Nexign Helps MegaFon Build an Open Ecosystem

MegaFon is a pan-Russian provider of digital opportunities and a leader in the Russian and global telecommunications market. The company combines all IT and telecommunications areas: mobile and fixedline services, mobile and broadband Internet, digital TV and OTT services, innovative digital products and services across Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), the Internet of Things, Big Data analytics and processing, cloud solutions, cyber security, financial services, digital advertising and marketing, e-commerce, and converged IT solutions in system integration.

Nexign’s primary goal was to support MegaFon’s digital transformation as the company embarked on the journey to become a digital service provider in pursuit of fostering customer experience and boosting revenues in the sluggish telecoms market. To this end, the operator needed to build a solid ecosystem empowered by a leading-edge platform that would allow to accelerate innovations based on microservices architecture and unlock partner-driven revenue streams.
 

Nexign Microservices Framework 

Nexign Microservices Framework provides a comprehensive set of tools, methodologies, and practices to launch and support the end-to-end lifecycle of continuous development, integration, and deployment of microservices. The highlight is an open-source technology stack on a single platform, reinforced by Nexign’s products to improve automation and significantly reduce time-to-market for new services.  

Nexign Microservices Framework revamped how the MegaFon IT teams worked by switching their focus from process engineering to delivering the core business value. Microservices Framework is an all-in-one solution suitable for both in-house and external teams who get rule-based access to coding and production environments.

The key solution component is the Microservices Development Layer containing a starter kit with templates for different coding languages and embedded technology libraries. Thus, Microservices Framework allows to rapidly create and deploy business applications thanks to integration with testing and production environments.

The Digital Enabler with an Extended Partner Ecosystem

With Microservices Framework, MegaFon streamlined partner onboarding onto its IT-landscape. The operator faces no longer the need to add changes to its core-systems. Instead, new microservices are easily created to adapt partners’ requirements to the lifecycles of the operators’ products and services. 

Microservices Framework leveraged the development of E-commerce platform that allowed to quickly launch up-and-coming spin-off businesses. The platform drives the partner ecosystem growth and simultaneously helps expand interactions with end-users through creation of new services that are actually out of billing and the CSP-landscape. It’s a new digital approach to service development, shifting payment behavior away from billing accounts to credit cards. This lifts barriers in serving digital consumers who are free from telecoms policies and regulations. 

Thanks to E-commerce, the operator launched the MegaFon Plus bundle spinning four partner streaming services, including IVI, Russia's largest online cinema, START, SberZvuk and MyBooK.

In-House Development and Systems Harmonization

Communications service providers have several ways to switch to microservices development. One of them is monolithic systems replacement, which requires long-cycle development for new services and puts new business features development on hold during the transformation period.

The most preferable way is freezing monolithic solutions development and starting new features development based on the microservices architecture with their further integration into the existing systems. One more strategy is to create all new systems with the help of Microservices Framework, on the basis of the targeted microservices architecture. Microservices Framework enables development of any full-fledged application environment for the Enterprise-landscape.

Successful projects of this type include the following:       

• Complex Event Processing (CEP) – up to 6 million events per second; 
• Cashing layers of in-memory BD Tarantool with minimized response time and high performance, which allows to organize Data Lake with all account parameters;
• Services for integration with external systems, such as a Game Center or robocalls;
• ERP systems, such as user portals, document management, automated workplace, employee KPI management, Think Tank, and others.

 

We are extremely impressed with the results of Nexign Microservices Framework. The solution aimed at supporting MegaFon’s transformation into a full-fledged digital services provider and ultimately exceeded our expectations. Thanks to Microservices Framework, MegaFon is no longer a traditional communications service provider, but a disruptive telco employing a new platform-based business model combined with its existing services.

Sergei Nikiforets

Director for Digital Services at MegaFon

 

Nexign Microservices Framework is designed as a scalable solution that has passed the critical test at MegaFon and proved to be a success. We believe that Microservices Framework can bring benefits to all operators that want to move away from simply selling communications services and become true enablers.

Maxim Nartov

Chief Business Development Officer at Nexign