Amdocs Voices We make sure you don't get left behind! The wider Amdocs team comments on industry events as they happen.

Here's one way of stopping friends from announcing what's going to happen in the next episode of your favorite TV show

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

Are you fed up of friends spoiling your favorite TV show by letting you know how the series ends before you’ve managed to see the final episode?

Well, help might be at hand if a solution currently in the Amdocs incubation lab actually makes it to market.

Under a scenario demonstrated at this week’s Amdocs InTouch Business Forum in Miami, while you’re watching your favorite TV show, you’ll also see on screen which of your friends are online at the same time, who’s watching which program and, most importantly for the spoiler scenario, which episodes of the series you’re viewing your friends have already seen. That way, you’ll know who to avoid if you want to keep the ending a surprise.

Now, as it’s only in its incubation phase, there’s no guarantee that this particular solution will ever make it to your living-room screen, but one thing is clearly coming into view: the home TV experience is about to undergo a drastic change as service providers seek to capitalize on innovative technologies in order to beat off the likes of Google and Apple from taking control of the living room.

This is one of reasons, as Amdocs CEO Eli Gelman stressed in his opening address at InTouch, that next-generation television is going to be one of the key areas Amdocs intends focusing on in the near future. Another next-generation TV solution demonstrated at InTouch is AirFlinger, developed by Amdocs partner TVersity.

This product mirrors the screen on a user’s tablet on the living room TV, via the set-top box, pushing media such as video from the device to the television. The solution has already been deployed at three different service providers in France, Israel and the US, with service providers either charging subscribers for this particular service, or offering it as a part of a package for top-tier customers.

As they said in the old days of analog broadcasting: stay tuned for future developments.

Add a Comment

Why should IT departments start celebrating?

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

We all remember the BYOB (bring your own bottle) parties we attended as cash-strapped students and perhaps somewhat foggily remember the hazardous effects that drinking cheap alcohol had on our studies the next day. Well, today’s trend of BYOD (bring your own device) might not damage our health, but it’s certainly giving enterprise IT departments one massive headache.

According to a recent Forrester report, there are more personal devices out there used for work than company IT departments are aware of. As Tech Crunch’s Sarah Perez notes:

“Today’s IT departments think they have only a handful of devices out in the field: a PC and smartphone for most users, and maybe a tablet for a handful of execs. But in reality, one-half of info workers report using multiple devices, often behind IT’s back.”

And this will only grow. The Forrester report is predicting a 58 percent expected growth in employees bringing smartphones to work in the next 12 months, whether BYOD-supported or not, which will mean some gnashing of teeth in enterprise IT departments as they have to worry about the security of their company’s data. Writing in eweek.com, Chris Preimesberger argues that:

“Most organizations do not have the tools to ensure security of their data on just any device, especially when those devices will be by definition either partially or totally unmanaged.”

But one person’s problem is another’s opportunity.

A recent global survey conducted by Heavy Reading for Amdocs found that:

 service providers see the BYOD phenomenon as a new customer experience/revenue opportunity.

 In fact, 73 percent of the service providers polled said they expected to see a 10-25 percent increase in BYOD-related requests from their enterprise customers in the coming year.

As Ari Banerjee, senior analyst at Heavy Reading told a group of journalists at the Amdocs InTouch Business Forum in Miami today, if service providers can overcome the technological challenges of disabling business functions, like email and IM when users switch to personal mode, then “huge gains in customer satisfaction and loyalty are possible.”

And these challenges are not insurmountable, but will demand service providers converging their BSS and OSS systems so that they have an end-to-end view of the customer, linking personal and business personas. With this in place, split bills for work and personal calls, secure business emails and shared loyalty plans, will become a matter of routine.

The IT department should bring round a bottle to celebrate!

Add a Comment

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

Amdocs CEO Eli Gelman provided a glimpse into the company’s future at this year’s Amdocs InTouch Business Forum today. Pointing out that it’s Amdocs’ job to anticipate what service providers need to stay ahead, he told an audience of over 500 people at the InterContinental Hotel Miami, that there were four areas on which Amdocs was concentrating for the future.

The first area, he said, was next-generation video consumption:

“Video will not be consumed as it has been for the past two or three years. It will be much more social. People want to interact with others”

The other new areas of focus for the company, he said, include the blurring of boundaries between IT and the network; providing  ICT and cloud services for enterprises, and the expansion of Amdocs’ services option to offer services around more than just Amdocs products within the company’s BSS and OSS domain expertise. 

