Sunday, March 5, 2006|
Talk! Buy! Talk!.
The Mobiface blog pointed out some video links today of some interesting mobile user interface animations from Japan, and when I clicked over to YouTube to check them out I found a whole bunch of other cool Japanese videos as well, including mobile phone commercials! Rock! I did a tag search of KDDI and DoCoMo, and found some pretty great commericals. It seems DoCoMo is selling Push To Talk and FeliCa mobile payments as a set: Talk Buy Talk! Awesome. (There’s also Play! Push! Talk! as well) Check them out… there are some seriously trippy vids. Japanese mobile commercials are like visual LSD - especially since I have no idea what they’re saying… Seriously. Someone needs to email me about the penguin. It’s harshing my buzz. -Russ [Russell Beattie Notebook]3:39:38 AM  comment
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Yes, Americans Get Mobile.
From an article in the March 2nd Economist: Getting the message:
Just a note in case you hadn’t updated your world view in a while: Americans have 200MM mobile phone subscribers, have higher ARPUs than just about any country except a few in Asia, and send more text messages per subscriber than much of Europe. (We also have things most Europeans can only dream about - like inexpensive flat-rate data plans). Mobile is so strong in the U.S. that T-Mobile USA is actually the number one reason that Deutsche Telecom is making a profit - and T-Mo is the smallest of the big four operators here. It’s an amusing article, really… The fact that we “get” texting now is really just a small sign of a much bigger trend. -Russ [Russell Beattie Notebook]3:39:08 AM comment
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Mobile Evolution: Carriers, Consumers Disconnect?. Optimism reigned at yesterday's RBC Capital Markets' Mobility Evolution... [Wireless IQ - News Feeds] 3:35:27 AM comment
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New MVNO Concept Under Development. Nokia and Aina Group, a regional Finnish content and service provider, have entered a frame agreement to develop Aina Group's unique media-based mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) concept that generates revenues for operators and media companies. [Wireless IQ - News Feeds] 3:29:37 AM comment
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Does SAP sap profits? You've seen the ads: Crowds of smiling employees clapping their hands and exchanging high-fives. Why are they so happy? Because their companies had the good sense to install software from SAP. The tagline: "Companies that run SAP are 32% more profitable than companies that don't."
That's an awfully big claim - associating significantly higher profits with the installation of a particular software package - but, as I've pointed out before (here and here), there's no way to validate it. SAP has spent millions on the ad campaign, but it hasn't made the research public. We get the tagline, not the facts.
Next week, though, a study examining the relative profitability of SAP customers will be made public. It's not the SAP-sponsored study, however. It's a study by Nucleus Research, an independent reseach house that specializes in helping companies assess the financial returns on IT investments. The headline of the Nucleus Research study is a bit different than SAP's advertising tagline: "SAP customers are 20% less profitable than their peers."
Nucleus Research looked at the 81 public companies that SAP lists as customers on its own website. It determined the return on equity (ROE) earned by each company, based on formal financial filings, and then compared that number with the average ROE for the company's industry, as calculated by Hoovers. The upshot, as stated in Nucleus's research note: "Nucleus found SAP customers had an average ROE of 12.6 percent, compared to an industry average ROE of 15.7 percent. It is interesting to note that three areas of significant focus for SAP, customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP), and supply chain management (SCM), had customers who fared quite poorly, with CRM customers achieving profitability 18 percent lower, ERP customers achieving profitability 32 percent lower, and SCM customers achieving profitability 40 percent lower than their peers." In its note, Nucleus documents the data it collected for each of the 81 companies.
In an email exchange, I asked Nucleus's vice president of research, Rebecca Wettemann, why her firm undertook the study. She replied, "Nothing inspired us other than a few of our clients who commented about [the SAP claims]. We do a lot of ROI investigation and since SAP opened the door to talking about profitability, it seemed reasonable to take a closer look." She also noted that "no one paid us or commissioned this in any way." I also asked her if she could explain the discrepancy between the Nucleus findings and the findings promoted by SAP in its ads. "It's hard to comment on SAP's study since they won't share it with us," she said.
The Nucleus Research study is a limited one, but at least the firm has clearly documented its data and analysis, so readers can draw their own conclusions. One wonders if SAP will now at long last release the documentation of its study. Until it does, Nucleus Research will have the last word in this game of strained statistics: "Despite SAP advertising claims to the contrary, factual analysis of ROE data shows the best-run companies don't run SAP." - nick (nick@roughtype.com) [Rough Type: Nicholas Carr's Blog]3:27:01 AM comment
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Changingworlds goes do it for Wataniya's GoDo. Wataniya Telecom announced the launch of its 'GoDo' mobile portal with ChangingWorlds' ClixSmart Intelligent Portal Platform. Wataniya Telecom is Kuwait's first privately owned operator and has 6 million subscribers. [i-mode Business Strategy] 3:26:38 AM comment
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Oldies to boost Japanese mobile penetration. Research and Markets predict future growth in the Japanese mobile market will be centred on the under 14s and over 55s as 100% penetration is reached in all other age groups. [i-mode Business Strategy] 3:24:41 AM comment
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Ofcom release interim communications market report
Ofcom today released this 117-page .pdf report (click
here
) covering the latest trends and figures in the communications market. I have not read the entire document yet, but found myself immediately turning to the discussion of the UK cable industry, starting on page 111.
