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Mobile Pricing Symposium identifies growth
19/07/08
Speakers at
the 3rd Mobile Pricing Symposium organised by research firm Tariff
Consultancy Ltd which was held at Cambridge University from the 9th
to the 11th of July have forecast that mobile data services will
continue to be the main driver of growth in the mature markets until
2012.
Previous forecasts made by equipment providers indicate that mobile
data usage will increase to over 1 Exabyte (1000kb to the power of
6). But with continued increases in mobile data subscriber numbers –
if the rate of increase matches that of earlier mobile user
penetration - it is likely that even this large data number forecast
of 1 Exabyte will prove to be an underestimate. “Which indicates
that mobile network providers will urgently need to address the
economics of provisioning their networks to handle Exabyte and above
levels of data, which will be the main driver over their network,
not voice,” says Margrit Sessions, Managing Director of Tariff
Consultancy Ltd. Furthermore, mobile subscriber growth is still
coming from the emerging markets as they repeat the same growth
phase as the mature markets.
Regulation for the mobile provider is about to enter a new phase as
prepaid SIM cards become an essential form of communication for low
income groups in all countries. This will place more responsibility
on the mobile operator to ensure that fair and transparent services
are applied with more robust consumer protection required.
The adoption of new bundled services means that mobile operators are
protecting existing price points but are doing so at the expense of
providing additional services which runs the risk of commoditisation.
The impact of new flat rate services means that the effect is to
reduce mobile operator ARPU over time.
New service adoption is being led by Mobile Broadband which has
become the most dramatic example of rapid penetration. Mobile
Broadband pricing has declined by more than half in real terms
during the 3 year period from 2004 to 2007 with more broadband
capacity being available for the same price. The recent availability
of easy portable mobile data connections (such as the USB modem)
means that mobile data services have started to become a mass market
consumer item.
“Mobile broadband prices in the UK market alone have dropped by up
to 50 per cent in the last six months,” commented Margrit Sessions
of Tariff Consultancy Ltd. “Price competition among mobile broadband
providers has become intense as the cost of devices has reduced and
increased network capacity has become available with HSDPA speeds,”
she stated. “We believe that flat rate price competition will
continue to be severe until mobile providers learn how to
differentiate their product offer to meet the need of individual
user groups. This is a recurring theme that we look forward to
analysing at the 4th Mobile Pricing Symposium in 2009,” Margrit
Sessions concluded.
* Speakers were represented from: GSM Association; John Tysoe
Founder, Founder and Managing Director The Mobile World; Claire
Milne Antelope Consulting; Rajaa Chbani, Profitability Expert,
Meditel/Morocco; Demet Penpecioglu Head of Pricing & Billing
Op.,Turkcell, Turkey; Eric Hatton, Head of Product Management -
Charging, Acision; Arivaldo Sousa Jr, Brasil Telecom/Brazil; Ray
Anderson, CEO, Bango; Dean Bubley Founder of Disruptive Analysis;
Plus research analysts from Tariff Consultancy Ltd.
Nick Gibson, editor
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