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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…
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Thursday, November 01, 2007
The Urge to Converge: Microsoft Unified Communications Offering Turbo-Charges Software…
Over the past few weeks, unified communications has dominated discussion in the blogosphere as Microsoft officially launched Office Communication Server (OCS) 2007, its VoIP and UC server; and Office Communicator (OC), its UC client. These two tools take UC to the next level, embedding UC tools like instant messaging, conferencing, email, voice and presence into critical business applications.
As Microsoft sees it, UC is “about bringing together all of the different ways to communicate with each other.” That’s best done through a software interface. Capabilities should live or be embedded in applications used every day. By embedding them,…
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Friday, October 26, 2007
24/7 Financial Services Sector Takes The lead In UC…
By definition, Unified Communications (UC) includes a group of technologies that integrate voice with other features such as email, instant messaging, presence and videoconferencing. But it can be much more.
Forrester Research, for example, takes the view that UC has become the inclusive name for a converging set of voice, data and video infrastructure services that integrate with common business applications to reduce typical communication bottlenecks.
In this scenario, Forrester says, UC tools and technologies link communication technologies (such as voice) with collaboration services (email, calendaring, instant messaging and presence) to improve information workers’ ability to…
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Thursday, October 04, 2007
Engaging The Enterprise & Enabling M2M
In the aftermath of ESPN and Disney it’s easy to assume the success of an MVNO rests on its ability to better deliver services in tune with our lives and lifestyles. But there is also a huge opportunity in offering services that have nothing to do with people or personalization. This detailed blog post in Phone+ points out some rather clever companies are taking advantage of a much larger opportunity: connecting inanimate objects in a ubiquitous “Internet of Things.”
MNVOs such as Aeris Wireless and KORE Telematics have found growth in communication between the world’s billions…
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Thursday, September 20, 2007
Unified Communications Takes Off
The term “unified communications” is a commonly used as the integration of telephony and desktop computers, applications, mobility and media. This convergence potentially includes the integration of voice both fixed and mobility, email, instant messaging, desktop and advanced business applications, voicemail, fax, video conferencing into a single environment offering the user a more complete and simple experience.
Until now, the market was dominated by network hardware vendors with the addition of some niche software vendors. Over the past few years however, Microsoft has been building an integrated suite of Unified Communications based around its Windows Server and Exchange…
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Monday, September 17, 2007
Good News For Good Business Models; Tailored MVNOs Reap Success & Receive Funding
Finally, some good news in an MVNO market rocked by failure (case in point: Amp’d Mobile) and dire analyst predictions. Recently, Movida Communications Inc., an MNVO focused on providing prepaid mobile services to Hispanic consumers, announced that a group of new and existing investors had committed $40 million in funding. The move coincided with the news that the MVNO had outpaced even its own projections in terms of subscriber growth, reaching a staggering 250,000 users since its launch in 2005.
How did this particular MVNO manage such a successful track record and reach the growing Hispanic…
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Monday, September 10, 2007
European MVNOs Pick Up On the Trend To Cost-Conscious Offers…
Enough of the MVNO-bashing in the wake of the Amp’d meltdown. There’s excellent reason to believe the MVNO business has never been as good an opportunity as it is now. The outlook is perhaps at its most positive in Europe, where a marked increase in the number of cost-conscious consumers is ushering in a new wave of discount MVNOs. It’s a tectonic shift that could transform the MVNO market forever, as this worthwhile article in the International Herald Tribune (IHT) points out.
It documents the market dynamics that have given rise to a slew of newcomer MVNOs,…
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Thursday, August 16, 2007
New MVNO Models - Advertising Takes Off
To become a successfully MVNO, it is important to differentiate from other MVNOs. Today, MVNO’s are really inventive and playing with different models. Before choosing the right model, MVNOs should really know on which market they want to focus. Looking to the market today, we see different targets:
- Focus on ethnical communities. This people are looking to cheap solutions to call to their motherland.
- Operational focus. People are not interested in the price, but are really looking to specific services.
- Focus on youth markets or special communities (like football clubs, …)
- Focus on low credit customers. Service is…