Speaking later in the day to analysts and media, Gelman also said the company was also examining big data and how Amdocs can help its customers make better use of it. Rami Schwartz, president of Amdocs Product Business Group, added that in Amdocs’ next portfolio release, CES 9, there will be a new product called Proactive Insight, which will use customer data to provide service providers with proactive insight into the financial reasons behind subscribers calling the call center for assistance.

In his keynote address, the Amdocs CEO stressed that today’s demand for data was unsustainable, and that operators could not continue investing in the network without being able to monetize it. “One of our jobs,” he said, “is to find ways to monetize data,” which is why Amdocs believed:

 ”operators need to create value-based offerings that people can understand, because they will pay more for better value packages”

Noting that Amdocs celebrated its 30^th anniversary this year, Gelman noted this was a significant achievement for a high-tech company and said Amdocs’ longevity was due to the fact that “we evolve all the time.”

Add a Comment

AT&T is the latest service provider to offer home automation services (and no, their security services don't go this far!)

BLOGGER: NAOMI WEISER 

Be honest – who hasn’t had one of those “Did I lock the door?” moments when you can’t quite remember whether or not you actually turned off the heater/left all the lights on/locked the door properly behind you?  

I admit that it’s happened to me more than once.

But the scope offered by home monitoring services is more than just satisfying a slight case of OCD – it’s the ability to completely control your home when you’re not there through connected machine-to-machine devices which can speak to each other.

According to a recent Cisco report, by 2016, there will be more mobile devices (10 billion) than people on the planet (7.3 billion) and machine-to-machine connections are expected to reach 2 billion. And no doubt these numbers will have taken into account the service providers jumping into the home automation arena.

Steven Winoker, an analyst at Sanford Bernstein, said only about 23 percent of U.S. homes have security systems so there’s plenty of growth potential here, reported Fox News. Even fewer have automated systems for controlling appliances, lights, heating and cooling.  Several of AT&T’s competitors, including cable TV company Comcast Corp. and phone company Verizon Communications Inc., have already ventured into the home automation and security field.

“Our goal is to bring something people have never seen before…”  (Glenn Lurie, AT&T)

But the latest splash has been made by last week’s launch by AT&T of its Digital Life service  which will be sold in AT&T stores nationwide, starting with a trial this summer in Dallas and Atlanta. Digital Life will  enable any wireless and wireline user (regardless as to whether or not they’re an AT&T subscriber) to access and monitor everything from water and energy usage, home security services, and the ability to shut off lights remotely from their smartphones, PCs and tablets.

Glenn Lurie, president of emerging devices, resale and partnerships at AT&T Mobility, told Reuters that he sees home automation as one of the largest revenue growth opportunities, “if not the largest,” with “very significant” incremental growth” next year. Lurie said AT&T may expand the service to support small businesses and senior citizens who want to live in their own homes even when they need close health monitoring.

Analysys Mason also agreed with Lurie that the home automation market is set for major growth: According to FierceTelecom’s Sean Buckley, the analyst group’s latest M2M forecasts show that security and surveillance solutions in North America will generate $1.2 billion in connectivity-related revenue (wholesale revenue) for carriers by 2021. 

Fortunately, even though service providers might be new to this under-exposed market, they have an advantage that other companies don’t: trust.

And that’s hugely important when it comes to protecting your home.

Blogger Jeff Barak made an excellent point last year when he commented that customers already trust their service provider with sensitive data. Instead of introducing another company into their home – with new proprietary hardware and new service subscriptions, along with multiple control interfaces, connections and contacts – consumers might prefer dealing with their service provider who can bundle connected home services into an existing plan. 

Add a Comment

BLOGGER: TSAHI LEVENT-LEVI

Once upon a time, we used to talk on the phone. (Remember those days?) Then we all started texting each other. And then, in the relative blink of an eye, everything changed.

 According to “Comics about Technology”, when it comes to communicating with each other, we now have 10 levels of intimacy, nicely summed up in the comic strip below. Which one do you think you use the most these days, by the way?

Unfortunately, if you look closely at the list, you’ll see that service providers only support us with phone (number 8) and text messaging (number 5). The rest (letters aside) is left up to OTT players – the companies who offer us additional ways to communicate on top of the service provider’s network. (And chances are high that you probably already use all of them).

