Azure Solutions, the revenue-assurance company, today announced it will offer complete revenue-assurance, fraud and interconnect capabilities through a new world-class service and data bureau established in Colorado. Azure’s new service bureau complements the company’s robust European centre to meet increased customer demand from a growing roster of North American telecommunications operators.

As in Europe, the centre will incorporate the company’s existing fraud, interconnect and enterprise data integrity (Certo 2) offerings as a web-based, managed service. The new service is quick to deploy, reduces the need for capital expenditures and IT resources, and further automates the monitoring, tracking and revenue collection of existing and next-generation telecommunications services. With more than 30 of its 80 telecommunications customers worldwide, including BT, using its bureau offerings, Azure has extensive experience in developing web-based revenue-assurance solutions.

At the heart of Azure’s revenue-assurance product strategy is its ability to provision and manage multiple revenue-assurance programs via a single web-based management application. Currently, Azure has seven customer implementations starting or currently running on the North American service bureau. The components of the Azure service bureau can be employed separately or together as a unified solution. They are:

·     Integrity Management Bureau - based on the Certo 2 platform, this bureau represents the future of enterprise-wide revenue assurance. Certo 2 is the latest version of Azure’s award-winning revenue-assurance solution. The Integrity Management Bureau offers operators the ability to deploy, manage and grow multiple revenue-assurance programs based on a common, easy-to-use software architecture. It provides the performance, flexibility and breadth of functionality needed to restore data integrity and certainty to any operator - wireline, wireless, data and cable. It uses advanced process automation to provide end-to-end visibility and control of the entire revenue lifecycle - faster, more cost-effectively and with greater accuracy and fewer resources than any other solution on the market. Because Certo 2 is integrated with Azure’s other hosted service offerings, it can interface with these modules and present results through a single monitoring and control mechanism.

·     Azure’s Fraud Bureau - provides high quality, effective counter-fraud monitoring together with the operational expertise required to maximise operator revenues and profits. The Fraud Bureau receives data from operators’ network(s) and service(s), and then processes the information for analysis either by Azure or the customer. Data feeds are taken from an operator’s network and processed through a fraud-monitoring engine where expert rules and intelligent techniques are applied. Rule sets deployed within the fraud-monitoring engine are tailored to individual operator’s needs and complimented by the application of intelligent tools to profile accounts and prioritise alarms. Powerful off-line analytical reporting and expert support compliment the Azure Fraud Bureau.

·     Azure’s Interconnect Bureau - allows operators to quickly and accurately settle charges with interconnecting partners without the need to implement and operate an expensive interconnect billing system in-house. Azure connects to the customer’s mediation system and collects interconnect call detail records (CDRs). These CDRs are then transferred to the Azure Interconnect Bureau. The CDRs then pass through a detailed validation and verification process that ensures there is no data loss or duplication, and highlights potential problems that might have occurred within the customer’s network. The Azure Interconnect Bureau processes each CDR to ascertain which operators and service providers have been involved in the transaction. It then goes on to rate the CDRs according to the commercial agreements that are in place with the customer’s interconnecting partners.

“It  was  necessary to establish a state-of-the-art service bureau in North America  to  meet  the  demands  of  customers  that  want  to  build their revenue-assurance programs via a managed-service model,” said Steven Bruny, president  of  Azure Solutions’ North American operations. “The ‘pay as you go’, value-driven  alternative  to traditional licenses provides customers with  a  low-risk,  low-cost  deployment  option to large, up-front capital expenditures.  Customers  can  choose  a  system  that they own and operate themselves or a bureau that Azure manages on their behalf.”