Syniverse’s RCS Hub for P2P Interoperability brings value to RCS interworking.

Rich Communication Services (RCS) continues to expand its presence in the market as an industry-standard communication protocol that surpasses the basic functionality of SMS and pressures OTT (over-the-top) messaging players. But to compete with OTTs, operators need to join the revolution and offer enhanced native messaging experiences for their subscribers by implementing RCS solutions.

The road to rich business messaging runs through person-to-person (P2P) messaging. Syniverse’s RCS P2P product is ready to serve.

The ultimate goals of operators implementing RCS are to drive customer retention, reduce churn and increase ARPU by turning that investment into monetizable solutions that can be used to regain revenues lost to the OTT providers.

Through RCS, subscribers have access to a feature-rich text-message system that is the next stage in text messaging technology, supporting features like read-receipts, group chat, image sharing, video calls, and a never-ending supply of GIFs, emoticons, and animated features. All the incredible features available to OTT users, but unlike OTT apps, RCS is a native app to the handset and more easily accessible by the subscriber.

To ultimately develop RCS into a revenue generating service through rich business messaging, operators need to first enable their networks for P2P RCS. To successfully implement a P2P RCS network, IMS network functions and ENUM capabilities need to be implemented.

The attributes of RCS are not lost on brands looking for better ways of reaching their customers through new, high quality experiences. Traditional SMS has proven its success as a messaging channel for personalized, opportune, and meaningful engagements between the enterprise brands and their customers. The potential of increased revenues will continue to drive enterprises to expand their RCS capabilities to help further propel the success of their customer interaction marketing programs. The real question for operators, though, is how can they benefit in the long term from the take-up of RCS?

Syniverse’s RCS Hub for P2P interoperability was designed to ensure connectivity to all operators and non-operator affiliated RCS devices while offering a single point of access to reach all RCS enable devices globally with best in class routing, unmatched global reach, while laying the foundation for A2P and 5G messaging. And as a proven leader in many areas of messaging, Syniverse continues this dedication by handling over 28 billion North American RCS P2P transactions per month with access to over 200 countries and 85 MNOs.

Mobile operators have long been looking to reap the benefits of RCS and the incremental revenue potential via the support of richer application to person (A2P) messaging. Enterprise brands need to have assurance that any new technology will have enough ubiquity in an entire region for their campaigns to be successful. It is necessary for mobile operators to invest time and resources into the support RCS P2P interconnectivity first so that the path to RCS ubiquity and monetization will be clearly laid.

Brian Beach( Product Owner- Senior Director )

As Product Owner- Senior Director, Brian Beach oversees the Evolved Mobility product portfolio for VoLTE to 3G roaming as used by tier 1 US operators today. This addresses their 3G sunset concerns and provides a gentle pathway to true VoLTE roaming. Brian has a long breadth of experience in IMS services that reside on Syniverse’s IPX (Internetwork Packet Exchange) network, including VoLTE (Voice over LTE), VoWiFi, Video over LTE and RCS (Rich Communications Services). He joined Syniverse as a member of the Research and Development team in 2005, when he began working with IMS and next-generation messaging, leading the technical aspects of the Fixed Mobile Convergence Alliance (FMCA) global presence and IMS trials. Mr. Beach later moved into the Product Management department where he spearheaded the company’s IMS Exchange product – a session aware P2P Hub for RCS and VoLTE interconnect. Over the last several years he has been focusing on roaming solutions to help operators address the oncoming legacy sunsets that will create a significant roaming gap between VoLTE and non-VoLTE operators. Mr. Beach holds a Master of Science in computer science from the University of Tennessee.