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Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Strength In Numbers: Operators Make Third-Party Involvement Number One Priority
Taken as single and separate events, recent announcements by the major mobile operators across the U.S. and Europe don’t say much about the role of Web 2.0 as a future revenue generator. However, connect the dots and draw the logical conclusions and a singular important mega-trend emerges: Command-and-control models are giving way to coordinate-and-cultivate.
It took some time, but operators are beginning to understand that insisting on strict control over what happens on their networks comes at a heavy cost and may lead, in some instances, to outcomes quite contrary to their interests.
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Monday, April 21, 2008
Multi-Brand Strategies Deliver New Revenues; But Why Don’t More Operators Follow KPN’s Lead?
Kudos to this month’s Total Telecom magazine for an in-depth look at Dutch carrier KPN and the link between its ambitious multi-brand strategy and its impressive success. KPN counted 9.4 million subscribers at end-2007, more than double Vodafone’s share of the Dutch market. Granted, part of the growth can be attributed to the operator’s acquisition of Telfort, but the article also points out that a “blooming multi-brand strategy” has also contributed significantly to the stellar rise. In fact, it’s the multi-brand strategy that is allowing the operator to make gains in Germany and Belgium, markets where research firm Current Analysis…
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Thursday, March 20, 2008
Location, Presence and Context: KPN Shows the Way with “Aware” Mobile Services That Deliver
A newly released and must-read report on mobile advertising from eMarketer provides us with more than useful stats (it forecasts worldwide spending on mobile advertising will reach $19 billion in 2012, from $2.6 billion last year); it supplies us with a simple summary of the issues that the industry must tackle before companies can deliver content, services (among them relevant mobile advertising messages and offers) to the right user at the right moment.
As report author and wireless analyst John du Pre Gauntt astutely points out, the contest…
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Monday, March 03, 2008
Are Plain Vanilla Location-Based Services Passé?
Regular readers will notice that this blog is sharply focused on the convergence of services as varied as messaging, location-based services, social networking, mobile search, mobile advertising and so-called collaborative web 3.0 technologies, as well as the systems and service providers that will ultimately need to come together to make it happen.
Consumers and prosumers alike must be empowered to experience communications on their own terms. That means having a say in how they communicate, with whom, and under what circumstances. Location is a part of this, but so is presence (the availability of the individual at the…
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Thursday, February 07, 2008
When Two Become One: Converged Applications Around Location and Presence Pave The Way For Web 3.0
In the run-up to Mobile World Congress, the industry is naturally anxious to identify the next “big thing.” But who said 2008 is destined to be marked by one mega-trend? Efforts such as the Google-led Open Handset Alliance lay the groundwork for a new open mobile Web where all-inclusive services and strategies are far superior to exclusive approaches.
Against this backdrop, it’s clear the concept of a killer app is passé. This year will not be the year of location-based services. Nor will it be a banner year for mobile search, or mark a…
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Wednesday, January 30, 2008
You Can Take It With You; The Buzz Around “Information Roaming” Reaches A New Pitch
In the lead-up to Mobile World Congress, there are a range of new ideas and concepts gathering traction around enhanced presence, “location-aware” apps and services, and the intersection of content (information) and context (where we are, what we’re doing and the communications medium that does the job best).
Industry focus on more enhanced and contextually-relevant mobile services has grown over the last months, boosted by a slew of M&A that involves location (Nokia & Navteq), mapping (Microsoft & Multimap) and personal mobility (Google & Jaiku). Location,…
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Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Is Presence The New Dialtone?
Amid the buzz about UC, it’s helpful for the industry to have some concrete data points upon which to base expectations and measure results. Welcome figures and forecasts come from In-Stat and Wainhouse Research. The firms have joined forces to publish an extensive two-part market report covering the whole of the UC services market.
FYI: Their definition of a UC system is complex, but comprehensive. It includes “elements of presence, instant messaging, IP telephony, audio conferencing, web conferencing or data collaboration, unified messaging (a common message store for voicemail, email and faxes), mobility, and/or…
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Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Trends That Matter; Defining What Comes After Unified Communications
Many analysts and industry observers have correctly identified 2007 as a pivotal year in Unified Communications (UC). A flurry of product releases and the firm commitment of market leaders such as Microsoft have placed UC firmly at the top of the telecoms agenda. But before mobile operators and managed services providers can achieve their business objectives, it is imperative to understand what UC is – and more importantly – what it is not. Against this backdrop, this blog seeks to be a catalyst for broad topic discussion and advancement on the subject of UC and all things at the intersection…
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Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Location-Based Services Make A Comeback…
Operators need to take the initiative to profit from Location-Based Services, according to a probing article published by Mobile Communications International magazine.
The advance of Global Positioning Systems technology (GPS) clearly plays in favor of location-based services - and the companies that successfully harness the technology to offer consumers services in tune with their context. Nokia certainly needs little convincing. The Finnish handset maker has already built GPS receivers into select devices, including the N95 and the aptly named Nokia 6110 Navigator. The hope is that location-based services will become the cornerstone of a variety…
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Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Survey Measures the Pain of Unified Communications; Waiting Is the Worst
While communication tools have proliferated, communication and collaboration with co-workers is becoming difficult. That’s where Unified Communications (UC) comes in. This post from CXOtoday.com provides some helpful examples to illustrate worker frustration and underline the need for a solution that effectively connects co-workers to get the job done.
In a word, workers are mobile and distributed and need solutions that bring together fixed and mobile telephony, e-mail, faxes, instant messaging and conferencing (audio and/or video) into a single message delivery system. With voice, data and video traffic all on one network, users can…