1. Data Pricing Dilemma
Since broadband revolution, mobile operators and ISPs were expecting a
reasonable revenue stream corresponding to the investment and the high speed.
But the fact was declining in total revenue for the most of operators. The
question, Is it a problem in ROI (Return Of Investment) or Pricing?
To eliminate the factors, over investment means capacity or capabilities are not
used properly so if this is not the case that means there is no issue in investment
in terms of market demand but the pricing still remains a very important
component in the ROI equation. For Mobile operators, traditional voice and sms
are declining year over year due to the alternatives over the IP such VOIP and
social media.
Bundling the service with handsets and connect the consumption with certain
speed then down the speed dramatically thus customer couldn’t enjoy most of
internet services, these are the most approaches done by the operators. Many
times subscriber couldn’t enjoy the capabilities of broadband even before
finishing their packages due to network or dimensioning issues.
On the other hand, price war among the operators makes price driven markets
especially in disappearance of quality meaning as the contractual speed
sometime not achieved. Therefore the customers are not loyal to the operators.
Flat rates force the consumers to accept bad quality under the umbrella of
monthly budget control. The challenge know to convince the subscriber to pay
more for better service or even to change consumption pattern to enjoy new
experience.
Now the question is, how we can escape from this dilemma?
1- Balance forces, Telecom Regulator Authority (TRA) should obligate all
operators with a certain quality and review the dimensioning to make sure
that network capabilities can deliver such speeds and applying a penalties
on the violated operators. In the same time operators should submit a cost
model every quarter (3) months to TRA to avoid dumping policy from
some operators which end up to bad quality and profit loss.
2- End to End Service, By putting a software client at the subscriber end to
measure the real speed and send a notification to the operators makes the
subscriber with the operator real time. In the same time it gives the
2. operator the opportunity to find out where is the problem (location based,
timing based, interconnect, etc.).
3- Make the maximum out of the technology, most of the markets are
saturated or even approach the saturation needs to make a kind of
penetration by acquiring new customers. Most customers don’t like to
change their operators and numbers or even make Mobile Number
Portability (MNP) as they see some benefits, loyalty programs and feel
that all operators are the same. So operators should approach the
customers by new methodology which is keep your number, your operator
as it is but try our service over the same handset. So the customer can
use voice calls for example from operator and experience the data from
another operator (technology is available, very cheap and fast. It is plug &
play by adding very thin film over the current SIM). By such approaches
the operators can give new experience for new customers based on a
certain competitive advantage in terms of price, quality or even both. Such
technology is not limited for data as operator can use it for another
competitive advantage such international calls, SMS, etc.