Now completely updated for the industry's newest trends, "The Essential Guide to Telecommunications, Fifth Edition" is the world's #1 non-technical guide to today's fast-changing telecommunications industry. Long-time consultant Annabel Z. Dodd reflects every important new trend and emerging technology, from cloud services to social networks, mobile video to telepresence. Now a faster read with a more attractive design, this edition reveals how the telecom market has evolved from a low-margin "commodity" business to a higher-margin customer-oriented services business targeting key verticals from finance to healthcare. Dodd explains how revolutionary tools like Skype, Facebook, and the iPhone are transforming networks; how service providers are refocusing on higher-bandwidth, higher-value offerings; and how new concerns about regulation, security, and energy usage are reshaping the industry yet again. This edition focuses far more heavily on mobile and wireless networks, infrastructure to support soaring video requirements; as well as crucial industry developments throughout Asia, China, India, Africa, and Latin America. Writing in plain English, Dodd demystifies today's (and tomorrow's) technologies, standards, and architectures introduces the providers, their strategies, and the competitive marketplace they're operating in briefs you on everything industry participants need to know now, whether they're salespeople, marketers, investors, or customers.