Cramer Announces Plans to Expedite Pre-Integrated Operational and Business Support Systems for Telcos; Cramer's Best-in-Class OSS Suite to Be Combined with Oracle BSS Capabilities.

LONDON -- At the launch of the Cramer6 OSS Suite, OSS leader Cramer today announced plans to offer solutions for telecommunications service providers pre-integrated with Oracle's Business Support System (BSS) capabilities. Cramer will work with Oracle to deliver solutions to integrate BSS and OSS and automate key business processes to drive efficiency, scalability and flexibility.

End-to-End Service Fulfillment from Customer Contact through to the Network

Increasingly complex service offerings, changing customer relationships and expanding product portfolios require service providers to automate the order management and fulfillment of next generation services. The proposition from the two companies will combine Oracle's strength in BSS, which includes Oracle Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Oracle Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), with new solutions in Cramer6 OSS Suite. This will enable Cramer to offer automated end-to-end fulfillment from initial customer contact through to service activation in the network. For the first time, service providers can achieve "zero touch" fulfillment--automated fulfillment with no manual intervention. As a result, carriers can manage rapid growth in sales of new services by dramatically reducing the time and cost of provisioning new orders. This will shorten the order-to-cash cycle, improving cash flow and increasing customer satisfaction.

Transforming Network Lifecycle Management (NLM) with an Inventory-Centric Approach

The combined offerings will leverage Oracle's Network Lifecycle Management (NLM) capabilities and Cramer's inventory-centric approach to enable closed loop network lifecycle management. Oracle's asset management offering manages the procurement and network equipment maintenance while Cramer delivers an up-to-date view of the network. Tight integration between asset procurement and network planning enables efficient use of existing assets and rapid network rollout of new services based on real time network utilization. In addition, a comprehensive view of network inventory and equipment status enables organizations to accurately manage and understand the value of assets to ensure that they meet regulatory requirements.

Pre-Integration and Flexibility to Lower TCO 

Oracle and Cramer will collaborate on the delivery of high value adapters based on Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) principles. As a result, service providers can reduce the labor intensive and costly processes associated with integrating BSS with OSS. The adapters will be based on industry best practices and can be tailored to meet individual customer needs, thereby reducing the ongoing cost of ownership. In addition, the two companies' offerings will be based on an open architecture that can be deployed across multiple technologies such as IP-based networks, or services such as VoIP or IPTV, to enable cost effective and rapid introduction of new services.

"To continue to grow profitably, operators must generate new sources of revenue while reducing operational costs," said Lars Wahlstrom, Vice President of Telecommunications and Media, Oracle Europe, Middle East and Africa. "The combined and pre-integrated capabilities of Oracle and Cramer will offer the industry a solution that is easier to adopt and can help manage the increasingly complex processes associated with next generation transformation."

"The pre-integrated products from Cramer and Oracle will enable operators to integrate data and processes to rapidly respond to changes in the market," said Guy Dubois, President and CEO, Cramer. "Tight integration between BSS and OSS will speed order-to-cash cycles and reduce time to market for innovative services."

About Cramer

Cramer is the leading provider of operational support system (OSS) software that is changing the economics of telecom. Cramer offers the industry's only complete, end-to-end service fulfillment solution, enabling providers to introduce and deliver new products and services quickly and cost effectively. Leading service providers continue to deploy Cramer's solutions and include Bell Canada, KPN, TDC, Telefonica, TeliaSonera and Vodafone. Cramer has partnerships with industry leaders including Accenture, Alcatel, Ericsson, HP, IBM, Oracle and SAP. Customers can also take advantage of Cramer's world class consulting, support and education capabilities delivered by Cramer Global Services.

Cramer is headquartered in the United Kingdom with offices throughout Europe, North America and Asia Pacific. For more information, please go to www.cramer.com.

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