Agile transformation has been shouted from the rooftops by telecoms operators across the globe as a mission-critical objective, yet many are still bound to legacy vendor contracts, writes Anna Ribeiro. They may have DevOps pods internally, but their external partners very often grab onto long-term contracts, waterfall fixes and siloed development. Meanwhile, open RAN, cloud-native cores and network automation require speed, and right now, suppliers are not delivering.
Analysts point out that over 70% of businesses say agile transformation is a must have, and yet, carrier adoption has been shockingly slow. In practice, telcos wish to adopt agile teams and continuous integration and continuous deployment/delivery (CI/CD) internally, while their vendors demand long request for proposal (RFP) timeframes and big-bang delivery.
Gartner warns that ‘the traditional, rigid request-for-anything (RFx) approach’ leads to contracts that ‘do not deliver the required flexibility’ to finish complex tech projects. Telco cloud surveys indicate that operators see vendor lock-in as one of their biggest obstacles to innovation. Put simply, inflexible multi-year contracts and siloed delivery models with suppliers do not fit with operators’ desire for rapid change.
Internal agility vs vendor inflexibility
Leading operators have built agile, DevOps-driven teams internally, but still rely on traditional vendors for network products, essentially creating a ‘vendor bottleneck.’
For example, Omdia notes that ‘most CSPs aren’t developing their software; they buy solutions from vendor partners,’ making it ‘difficult for operators to create CI/CD pipelines that cut across organisational boundaries between CSPs and suppliers.’
In practice, many telcos remain ‘structured for waterfall processes’ with siloed development groups. They are not prepared for agile methodologies as software development becomes more ad hoc and organic. Likewise, it is difficult to deploy DevOps at scale across large enterprises where the developers are disconnected from operations by layers of intermediaries, and thus external projects must adhere to long-term, phase-gated contracts rather than ongoing, iterative cycles appropriate for cloud-native networks.
Need for speed in open RAN, cloud-native networks
At the same time, telcos face intense pressure to innovate quickly.
McKinsey emphasises that operators now must ‘swiftly build and integrate new technologies into their operations,’ recognising that ‘is no longer a luxury but a necessity’ as 5G, open RAN and cloud-native cores roll out. McKinsey’s benchmarking found top operators can turn a proof-of-concept into production in three to six months, whereas laggards can take on average up to about a year and a half.
Legacy partner contracts and silos
The result is a bottleneck in transformation. Telcos routinely enter multi-year managed-services deals that lock them into waterfall roadmaps. One European telecoms operator observed that projects which used to be ‘three sourcing projects’ (hardware, software, infrastructure) have all merged into one huge cloud initiative, creating ‘unsustainable workloads’ and long cycle times for procurement teams and business units.
Industry bodies underscore this pain. TM Forum research found that outdated RFP processes ‘slow down business agility,’ delaying new offerings and innovation. In fact, CSPs report months-long procurement cycles that block quick experimentation. As an alternative to iterative builds, vendors demand detailed specifications up front, a recipe for missed deadlines and stalled launches.
In practice, these rigid contracts mean telco developers cannot push software fixes or service upgrades on a sprint cadence. Instead, they wait for ‘phase two’ or ‘phase three’ of a contract, which may arrive months or years later.
Slow path to newer services and automation
Undoubtedly, this mismatch shows up in operations and service roll-out. Where cloud-native competitors iterate features every week, traditional carriers tend to release services just a quarter or on a big project. Analysts connect agile adoption to faster time-to-market and greater customer satisfaction. In contrast, telcos restricted by legacy vendors have a hard time building new 5G features, IoT platforms or self-service portals with the same speed as their modern rivals.
TM Forum reports ‘widespread delays and failures of IT transformation projects’ in telecom, and explicitly calls out ‘delays in time-to-market for new services and new lines of business’ caused by old procurement models.
Companies like Ericsson, Nokia and integrators such as Capgemini have rolled out co-creation labs, sandbox networks and joint sprint teams to work side-by-side with operators.
Ericsson and Vodafone have built a shared 5G lab in Spain where start-ups and developers can use a live 5G core and radio network, provided by Ericsson, to rapidly prototype use cases under real conditions. In Vietnam, Ericsson and mobile operator MobiFone announced a 5G Innovation Hub featuring a state-of-the-art sandbox network, designed as ‘a 5G co-creation space’ for enterprises to experiment with new applications.
Capgemini set up a 1,300 square-foot 5G factory in India equipped with Ericsson’s private 5G solution; it’s being used to help industry clients ‘test potential 5G use cases’ and bring them to market faster. These partnerships embody the agile ideal, with telco and vendor teams integrated, not siloed. By placing vendor engineers, equipment and virtual networks on-site at operator labs, they collapse delivery cycles.
Capgemini’s research finds carriers are adopting ‘co-creation’ and joint R&D models to stay ahead. For example, NTT Docomo in Japan launched a partner marketplace to co-develop enterprise services. Even beyond labs, many vendors now deliver in smaller increments.
Subscription and service-delivery models
Beyond labs, service providers are also modernising commercial models. Vendors are offering subscription-based, on-demand solutions that align with agile operations.
Alliances are emerging to deliver integrated platforms with an agile mindset.
Cloud-native telco platform provider Circles and Prodapt, a telecom systems integrator, announced a global SaaS partnership to help carriers ‘launch new digital brands and services in months rather than years.’ Such deals package turnkey platforms and integration in tight timeframes, embedding agile project management into the vendor offering.
Tune Talk partnered with Mavenir to deploy a cloud-native OSS and BSS platform, announced at MWC 2025. The five-year deal focuses on agile service delivery, automation, and scaling telecoms workloads on AWS to boost efficiency and speed.
Globally, forward-looking operators and suppliers are increasingly running joint hackathons and design sprints. T-Mobile teamed with Ericsson, Nokia and Nvidia to launch an AI-RAN testbed, aiming to ‘design and drive the future of mobile networks with AI at the centre.’
Clearly, telcos can no longer continue to leave it to inflexible partners to determine the pace. As vendors align their views with an agile culture, from on-site co-innovation hubs to cloud-delivery models by demanding more iterative procurement and adopting these new service delivery models, operators will eventually break free of the chokehold of legacy contracts.
Ahead, the path belongs to those who view vendors as genuine development partners, speeding to market new services rather than waiting for them to become almost relevant.
Anna Ribeiro 