Although OTT players such as Skype have already been taking away service providers’ long-distance business for a while, the OTT threat has now become much more serious:

*  Apple’s FaceTime, Skype and Tango have taken the mobile video-calling business away from mobile carriers

*  Apple’s iMessage is eating up service provider’s  SMS revenues (and so are WhatsApp, Facebook and a myriad of other solutions)

*  Viber, Skype and others are taking over voice calling.

In the face of such aggressive competition, is it too late for the service providers to fight back?  That’s what Mobile Industry Review’s Ewan MacLeod is wondering about regarding rich communication services, i.e. services that your provider typically deploys, manages (and charges you for):

“Have operators missed the boat with their own RCS?…

My own view is that in most cases, it’s far too late. The market has moved on. That decision has been made.”

But if it were up to me, I’d look seriously at those 10 levels of intimacy again because I think service providers can and should take action.

I think they need to do three things – and to do them fast:

1.  Offer services other than voice and SMS. Data services don’t count. Instant messaging or other options from the 10 intimacy levels do.

2.  Adopt interoperability 2.0 techniques and do something similar to what Canadian service provider Rogers have done with their great One Number initiative, which provides an application for your PC that enables you to send and receive your mobile voice calls and SMSs to and from your PC. In other words, it combines a ubiquitous service that they already had with OTT thinking.

3.  Join forces with successful OTT services so that they can find ways to generate revenues with them. GigaOm’s Stacey Higginbotham illustrates this with the example of WhatsApp and Indonesia’s Telkomsel who are working together on new unlimited data plans for a WhatsApp package.

What do you think? What options do service providers have? Do you think it’s too late?

See 3 Comments / Add a comment

Watch out MSOs and cable operators - there's a new player in town...

BLOGGER: SHAI SHAMIR

While Amdocs Voices has blogged before about the threat multiple service operators and cable companies have been facing from over-the-top-players like Google TV and Apple TV, here’s something new…

It seems like there’s a new player in town, and surprisingly enough, it’s IKEA.

I’ll explain. When we bought our new 52” flat screen TV,  we couldn’t find a furniture unit to accommodate such a large screen, as well as all the different electronics (and cables) that make up our  particular home entertainment system. In the end, a carpenter had to design and built a piece of furniture tailored to meet our specific needs.  

It was a hassle and it was expensive, which is one of the reasons why this week’s launch of what cnet are referring to as the potentially “game changing” IKEA UPPLEVA unit is so interesting: IKEA has joined forces with Chinese consumer electronics firm TCL to launch a line of furniture with integrated connected television and sound systems.

In an interview with Reuters, IKEA’s Magnus Bondesson explains why UPPLEVA is a completely unique market offering:

 ”We are launching a new concept where you in one place can buy your furniture and your electronics — designed for and matched with each other from the start”

UPPLEVA is a package that’s made up of a full HD TV, 2.1 sound system, DVD/Blueray/CD player, a wireless sub-woofer speaker, WiFi, and Smart TV (which uses the Internet) – all integrated into one furniture unit which hides the cables.

And  it’s getting noticed. IKEA’s charming promotional video for UPPLEVA has already gone completely viral on YouTube, already racking up over half a million hits in just two days: 

In the battle over who’s going to provide your entertainment, packaging is definitely becoming the weapon of choice. Take Boxee – they’ve already packaging Internet TV, local content and live TV into one (the Boxee Box). And screen manufacturers have been also busy embedding media centers and Internet access into their displays.

IKEA have applied this to their domain. They understand what bugs the average customer: Cable clutter. Too many remotes. The complexities involved in trying to hook and set up your entertainment system. And how it all actually looks once you’re finished (they’re offering the choice of three different designs). With UPPLEVA, they’ve seemingly managed to simplify the experience.

So why do I think IKEA could end up being an OTT threat? Well,  I wonder how soon it will be before the first content provider starts to sell simple packages at IKEA cash registers…

See 3 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

If you’re looking for confirmation that the world has gone mobile, then Facebook’s $1 billion purchase of Instagram should help point you in the right direction.

Given that Instagram isn’t yet turning a profit, Mark Zuckerberg’s decision to drop $1 billion on buying the company isn’t based on seeking an immediate return on his investment. But it does show that Facebook is serious about meeting its biggest challenge to date: its failure to monetize the fact that more than half of its 845 million members log into Facebook on a mobile device.

