The meeting highlighted the clear opportunities of the Cloud, and we were informed of the serious issues facing the Software industry in embracing the opportunity of the Cloud. These included:

• Invoice recurring revenue on a monthly basis

• Provide a customer support function on a 24/7 basis

• Tailoring a standardised service to customers' requirements

• How moving from big ticket sales to recurring revenue will impact their ability to motivate the channel and the sales team

Sound familiar?
These are lessons that most of us in the telecom industry learnt years ago and have honed to a fine art to the extent where we take it for granted. For example, a standard fixed line voice service involves billing thousands of call transactions per customer per month, processing and rebilling costs from multiple suppliers, some in advance, some in arrears, producing a customer friendly report and delivering this 100% correct within a few days of the month end. In the IT and Software industry, many companies billing is no more complex that a couple of lines that they can run from an Excel spreadsheet.

We also understand the importance of rectifying issues quickly, tracking order processes, bundling services, embracing the channel and demonstrating to the customer how all of this can turn a "utility" product into a true customer solution.

The IT and Software industries have a lot to learn from the telecoms sector. The voice market may be in decline, but it has given us the tools and experience at hand to lead the charge into the Cloud. Software companies looking to target SME's will embrace any company that can sell their product and the deliver effective and efficient customer service. Just take a look a the mobile phone, its quickly replacing cameras, MP3 players, gaming consoles maybe even your wallet - it has become the principle personal device because principally it fulfils our number one priority - communication.

At Knight CF we see no reason why this success cannot be replicated in the fixed line world. Look at your customers, for many you will already be managing their voice, mobiles, data, inbound services, maybe even their email - you are a trusted supplier of business critical services - who better to turn to when they start looking at their Cloud strategy.

Should anyone wish to raise any questions or arrange a meeting with the Knight team, please email us on enquiries@knightcf.com.