- Russ [| OfcomWatch |]Update: It's really interesting to read a report like this. Most (nearly all) of the figures relate to products and services that are regulated by Ofcom. That makes sense. But still, this is not a complete picture of the 'communications market' and therefore I am not sure if the stated aims of the report (p. 11) are achieved. Information concerning products and services that are not regulated by Ofcom--such as podcasting--are covered only in certain respects (in the context of some newspapers producing them), but not in a comprehensive manner. Similarly, hugely important communications products like iTunes are not even mentioned. 3:22:40 AM comment
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TV Licence needed to watch mobile TV
The question of whether you need a TV licence to view TV on a mobile phone was clarified in Parliament yesterday. In
answer
to two questions in the Lords, on whether you need a licence to view content, and whether this is covered by the owner's domestic television licence or whether a separate licence is required, Lord Davies of Oldham, speaking for the Government said that "the BBC, as licensing authority, has responsibility for interpreting the television licensing legislation and determining licensing requirements in individual cases. However, a television licence is required to install or use any apparatus for the purpose of receiving any television programme service, whether by means of wireless telegraphy or otherwise and whether or not it is installed or used for any other purpose ... Such a licence permits the licensee or a person normally living with the licensee at the licensed address to use a television receiver powered solely by its own internal batteries anywhere in the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man".
- Scott [| OfcomWatch |]3:19:32 AM comment
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NEC Announces Mobile Music for Telstra. JCN Newswire, 2 March 2006 NEC has announced the release of "music-on-the-move", an innovative new mobile content service for Telstra i-mode users. To bring the site to life, licensing agreements have been secured with major record labels, EMI and Warner, as well as local Australian independent labels, Shock Records and Vicious, providing consumers with a diverse array of mobile content. Music of all genres from past and present is available for purchase and download in through the "music on the move" i-mode site, giving Australian mobile phone users instant access to their favourite tracks. [Wireless Watch Japan] 3:19:03 AM comment
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Kids' Mobile Device for Willcom?. Nikkei Net, 3 March 02206 Reports in the Japanese business press have suggested that publisher Bandai Namco is about to announce the launch of a new mobile gaming device, which would be aimed at the children's market and launched with mobile network operator Willcom. The new service, Kids Mobile, would be co-launched by Bandai Namco and Willcom, a Japanese mobile operator which was spun out of major operator KDDI in mid-2004, and is now co-owned by Kyocera and the Carlyle Group. [Wireless Watch Japan] 3:18:37 AM comment
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AT&T To Buy BellSouth. Holy smokes… King Ed (Whitacre) is really going to be the king of telecom. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that AT&T is in talks to buy BellSouth for about $65 billion. The news should not surprise anyone, since it was a foregone conclusion that BellSouth would eventually end-up with SBC/AT&T. The prime driver behind this deal has to be Cingular, the wireless joint venture between the two companies which has become an awesome money machine.
Put together, the SBC territory would extend from California to Florida, north to Illinois and south to Texas. Combining the two companies’ current market capitalizations, AT&T would have a market value approaching $150 billion, over 50% greater than Verizon.This basically makes it Verizon versus AT&T in the telecom space. So its pretty much back to the future. I think this could prompt another round of mergers. Qwest and Sprint Local could make good partners. Of course, Verizon could make some moves of its own, and snap-up someone like Alltel.
The wave of mergers has dramatically reshaped the telecom industry, and a purchase of BellSouth would further cement the recreation of the old Ma Bell, which the government pushed to break up in 1984. The management of AT&T, which has apparently briefed key senior government officials late last week, appears to be betting that the Bush administration and a Bell-friendly Federal Communications Commission won’t raise too many obstacles for such a deal.
Bell-Friendly is a euphemism t FCC does whatever bells ask them to do. The long term implications of this deal, and its impact on the whole network neutrality debate is going to be huge. I have not had a chance to fully digest this information, but will update the post, in the morning.
3:17:35 AM comment
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Japan's Global Mobile Market Shrinks. Japan Economic Newswire, 2 March 2006 Global mobile phone sales in 2005 rose 21 percent from the previous year to 816.6 million units, with Japanese manufacturers' share shrinking from 2 to 1 percent, information technology research company Gartner Japan Ltd. said Thursday. Although Japanese-Swedish joint venture Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB's share grew to the fifth-largest, total share by Japanese companies went down from the 2 percent level to the lower 1 percent. [Wireless Watch Japan] 3:17:07 AM comment
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Vodafone Bows out of Japan?. Timesonline, 4 March 2006 Vodafone, the beleaguered mobile giant, bowed to investor pressure last night, announcing the sale of its failing Japanese division for up to 8 billion British pounds. The proposed sale of the Vodafone KK business to SoftBank, the Japanese internet giant, sent shares in Vodafone surging, adding 5.6 billion to its stock market value. The move to sell the business, which accounts for 20 per cent of Vodafone's revenues, was also hailed as a landmark move marking the end of the group's empire-building strategy. A successful sale would mark the first major sell-off by the group in its history. No offense to the Timesonline, however we'd prefer to wait for Reuters Japan (who first announced a deal was in the works) to provide a 'confirmed sale' update -- Eds [Wireless Watch Japan] 3:16:30 AM comment
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The Next Net 25.
