>That is, Europeans will turn on their phones in 3 years and see one of three
>things 'Welcome to Vodafone', Welcome to Orange' or Welcome to T-Mobile'
>(or, perhaps, AOL). And people will not argue about whether Nokia or
>Ericsson have the best messaging app, but whether Vodafone or Orange do.
That is what people said years ago about last mile ISP connection
providers. Then came along portal ISPs like Yahoo who didn't bother
with providing IP connections and almost everybody today has an email
alias or web email account with one of those portals.
Unified messaging is going to be an important service - it is
already, but it is by no means clear that it will be the mobile
companies who are the players in that segment.
For one, such services allow wireline carriers who have lost out
against wireless carriers to regain some terrain. Then, skyrocketing
cost for 3G has prompted carriers to look into ways of renting out
their networks to emerging MVNOs which is more and more favoured and
promoted by regulators in Europe. It only needs one of those MVNOs to
successfully deploy unified messaging and call forwarding services
and telephony portals will be all the rage.
It might well be that in 3-5 years from now, Europeans will turn on
their phones and they will be connected to a Voda, an Orange or a
T-Mobil base station,*but* the Welcome message may say "Welcome to
Yatelhoo!" or "Welcome to Telexcite" or "Welcome to Telycos" or
whatever portals there may emerge. These portals could provide a
global telephone number which can be used with wireline, wireless
and VoIP telephony services and users may neglect the numbers they
get from their wireline or wireless last mile connection provider.
>Put another way, how many sisters and fathers and cousins and
>computer-illiterate friends has this group, collectively, managed to
>persuade to dump AOL and sign onto a cheaper, faster, 'real' ISP'?
Exactly. But AOL is more akin to the telephony portal which hasn't
emerged yet - the mobile phone companies are predominantly connection
providers and it is by no means clear that they will be the big
players in a portal market.
Portals that are independent of the last mile (wired or wireless)
have the distinct advantage that they can provide the same service to
you no matter what last mile you use.
After all mobile phone services have increased the mobility of
people. Total mobility however demands that you are independent of
any physical network and its limitations. Virtual services and
personal numbers are a means to achieve that.
I myself am "very mobile", three months in this country, six months
in another, three months at home etc etc. I have organised my
communications tools and services into a virtual environment by using
internet portal services and email aliases, unified messaging and
personal numbers, which allow me to swap last mile providers in an
instant without anybody noticing and the inconvenience is actually
less than with the traditional approach. Cost is also less.
For example when my credit card expired, a UK ISP I used was unable
to enter the new credit card into their billing system and cut me
off. When I couldn't get anywhere trying to talk to them and it was
costing me time and money, I simply signed up with another provider,
ran my script to change all my virtual settings and the problem was
solved within five minutes and I even even ended up saving some money.
I did not loose any services and did not need to tell anyone. In
fact I change ISPs and mobile phone providers almost like other
people change underwear, it's more convenient and cheaper. Automate
this and offer it to others and there will be many more people doing
it. The user bases of companies like YAC are growing very fast.
You may say that this is only for a small group of users, but then
again that is what was said about mobile telephony only 10 years ago
- today mobile penetration is well over 50% in most countries.
The split between transport and services into separate entities is a
global trend in any network industry...
It is already the norm on the internet. Take ADSL in Japan as an
example. NTT provide the physical connection, but you are free to
choose between a variety of ISPs for service.
Railway companies used to have their own tracks exclusively for
themselves. In the US and the UK those tracks are organised into a
separate entity and the transport networks share the track.
Electricity companies used to own their own power transmission lines.
Again the US and the UK have taken the lead to organise those
transmission lines into a national grid which is shared by all the
electricity providers.
Airlines are teaming up to provide codeshare flights where individual
networks can sell capacity on routes they themselves do not operate
but share with others.
Local number portability and long distance user preselection (i.e.
MyLine in Japan) as well as VNOs (i.e.Virgin Mobile) have already
started this trend in the telephony segment. It is very likely that
eventually the providers of capacity (wireline and wireless) might
become totally divorced from the end user service providers and
national telephone grids emerge on which service providers can sell
no matter what package unrestricted by the boundaries of individual
physical networks.
Who says that VodaFone or Orange even keep their networks ? When the
conditions are right, they may choose to initially farm their
physical networks out and concentrate on services and brands.
Eventually they might sell the physical network and become themselves
MVNOs.
regards
benjamin
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Received on Wed Aug 15 08:13:23 2001