Insights from This Week’s The Inner Circle With Simon-Kucher
The Inner Circle is CPaaSAA’s members-only monthly webinar series, where our analyst team and invited advisory partners share insights, frameworks, and practical guidance to help members accelerate results.
Each session goes deep — discussion, Q&A, models, examples, and next-step recommendations.
This blog is a short summary of the main points from this week’s The Inner Circle session with Simon-Kucher’s Yesmean Luk and Ziga Lesnik. Inside the member community, the full experience includes:
- the complete maturity model and detailed implications,
- pricing and monetisation guidance,
- the ecosystem-layer model,
- examples from adjacent industries, and
- an action framework for moving from “product” to “value.”
What follows here is a public glimpse into a much deeper members-only conversation.
Why We’re Here: It’s Time for the Narrative to Shift
If there’s one message we’ve been repeating all year at CPaaSAA, it’s this:
Network APIs will only scale when the industry stops talking about the tech and starts talking about the value.
This week, Simon-Kucher delivered the maturity framework that finally shows why now is the right moment for that shift — and what the industry needs to do next.
Coming right after MWC Doha, the timing could not have been more perfect.
The Maturity Curve: Product → Benefits → Value
Simon-Kucher presented a simple but powerful model that explains the natural evolution every innovation goes through:
- Product — early stage, tech-first
- Benefits — what the capability delivers
- Value — what it creates for customers and the business
For the first three years, Network APIs have been squarely in the product phase — building coverage, specs, interoperability, and alignment.
Now the ecosystem is finally moving into the benefits phase, and over the next 24 months it will enter the value phase, where real commercial outcomes become visible.
Seeing this mapped so clearly was the “aha moment” for many in the room.
Why This Matters: Impatience Is the Real Risk
One of the biggest risks to Network APIs isn’t technology — it’s impatience.
Telcos think in 10–20 year cycles for infrastructure.
But for innovation, expectations compress dramatically: results are often expected in 12–36 months.
The maturity curve shows why this is unrealistic.
Enterprise innovation — especially around trust, onboarding, fraud prevention, and identity — follows a 3–5 year trajectory from “interesting capability” to “demonstrable value.”
This is why GSMA’s roadmap makes sense:
- Open Gateway (3 years) → foundational work
- Fusion (3 years with overlap) → value, monetisation, business models
A 5–6 year runway is exactly what a capability like Network APIs requires to mature.
This also ties back to the conversation I had with Henry Calvert at MWC Doha last week: Network APIs are not behind schedule — we’re precisely where we should be. Trust the system.
What This Means for the Ecosystem
1. Shift the narrative to value and outcomes
Examples include:
- fraud reduction
- onboarding success
- trust signals
- checkout conversion
- customer experience
—not endpoints.
2. Align pricing with value
The high-level direction:
- active-user pricing
- session-based models
- bundled trust services
- outcome-aligned tiers
3. Think in layers
The Simon-Kucher ecosystem model matched what we see across our Case Directory:
Telcos provide the assets.
CPaaS platforms amplify them.
Builders operationalize them.
Enterprises buy the outcomes.
Value is created together — not in isolation.
Why Members Loved This Session
Inside the Inner Circle, members received:
- a maturity model they can use internally,
- guidance on where each API sits on the curve,
- metrics to track,
- pricing (model) direction,
- ecosystem insights,
- and a roadmap for moving from tech → value.
It was practical, actionable, and immediately relevant.
This is why The Inner Circle exists:
to give our members the clarity and strategic insight the industry isn’t getting anywhere else.
Want the Full Experience?
Everything — the full recording, the slide deck, the analysis, and the deeper recommendations — is available in the CPaaSAA Online Community.
If your organisation is working on Network APIs, Intelligent Engagement, CPaaS strategy, identity, or trust — and you want to learn from leaders like Simon-Kucher, GSMA, McKinsey, STL Partners, Infobip, Sinch, Vonage, Radisys, and others — we’d love to welcome you.
👉 Members: Watch the full session in the Online Community
👉 Non-members: Contact us to learn more about joining CPaaSAA
Network APIs are entering their value phase.
This is the moment to lean in.