 “Facebook may have had a strong product (photo-sharing on the Web),” explains Business Insider’s Nicholas Carlson, “but it also had a gaping weakness (photo-sharing on mobile), that Instagram was exploiting”.

Instagram is fun. It lets people add quirky effects to their smartphone photos and share them with friends. Incredibly quickly, it has developed an almost cultlike following, with 30 million users who upload more than five million photos a day.

The Guardian newspaper adds a toasty glow to the relationship courtesy of Instagram

As The Guardian newspaper showed, Instagram allows you to give new meanings to your photos. By adding Instagram’s “Toaster filter”, the warmth of the special relationship between the United States and Great Britain took on a new glow in this photo of George W Bush and Tony Blair.

But are quirky photos worth $1billion?

It is if your main competitor happens to be Google, who are a strong player in the mobile space with the Android operating system and who also happen to own YouTube. Facebook originally took off in the desktop era as people played at being farmers during work hours. By adding Instagram, the social media giant has, in a single shutter click, made its service more appealing on smartphones.

As Rebecca Lieb, an analyst at the Altimeter Group told the New York Times, “it’s easier to update Facebook when you’re on the go with a snapshot rather than with text.”

Devoted users of Instagram, like David Meerman Scott, are already concerned about the implications for Instagram following the Facebook purchase. One of his concerns is that:  

“I’m also seeing a future where we are forced into the Facebook mobile app to use Instagram.”

Perhaps Instagram will indeed disappear behind Facebook’s walled garden, but one thing is already clear: A $1 billion payment for a single mobile app still to make a cent is the clearest picture yet that the future is mobile-centric.

See 4 Comments / Add a comment

Are you a couch potato?

BLOGGER: TSAHI LEVENT-LEVI  

People say that we are what we eat. If that’s true, then a few years ago most of us were potatoes, spending far too much time just sitting on the couch, passively watching TV. 

To see whether this still the case today, let’s take a look at Wikipedia…

In a 2008 blog post entitled “The TV Dividend,” Seth Godin asked: 

“Where did Wikipedia come from?
 All those hours, all that work. Where did the time and effort come from?”

Answering his own question, Godin quoted Clay Shirky’s book “Here Comes Everybody”, and argued that: 

The energy behind Wikipedia comes from the TV that we’re NOT watching. 

And while I don’t actually think most people are busy researching and writing Wikipedia entries, I do think that  what we’re doing in front of our TV screens is changing. According to the BBC, sales of computer games in the UK last year were higher than video sales for the first time.  Kim Bayley, director general of the ERA described it as: 

“…a historic development for the games sector to have overtaken video last year. Video has long been the biggest entertainment sector.” 

You could argue that DVD sales have slipped because of  video streaming services, but at the same time, “TV games” have also had to face competition from games on smartphones and tablets where their prices are lower. 

To me, the shift to playing games as opposed to watching a TV series or a movie makes more sense than filing Wikipedia entries  as a way of filling out our TV time: we’re still consuming entertainment, but now a growing portion of that is interactive – in the form of games. 

Not convinced? 

A Google search for the latest Angry Birds game yields 221 million results, while “Harry Potter Deathly Hallows” garners around 71 million results. 

Our entertainment consumption is shifting from  passive to active. 

In fact, we’re becoming so active, you’ll have to excuse this couch potato – I’ve got a Wii karate lesson to go to.

See 2 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: SHAI SHAMIR 

30 million downloads. 15 million people use it each day. It’s kicked Angry Birds right off their Number 1 perch. And it’s made its developer OMGPOP very, very rich indeed – according to TechCrunch’s Josh Constine, rich to the tune of the $200 million (give or take a few) that Zynga has apparently paid to buy OMGPOP.   

So any guesses yet as to what “it” is, and more importantly, why it’s worrying people so much? 

 It’s called “Draw Something” and it’s an interactive gaming application, based on a very simple concept: one player sketches out clues using their smartphone or tablet and the other tries to guess what the drawing represents. 

Even though I’m no Picasso, oddly enough, I’m finding it really addictive, so I wasn’t surprised to find out that it only took five weeks to become the biggest game on Facebook. 

So it’s fun, hugely popular, interactive and free. So what’s the problem then? 

