For decades, telecom operators have relied on legacy systems that are highly customized, deeply intertwined and challenging to scale. These systems have supported critical functions such as billing, provisioning and customer management, but in many cases, they are now holding providers back from innovation, agility and long-term growth. As the industry pivots toward cloud-native, data-driven architectures, modernizing these legacy environments has become a business priority.
Today, a combination of generative AI, DevOps practices and modular system design is enabling telecom organizations to transform with greater speed, intelligence and resilience, without destabilizing the core of their operations.
Using GenAI and DevOps to Streamline Legacy Transformation
You’d have to be living under a rock not to recognize that gen AI is proving especially useful in large-scale transformation projects. It can be used to analyze legacy code, generate documentation for poorly documented systems and even propose refactored versions of modules for modern architectures. When paired with DevOps pipelines, this reduces manual effort and helps teams maintain velocity throughout the modernization journey.
For instance, during the migration of legacy code at a major cable provider to the latest Java Springboot standards, GenAI analyzed the existing Ruby on Rails code. It created comprehensive documentation for the migration process to Java Springboot and assisted in the deployment on Anthos P3. The project followed a phased approach: Initially analyzing the legacy code, documenting the requirements and subsequently converting those requirements into architectural artifacts. Windserf (Codeium) was employed to first convert Ruby code into Java and then upgrade it to the Springboot framework. This initiative significantly streamlined onboarding, reduced reliance on individual expertise, increased team velocity up to 30%, improved code quality and mitigated security vulnerabilities through robust DevOps pipelines.
Meanwhile, DevOps provides the structure needed to make modernization iterative and testable. Continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines allow teams to test small components in isolation and deploy updates with minimal risk. This is crucial in telecom environments, where even minor outages or performance lags can affect thousands of customers in real-time.
Containerization, infrastructure as code (IaC) and automated testing environments can all play a role in supporting clean deployments as systems are broken down into modular, more maintainable components.
Rationalizing Complex Billing Systems
One of the most complex modernization challenges telecoms face is rationalizing legacy billing systems. These platforms often include decades of custom logic for rating, charging, discounting and revenue recognition. They’re also frequently interwoven with customer care and provisioning tools, making them even harder to decouple.
To move toward commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) readiness, organizations must first normalize and document existing business logic. AI can assist here by identifying redundant logic paths, surfacing undocumented dependencies and creating test cases that mimic production behavior.
Organizations preparing for COTS should standardize and document their existing business logic. Artificial Intelligence facilitates this by identifying redundant processes, uncovering dependencies and creating test cases. During the transition from old billing systems to a new Telecom Billing COTS platform, business rules are extracted and normalized. The Billing and Product Catalog can integrate with CRM, provisioning and financial systems. AI tools support simulation, validation and regression testing to ensure accurate billing. Additionally, AI aids in designing billing catalogs, optimizing performance and developing interfaces, emphasizing the significance of modular design in building scalable COTS billing systems.
During a major media billing modernization project, normalized legacy billing logic was introduced, modular microservices were implemented and DevOps pipelines were established for continuous integration and deployment. AI tools like GitHub Copilot and Windserf were integrated into the development workflow to accelerate code generation and enhance quality. This initiative ensured business continuity and set the groundwork for future COTS integration by aligning the architecture with industry standards and enabling scalable, testable components.
Migrating to COTS products, particularly convergent billing systems, can significantly enhance long-term maintainability and scalability. But success depends on rigorous upfront rationalization, clear mapping of old-to-new processes and robust fallback strategies during cutover phases.
Minimizing Business Disruption While Supporting Innovation
One of the most difficult balances to strike in modernization projects is minimizing disruption while enabling innovation. It’s not just about ripping out old systems; it’s about gradually introducing new capabilities without alienating users or destabilizing operations.
Progressive modernization, starting with loosely coupled modules like reporting, analytics, or self-service portals, can help prove out new technologies before moving into core transactional systems. During this time, digital twins or shadow deployments can simulate new architectures alongside legacy systems without impacting production workloads.
Progressive modernization with loosely coupled modules like reporting, analytics, or self-service portals allows for demonstrating new technologies before full integration. Digital twins or shadow deployments can simulate new architectures without affecting production.
A phased strategy was used in the media billing modernization program to minimize disruption. Non-critical components, such as reporting and invoice generation, were decoupled from the legacy system and redesigned using microservices on AWS. A shadow deployment model allowed the new system to run in parallel with the old one, simulating real-world scenarios.
Regular workshops with business users gathered feedback and ensured alignment. Training sessions helped familiarize teams with new interfaces and workflows. By the time core billing logic was transitioned, the organization was accustomed to the new architecture, reducing resistance.
This approach ensured a smooth transition and built confidence in the modernization roadmap.
Modernization efforts must also consider regulatory compliance, particularly when handling customer data. Adopting zero-downtime deployment strategies and embedding robust rollback mechanisms into DevOps workflows can help organizations deliver faster without compromising stability or trust.
Future-Proofing With Big Data, API Architecture and Convergent Billing
To remain competitive, telecom providers must move away from monolithic systems and embrace modular, interoperable platforms. This means building infrastructure that’s not only agile, but also extensible—ready to adapt to the next wave of customer demands, partner integrations, or pricing models.
Big data plays a central role here. With the right data ingestion, storage and processing frameworks in place, providers can generate real-time insights on network performance, customer behavior and fraud detection. AI models trained on this data can recommend optimizations in areas ranging from pricing to infrastructure planning.
Equally important is the shift to API-first architecture. APIs enable seamless integration across platforms and make it easier to experiment with new services, partners, or monetization models without needing to overhaul core systems.
Convergent billing systems, which combine prepaid, postpaid and multi-service offerings, are also key to building a unified view of the customer and reducing the complexity of managing multiple platforms. These systems make it easier to launch bundled offers, track usage across products and reconcile billing more efficiently.
Telecom modernization is no longer a one-time transformation. it’s a continuous evolution. With generative AI to accelerate development, DevOps to ensure safe and repeatable deployments and modular architecture to enable flexibility, providers can break free from the constraints of legacy systems without jeopardizing performance or customer trust.
Telecom modernization is ongoing. Generative AI, DevOps and modular architecture enable us to move beyond legacy systems while maintaining performance and trust. AI speeds up development, DevOps ensures safe deployments and modular design provides agility. Tasks like analyzing billing rules or validating system migrations now take days instead of months. Telecom platforms will become self-optimizing with embedded AI agents, transforming from finite projects to adaptive capabilities.
Telecom modernization is a continuous evolution. With 24 years of experience in global digital transformations, I’ve seen how legacy systems can be revamped using COTS platforms, modular architecture and technologies like AI.
GitHub Copilot boosts development with DevOps pipeline automation. AI agents will continually optimize telecom platforms, making transformation adaptive.
The path forward is not without risk, but the cost of inaction is far greater. Organizations that approach modernization with a pragmatic, tech-forward mindset can expect to reduce operational overheads, launch new products faster and future-proof their infrastructure for the next wave of digital demand.
