EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Telefonica believes its cognitive intelligence platform Aura will give users full transparency around their use of services – a capability the operator hopes subscribers will take advantage of instead of contacting call centres.

In an interview with Mobile World Live, Telefonica’s chief data officer Chema Alonso (pictured) said the operator has 350 million users worldwide, most of whom have similar issues. For instance, 45 per cent of calls received by customer services are related to bill clarification, finding out about services, and finding out how to watch Game of Thrones.

Telefonica hopes all of this can be answered by Aura, its chatbot-based customer-service agent, which Alonso explained can be accessed through several means – be it a mobile app, Microsoft Hololens (which he demonstrated at the launch of the platform), Amazon’s Alexa or even Skype.

The channel is not important, he stressed, adding that it should be whatever comes naturally to users.

He also explained Aura gives consumers three powers: accessing Telefonica services and getting things done in real time; “full transparency about their life in Telefonica” through a feature called ‘my timeline’; and enriching users’ lives with data.

Alonso also spoke about how his background as a hacker and a cyber security expert has helped him in his current role at Telefonica.

To see the full interview, click here.