One of the commentators on the MacRumors forum explains: 

“Let’s face it, a ton of people play this game. And frankly I’m wondering/worried about how much data it potentially uses. I’m deciding which data plan to go with (Either 1GB/20$ or 2GB/30$), my usage will be incredibly light on the go, mostly email and web browsing, no video. But I do worry how much data this game could chew through due to how it sends a video of each play. Any guesses/estimates of how much data a round of this game takes?” 

I decided to find out for myself how much data the app actually uses to transfer the animated drawings during one game session. 

Using another app “My Data Manager”, I ran a few tests to make the calculations and discovered that an average session consumed between 160-1,000KBs. 

Since I play against 3-5 people every day (yes, I did mention that I’m addicted…) and approximately 10 games with each one, I calculated that I’m using up approximately 11 MB a day – this means I’m using over 300MB a month, just by playing “Draw Something”. 

Players are starting to notice the drain on their data and are trying to find out more information all over the Internet: 

Take “Lesley5”, who already put two and two together (and realized it added up to a lot): 

“My daughter uses Draw Something on her iPhone 4S… admittedly we are in Australia, but do you know generally, if she`s not on free WiFi, will it use up much data? We have received a horrendous phone bill this month” 

Or “Bob”: 

“How much data/internet does Draw Something use? I’m only on a 250mb data plan and I’m afraid to play/draw something without wifi because I don’t know how much data it uses...” 

Lucky for Bob that he asked before starting to play, because if he was using the app as much as I do, he would have easily exceeded his data plan by the end of the month. 

Apps like this,which are being released with no information about how much data they use up, are very bad news for the consumer’s pockets. This lack of information has to change – my guess is service providers will start to work harder to educate customers about measuring data usage, and also to proactively warn them when they’re reaching their limits. That’s because even if they’re relatively simple apps, when you add up the subsequent capacity demands, they’re also bad news for 3G networks struggling to deliver. And yet another reason for looking to wifi to reduce some of the load from mobile networks. As Informa’s Thomas Wehmeier explains: 

“Wi-Fi should no longer be viewed solely as a complement to mobile networks, but increasingly should be looked at as a potential disruptive substitute” 

 In the meantime, keep drawing and having fun, but do keep an eye on your data usage too.

See 7 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

So when does your service provider finally start taking notice of you?

In most cases, it’s only when you’ve told them you’re about to leave them and move to a rival operator. All of a sudden, you have their attention – and a number of tempting offers to consider, particularly in terms of subsidized smartphone upgrades.

On the other hand, new and loyal customers receive the short end of the stick, according to a recent Amdocs-Informa Telecoms and Media survey into service providers’ customer retention strategy.

But this is a mistake, and some service providers are beginning to realize this. As Aaron Souppouris from The Verge reported, AT&T is presently trialing a new pilot loyalty program called AT&T Plus, with the hope of keeping its most important customers loyal by showering them with special offers and preferential service.

There’s a sound reason behind looking for different ways to retain customers – it’s becoming “difficult and costly” to try to hold on to potential churners by offering them an expensive  subsidized smartphone, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers in their 2011 survey of North American wireless carriers:

“ Several major operators have recently warned that increased subsidies from the introduction of popular smartphones will cause material financial changes”

In fact, it’s so costly, that some service providers are already beginning to wish they hadn’t started dishing out subsidized handsets. Andy Patrizio in Brighthand explains that on average, carriers pay $450 for a phone, and sell it for only $200. It then takes them several months to make that money back through the cost of the monthly package to the subscriber, leading operators to lose their profit margin.

And more significantly, these subsidies are not necessarily even helping to keep the customer loyal. PwC’s report  No wires attached: 2011 North American wireless industry survey  points out that customer loyalty is on the wane, with the average length of postpaid customer relationships dropping to 48 months in the 2011 survey, from 59 months the year before.

The decline in customer loyalty can be arrested, but only if service providers succeed in creating an emotional bond with the subscriber, based on an excellent customer experience throughout the customer lifecycle, and not just in its final days. 

In fact, customer loyalty programs can become a new center of growth, provided that operators understand what their customers really want and act on this immediately, all the way through the contract period.

Simply throwing a subsidized smartphone at a churning customer is not the best way to grow.

