Mobile Breakfast Series is
a quarterly event that brings together thought leaders and
visionaries from the global mobile industry to interact and share
ideas, insights, and best practices with the entrepreneurs,
enthusiasts, and others who are passionate about mobile. The next
event is on March 10th, 2010 with keynotes from
Rob Glaser,
Chairman, Real Networks
(Mobile Media Innovation) and
Kevin Martin,
former FCC Chairman
(Spectrum Crisis? Current Trends in Wireless).
Registration.
Sponsors: Motricity,
Openwave,
WDSGlobal, and
Clearwire
http://www.chetansharma.com/mobilevoip.htm
Mobile VoIP -
Approaching the Tipping Point
Sponsored by
Skype
This paper is
a collaboration with Ajit Jaokar (FutureText)
in London
Over the course of the last decade,
mobile devices have become the most ubiquitous consumer electronic
devices ever invented. Even in the poorest of the nations, mobile
phones have evolved from being a luxury to an indispensible
necessity. The paradigm of communication itself has undergone a
significant transformation from just voice to multimode interaction.
The trend is also discernable in the revenue numbers from the
advanced mobile markets where voice revenue per user have been
declining over the course of the last decade while most of the
growth is coming from mobile data services. Mobile data services
have evolved significantly from simple text messaging to multimode
communication involving text, VoIP (voice over IP), video, and other
forms of messaging and social networking interactions.
As we head into the next decade, the
competitive landscape is going to change from year to year and
sometimes even quarter to quarter. For major service providers,
competition is no longer just from an operator who provides voice
and data services but any company that captures the communication
value chain. It is no longer sufficient to rely on voice revenues
but providers need to think communications in a much more holistic
form. Once the transport layer becomes all-IP in a given network,
voice is nothing but another application that will work and interact
with other applications in tandem often in real-time. The fear of
cannibalization are unwarranted as our research shows that by
offering consumers comprehensive services, the lifetime value of
customers can be increased, churn can be reduced, and the overall
value proposition of the operator increases tremendously.
The forces of technology, business
models, consumer expectations, regulatory regimes, competition, and
collaboration will help define the communication landscape of the
next ten years. This paper will take a look at the evolution of the
Internet, mobile broadband, and mobile communication and how
consumer behavior and expectations have changed. Next, the emergence
and the role of VoIP is discussed in further detail before we delve
into the intricacies of communication economics to dispel some myths
and layout the framework for how operators should approach the new
communications world.
Given the embrace by major tier-one
operators, we believe that mobile VoIP is on the verge of becoming
an integral part of the communications framework. This acceptance
represents a tipping point in the evolution of mobile VoIP. The
ecosystem participants who embrace and collaborate to provide a
holistic and comprehensive communication solutions stand to benefit
the most.