Driven by ubiquitous broadband, cheap hardware, and open-source software, the Web is mutating into a radically different beast than it has been. And that is leading to the creation of entirely new kinds of companies, new business models, and oceans of new opportunity.
We have spliced this list into five categories - Social Media, Mash-Up & Filters, The New Phone, The Web Top and Under The Hood. The VoIP Companies we picked for this category include Fonality, SIPphone, iotum, Vivox with Skype (eBay) as the incumbent to watch.
3:16:06 AM comment
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Business 2.0’s |
MVNOs Not Making Money? Surprised?. When table stakes are $500 million, it is clear making money in the MVNO business is hard. I have been saying this for a while, but now Pyramid Research has crunched the data and come up with the same conclusion in their report, “MVNOs and MVNEs: Analyzing the Viability of Virtual Mobile Players.”
Their data shows that MVNOs account for 2.75% of the total world’s mobile users and is projected to rise to 3.3% by 2010, reaching more than 100 million subscribers.
Pyramid found that most MVNOs are loss-making to slightly above break-even and believes that there is enough fodder to question the MVNO model, at least in its first iterations. Pyramid concludes that not all MVNOs will achieve profitability and the next 24 months will either make or break MVNOs, particularly the prepaid-focused ones.
They think that the next generation MVNO will do well, because they are focusing on ARPU and better margins. Like Amp’D mobile? Hah, I will in 12 months, repeat myself and say… told you so.
3:13:45 AM comment
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Who Did News Corp Just Buy?. Apparently, News Corp., is back shopping and has just acquired another start-up. I am in middle of Next Net 25 round table event, and don’t have many details. Nearly half way through our event, a little buzz went around the room. The word came from down in Silicon Valley, where IBD was having its under the radar event.
Ross Levinsohn, president of Fox Interactive told the attendees that Rupert Murdoch had snapped up another, though he did not reveal any details. He apparently said that the company was in the room. So I ducked out of our roundtable, and was able to confirm that News Corp., had indeed bought a smallish Web 2.0 company! Which one? Not sure as of now - but rest assured the phone is in maximum use right now.
2:48:44 AM comment
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* MVNO concept gets a make-over.
Aina's media-based virtual service operator concept generates revenues not only for operators, but for media companies as well. Aina Group offers personalized services for niche consumer segments, such as newspaper subscribers, on regional basis, and solutions for enterprise and public sector customers in Finland. |
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* Text messaging remains top service.
Text messaging remains the most popular service for mobile phone users in the Asia Pacific despite offers for fancier applications such as email and gaming, an industry research group said, reports the AFP. IDC said that the "latest findings reveal that, despite the proliferation of content-rich mobile data services, the adoption of advanced services such as mobile phone payment, online mobile gaming and mobile email have yet to reach noteworthy levels of usage." |
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/ Music phones to slice into iPod growth.
According to Reuters, the biggest threat to Apple's iPod and the portable music player industry, is a device already nestling in a billion pockets: the mobile phone. "The music phone is not going to significantly impact the high-end, high-capacity hard disk market but it will certainly have a major impact on the low-end flash market," said Peter King of Strategy Analytics. |
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* People like to watch mobile TV at home !.
"John Cullen, Mobile TV Strategy Manager for O2, the British company that ran the Oxford trial, offered a reason: [base ']ÄúPeople liked the utility of having a TV they could walk around with[base ']Äù from room to room[base ']Äù, like taking the mobile into the bathroom. But he put it down to a basic human impulse [base ']Äî selfishness. [base ']ÄúPeople in the trial,[base ']Äù he said, [base ']Äúvalued that it was personal to them, that they had control of the TV.[base ']Äù |
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AT&T On Verge Of $65 Billion Acquisition of BellSouth, Rest Of Cingular: Report. : AT&T is close to acquiring BellSouth for roughly $65 million -- and, most important, sole control over wireless powerhouse Cingular, according to a report on WSJ.com. The market cap of the expanded AT&T company would be in the $150-160 billion range, about 50 percent greater than Verizon. Despite certain protests from some quarters, the Bush FCC may be inclined to stick with its current pattern of approving big mergers as long as competition can be invoked -- but with some restrictions. The Journal frames it -- in part -- as the possible last hurrah of serial acquirer AT&T Chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre as he nears retirement. [PaidContent.org] 2:04:31 AM comment
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Last update: 4/21/06; 10:46:54 AM .