See 4 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: ERIC M. DANIS 

Suddenly the huge “I Love Mom” tattoo on my bicep* feels so passé… 

ABC News and other news outlets are reporting that Nokia has filed a U.S. patent application for a magnetic, vibrating tattoo that would wirelessly connect to a mobile device and alert users of phone calls, texts and battery status. 

The patent diagram shows the small square applied to a finger, torso and wrist. For those who are wary of getting actual tattoos (c’mon, my mom loves her tribute!), the patent says the receiver can potentially be attached in other ways, including as a stamp or with adhesive tape. 

CNNMoney’s Chris Boyette  points out that the tattoo could be a solution for people who don’t like loud ringtones, but don’t always have their phones close enough to feel vibrations. Although surely service providers are pleased to learn about any new feature or device that has the potential to increase usage by keeping people even more connected, I wonder whether there will be a consumer backlash at a certain point. 

Last summer, an Amdocs survey identified three distinct groups of mobile consumer communities – the “cyborg” group was described as embracing connectivity in all aspects of their lives, including professional and personal spheres, across all devices and places. Maybe some of the people in this group, who view their phone as part of their personality and a prime social enabler, would be willing to start down the path of becoming actual cyborgs.  

But what about people who make a firm distinction between their virtual life and their “real life” and don’t see their mobile phone (or tablet, etc.) as an extension or reflection of their personality? And what about “technological nomads” who are hesitant to commit to a specific device-maker for even a year, let alone a lifetime? 

Blogger Jeff Barak previously noted that some employers have already started blocking employees from checking emails on their mobile during off-hours. Too much connectivity can lead to an increase in stress and a decrease in the quality of human relationships, which could eventually cause a consumer backlash. 

Maybe it’s something to think about before getting a tattoo that you may regret… 

*I don’t actually have an “I Love Mom” tattoo. (And no, Mom, it’s not because I don’t love you!)

See 3 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: DAVID JACOBS 

In the first few days following the launch of the new iPad – don’t call it an iPad 3 because Apple will correct you – Apple reported an astonishing sales pace of a million units a day (and yes, you read that right). 

And what will most people be using it for? Viewing video probably, since tablets offer the versatility and additional features that most TV sets simply don’t have.

The millions of new tablets being sold every day, along with 4G-ready smartphones that can run real-time video (so you can take March Madness with you), are offering traditional cable and satellite service providers really exciting new opportunities to serve their customers with additional touch points beyond their TVs. 

It’s called TV Everywhere:

TV Everywhere allows us to watch what we want, when we want it, on any device we want.

But in order to make TV Everywhere possible, service providers have some major technological hurdles to overcome in the form of multi-service authentication and The Three As:  authentication, authorization, and accounting. (There’s actually a fourth A that trumps them all – aggregation – but we’ll deal with that another time.) 

Here are the three As in a nutshell (or alternatively, just carry on reading):

Authentication: Who are you?
The first step in letting you, the customer, access content services from your home is to make sure that you are in fact who you say you are, and that the device is what it says it is. That’s a big challenge for cable TV service providers because most back offices were designed to deliver video to a specific address and to a known set top box that has been connected to a TV, usually located in the living room.  Those same systems now have to be enhanced to cope with a massive range of untethered devices.  Not surprisingly though, customers couldn’t care less about those really complex problems – they just want to be able to click “play” and watch.

Authorization: We now know who you are but what services are you allowed to use?
Premium and traditional Cable TV channels operate using a subscription model. So if you’re a cable TV subscriber with the right to access content and want to watch your HBO programming on a tablet, your service provider is going to need integrated business and operational support systems (BSS and OSS) that know when you log in, work out exactly where you are (i.e. outside or inside the home), identify what you’re entitled to do on that device, and then authorize interaction with the content.

Accounting: How is the customer billed for the service?
If you can’t bill for a service, it isn’t really a business, is it? The billing platform needs to effectively capture any additional charge for use (e.g.  a premium VoD transaction), bill it to the customer and make sure that the delivery agent and content rights holders get their money.

Clearly, it’s not easy to get The Three As right, especially since they involve moving from a one-to-one delivery and collection model to the new reality of the “one-to-many” authenticated world. But customer loyalty  – in particular, their customer lifetime value – for broadband, cable, and satellite service providers depends on it, and new processes and integrated BSS, OSS and policy-management solutions are definitely the key to making it happen.

