Mobile messaging operator, TynTec, has called for the mobile industry to adopt service level agreements (SLA's) for enterprise SMS to aid the adoption of the technology in businesses.
SMS' growth as a business tool has been stifled by its perceived unreliability and the incapability of traditional SMS providers to offer traceability, security or delivery guarantees. TynTec is calling on all providers of enterprise SMS to bring about greater accountability in their services in order to encourage enterprises to adopt the technology as a communications tool.
At the moment, SMS is generally being offered to enterprises without specified service level agreements defining the reliability, security and traceability of messaging. The widespread adoption of SLA's by the enterprise mobile messaging community would enable buyers to quickly benchmark services and make educated decisions about suppliers.
Michael Kowalzik, CEO of TynTec, said: "The lack of defined service level agreements has been one of the major stumbling blocks in the adoption of SMS in the enterprise. Before adopting a technology for mission critical applications, businesses need to know that they can offer the appropriate degree of reliability and measurability. If you can't offer an SLA you're asking a company to essentially sign up to an unknown quantity – something that's acting as a brake on the enterprise SMS market as a whole.
"Its clear that some providers can't provide an enterprise quality service and, if SLA's were the expected norm in SMS providers, then companies would quickly be able to tell the wheat from the chaff and home in on an appropriate solution."