Operator-branded cloud storage is online storage for photos, videos, contacts and files that a mobile operator offers under its own name, usually bundled with a mobile plan. The operator does not usually build this service itself. A software company builds it and often runs it for the operator, and the operator puts its own name and logo on the app. A product sold this way is called a white-label product.
Why would an operator offer storage? Phones fill up with photos, and phones get lost or stolen. Storage gives customers a reason to choose a plan. It also makes them less likely to move to another operator, because their photos are stored with this one. And extra storage can be sold as an add-on to a plan.
Here is a typical case. A shopkeeper in Siliguri drops his phone in a river. His plan included 50 GB of free cloud storage from his operator. The operator's app on his old phone had been copying his photos and contacts every night, over Wi-Fi. He buys a new phone and gets a replacement SIM for his old number. He installs the operator's storage app and logs in with his mobile number and an OTP. Within an hour, his 4,800 photos and 600 contacts are back on the new phone.
The service is tied to the phone number, so it is linked to the operator's other systems. SIM activation can create the storage account when a SIM is set up. Telecom billing and real-time charging adds the free storage to the plan. If the customer buys more space, billing adds the monthly charge to the bill or deducts it from the prepaid balance. The files themselves are kept on servers, often in the operator's own data centres, which run private cloud software. This keeps the customers' data in India.
Other software companies build messaging services for operators. One example is RCS, short for rich communication services. RCS is a newer form of SMS that supports photos, read receipts and group chats inside the phone's own messaging app.
Operator storage competes with the storage that comes with the phone's own account, from the maker of the phone or of its operating system. That storage stays with the customer when they change operator, but operator storage stays with the phone number. Brands that sell plans on another operator's network, called MVNOs, can offer the same storage under their own names.