones and which is placed at strategic locations, confirming the user was there, and extending our operational scope from access control to asset management also.
TowerXchange: As you said earlier David, ‘It’s all about data – you can’t run a business with guesstimates!’ Please summarise how tower owners can leverage the data you can provide to improve adherence to SLAs.
David Meganck, COO, Acsys:
The reason why there is preventive maintenance is to avoid un-forecasted emergency maintenance which often leads to down-time. We transform our site attendance and asset attendance records into information that can be monetised. Other data such as reaction times are a good indication of the motivation of a vendor. Vendors who are persistently on time are obviously motivated, those who are persistently late, don’t get more business, and risk being replaced.
In order to ensure towercos meet MNO’s challenging SLAs, it’s important they establish strict but realistic KPIs for all their equipment and service partners, monitoring performance, and giving more business to vendors who help them meet SLAs, while phasing out those who don’t. This eventually all translates into improved bottom-line results for everyone.