Add a Comment

BLOGGER: GAYLE RINOT

Did you know that “naughty” texting (also known as “sexting”) has changed the way we flirt? Or that the idea of instant messaging was invented while eating a pizza?  These are two of ten astounding facts about the humble SMS whose technology has remained pretty much the same for the past 20 years.

But what has changed about instant messaging is the competition it faces in the form of free third-party social messaging apps like Skype Chat, WhatsApp, MSN Chat, Google Chat, Facebook Chat, and Blackberry Messenger.  Not surprisingly, free apps mean bad news for service providers keeping an eye on their profit margins:  according to analyst firm Ovum, social messaging apps cost mobile network operators $13.9 billion in lost SMS revenue in 2011 and it’s a trend that’s expected to continue.

Industry analysts suggest that service providers could offset potential future losses by rethinking their SMS plans. For example, last August AT&T ditched its 1,000-message plan at $10 per month, in favor of an unlimited plan for $20 per month (and users who don’t want a plan can pay 20 cents per SMS).  Service providers could also partner with third-party app developers, particularly those who control the most popular social messaging apps, and cooperate amongst themselves to take on the challenge from major Internet players.  But for now, they can take comfort in the fact that there may still be a market for the simple SMS for people who still aren’t using mobile broadband, or who like their privacy.

At the end of the day, the danger to future SMS-generated revenue may not be as bad as the research suggests. “I think it’s a growing threat which is manageable through the right tariffs and the right costing,” explains James Barford, a mobile analyst for Enders.  Barford also pointed out that social messaging still only represents a tiny part of overall mobile communication, and according to a You Gov survey, the majority of smartphone users – 81% – still view SMS as the preferred way to send messages on a mobile.

I can’t help wondering how many of those are “sexting”.

See 7 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: ERIC M. DANIS

What can you do in four minutes? Well, if you are Madonna or Justin Timberlake, you can apparently save the entire world. Another way to kill four minutes is to work out, or you could decide to burn through your entire data plan. Wait, what?

Maybe you’ve heard the news that Apple has introduced its new 4G iPad. The prospect of a faster-than-a-speeding-bullet 4G LTE data connection is certainly tantalizing, but Will Oremus over at Slate reminds us of the potential Kryptonite:

“Life in the fast lane ain’t cheap. With an advertised top download speed of up to 73 megabits per second, the top-of-the-line iPad could theoretically burn through a basic 2-gigabyte-per-month data plan in about four minutes. But oh, how delicious those four minutes would be!”

Oremus goes on to note that it’s unlikely that anyone would really burn out their entire plan in only four minutes, but his overall point is a solid one: millions of users will soon possess a super-fast device capable of downloading huge amounts of data, and yet the data plans for the new iPad will remain the same as the carriers’ current plans (with no unlimited options). “That’s pricey enough that many users of the next-gen iPad will likely ignore its mobile data capabilities” and continue relying on Wi-Fi, says Oremus.

It seems the data crunch problem just won’t go away. According to MIT’s Technology Review, Apple’s new tablet is going to place “significant new demands” on 4G networks that have only been lightly used, which will deplete bandwidth. “Many users may also get their first taste of what it is like to bump up against the data limits that are now a standard part of wireless contracts.”

There are no simple answers, but as industry blogger Jeff Barak recently noted, there is a tremendous need to make networks smarter and more efficient, so that service providers can continue to satisfy consumers who are ravenous for data without bankrupting them. Fast data consumption from anywhere may be in vogue, but customers shouldn’t have to be a material girl (or boy) to afford it.

See 6 Comments / Add a comment

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

Perhaps the starkest example of the digital divide cropped up at this week’s SXSW (South by Southwest) technology conference in Austin, Texas, where a marketing agency hired members of the local homeless population to walk around carrying mobile Wi-Fi devices, offering conferencegoers Internet access in exchange for donations.

Yes, you read it right: homeless people were hired to become 4G hotspots at one of the world’s leading geekfests.

In return for $20 a day, and whatever customers donated in exchange for the wireless service, these people wandered around the conference, making sure the tablet-toting, smartphone-surfing attendees never lacked an Internet connection. As the New York Times reported, many people felt turning down-and-out people into wireless towers “was exploitative and discomforting”, but as one of the human hotspots commented, “I love talking to people and it’s a job. An honest day of work and pay.”

