Telecom Argentina Taps Vlocity to Enable Digital Transformation

Vlocity, a provider of industry-specific cloud software, has announced a successful digital transformation program with Telecom Argentina.

The transformation simplified Telecom Argentina’s systems and processes after multiple acquisitions, while upgrading the customer experience for nearly 30 million subscribers. Together with Bluewolf, an IBM company, Nokia and Salesforce, Vlocity leveraged deep telecommunications industry expertise to support Telecom Argentina in its digital transformation journey.

Telecom Argentina started working with Vlocity and partners Bluewolf, an IBM company, Salesforce and Nokia, following the close of its merger with Cablevisión. The merger was designed to establish Telecom Argentina as the first regional provider of quadruple play services—combining mobile, broadband, television, and fixed-line phone services. Telecom Argentina’s previously siloed legacy systems made it difficult to run the business, slowed new product and services delivery, and made a full 360-degree customer view impossible. Those siloed systems are now a thing of the past. Today, agents have one system log-in vs. eight.

Rather than retrofit or overlay existing CRM systems, Telecom Argentina decided to start with a “clean slate” implementation that utilized the latest omnichannel, cloud-based solutions from Vlocity and Salesforce—together with digital strategy and deployment expertise from Bluewolf.

“The volume of customer data we had to integrate while creating a brand-new CRM was enormous,” said Maximiliano Valiente, transformation director at Telecom Argentina. “We had 19 million customer profiles to migrate to the cloud, as well as numerous legacy systems to synchronize. Bringing all the data together for quad-play meant a complete digital transformation, pushing the limits of technology. This is where we turned to Vlocity, Nokia, Salesforce and IBM for guidance and enhanced software solutions and services.”

Telecom Argentina committed to simplify everything it could, taking advantage of modern configurable software with minimal coding, integration effort, and customization. The full implementation includes sales, care, customer community and order management applications from Vlocity; service order management from Nokia; and the Salesforce platform. The new system synchronizes with 80 other software systems through more than 300 API integrations.

Beyond technology, the transformation team worked closely with business leaders to streamline more than 2,000 processes – eliminating paper and moving to a 100% cloud native environment. All told, Telecom Argentina reduced the number of commercial processes by 65 percent, streamlined its product catalog by 70 percent, and reduced the number of clicks and screens for agents by 70 percent. That translates to faster phone activations (down from 10 to four minutes for pre-paid mobile); simpler “change of plan” experience (down from seven steps to one); and 120 percent faster case resolution with integrated front and back office operations.

“Unified records enable our customers to interact with Telecom Argentina on their preferred channel, at any time—whether it be an in-store visit, a call to our contact center, or an online chat,” said Valiente. “Our employees benefit from having fewer pages and records to navigate when assisting their customers. This allows them more time to focus on customer service and less time searching for information. Putting this into action, however, required a massive amount of planning, strategizing, and agile methodology. Our goal was to also leverage this change to simplify the complexity of our tech stack.”

“Telecom Argentina has shown tremendous leadership in driving its digital transformation vision,” said Dan Ford, SVP and General Manager of Vlocity Communications. “One of the most important changes was cultural—essentially re-defining the working relationship between IT and business. The team engaged business and product owners early in every phase to define business requirements and user journeys to guide the development process, while providing feedback every couple of weeks as the system was being designed. This direct engagement throughout the process helped ensure that new capabilities reflect the true needs of the business and users.”

“Salesforce is thrilled to be part of Telecom Argentina’s transformation, and to help them sustain that agility over time,” said Guido Ipszman, Area Vice President at Salesforce Argentina. “By collaborating with Salesforce, Vlocity, Nokia, and Bluewolf, an IBM company, Telecom Argentina was able to innovate on a shortened timeline.”

“Nokia is pleased to partner with Telecom Argentina and the Salesforce ecosystem with the shared aim of removing complexity and delivering relevant services to customers more efficiently. Nokia’s end-to-end software solutions bring new digital services to the market quickly and at scale. This gives customers both the ability to connect the business to the network and to derive the needed real-time insights in order to meet customer needs more effectively,” said Katie Nittler, SVP Global Alliances with Nokia Software.

“Telecom Argentina’s digital transformation is not only radically changing the interaction with customers but also Telecom Argentina’s internal culture,” said David Trinh, managing director at Bluewolf, an IBM company. “We look forward to uncovering new opportunities with Telecom Argentina to further streamline the business, save time for employees, and improve the experience for customers.”