Leaving aside the tastefulness of this particular marketing initiative, it does highlight the growing gap between those who are connected and those who aren’t. While there are 6 billion mobile connections (not bad for a world population of 7 billion), “only” 1.3 billion of these are connections  to mobile broadband, meaning that the vast majority of the world’s population is cut off from some of the most exciting developments in today’s world.

Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt made this one of his main themes at last month’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, warning of the creation of a “digital caste system,” and even arguing that with greater Internet access, “human rights abuses and suffering under dictatorial regimes could lessen.”

But for this to happen, the price of smartphones has to drop considerably. As Santiago Fernandez Velbuena, CEO of Telefonica Latin America, said in Barcelona, the price of a smartphone has to drop below the $100 level for mobile broadband to really take off in emerging markets.

And of course, once this happens, service providers will need to have new and efficient networks in place to cope with the increased demand for data – whatever the rights and wrongs of homeless, human hotspots, they’re certainly not a long-term solution to the capacity crunch.

Add a Comment

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

Remember when you were a kid and had to miss school because you were sick?  The good part was being able to stay in bed all day, the bad part was having to copy up all the missed schoolwork when you went back.

Well, according to Ericsson’s Erik Kruse, those days will soon be over. Kids will still get sick of course, but they’ll be able to send a robot to school, through which they’ll be able to interact with their friends and follow lessons, all without leaving the comfort of their bed. The robot is child-size, moves on wheels, and has a small screen at the child’s head level. Kids, said Kruse, are digital natives and won’t be put off by robots, “they’ll think it’s cool.”

In a session on mobile innovation at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Kruse pointed out that the foundation for the change we’re all going to see in our daily lives is based on the convergence of three elements: broadband, mobility and the cloud.

AT&T are also busy looking for ways to make our lives easier. An application called “got my stuff”, now being developed in AT&T’s labs, will make sure you never again arrive in the office without your laptop. As you get into the car in the morning and switch it on, the “got my stuff” app checks your profile, realizes from the data it knows about you (that you’ve voluntarily signed in for), that you’re about to go to work, and scans your briefcase. If your laptop is missing, it will immediately notify you.

AT&T’s John Donovan also gave a shout out to Ringbow, a start-up that has benefited from the AT&T Foundry at the Amdocs campus in Ra’anana. Ringbow has developed the first peripheral device for touch screens, allowing more than one person, for example, to play a game on a tablet.

Other cute innovations highlighted by Donovan include an app that turns your smartphone into a key for your reserved hotel room, so there’s no need to queue up at registration to check in, or suffer from the key card not being properly programmed once you reach your room.

And my favorite innovation: an app that lets you send a message to a person, but is scheduled to get to them only when they reach a certain location and not before. With that, my friend will have no excuse for not ordering me a drink the minute he enters the pub we’ve arranged to meet at. Now that’s what I call progress.

See 1 Comment / Add a Comment

BLOGGER: JEFF BARAK

Even as Nokia’s Stephen Elop and HTC’s Peter Chou got into a bragging rights argument over whose is bigger than whose (megapixels on a camera, with the new 41 megabit Nokia PureView 808 smartphone winning out), both men agreed that size doesn’t really count.

“It’s not about megapixels,” said Elop, the Nokia CEO, “It’s about the quality of the customer experience.” Sharing a stage at the morning keynote session at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona,  the two leading device makers also agreed that all the end user really wanted was simplicity.

Chou stressed that at HTC, the fundamental principle behind the design of a smartphone was that the design had to be what he termed “human”, making the technology work for humans and not the other way round. He also insisted that good design was simple, letting the essentials shine through.

The HTC chief executive talked about the next challenge for device makers: “We want to extend the mobile experience into the living room,” he said, where anyone, with no technological background whatsoever, will be able  to transfer pictures and videos from their smartphone to the living room’s, big-screen television with just a few swipes of their smartphone.

Elop said device makers needed to look at the consumer experience in terms of making life easier for their customers. As an example, he noted that Nokia had operator billing services with over 150 operators in 41 countries and that “purchases of apps increase by a factor of five with operator billing,” as compared to credit-card payments.

After just a year of Nokia’s tie up with Microsoft for a new operating system for their phones, Chou interestingly had some words of encouragement for Elop, saying he believed the new Nokia phones with their Windows operating system would catch up in the next few years with Apple’s IOS and Google’s Android.

And not just because of the size of the phone camera.

See 3 Comments / Add a comment