Does Telco Revenue Future Require Bandwidth QoS?

A new survey of U.S. communications and media executives by STL Partners offers a couple interesting insights. First, "telcos" are largely assumed to own mobile spectrum and networks.

That does not mean every entity can create a business case around mobility in a direct sense. Keep in mind that it is not simply telco executives who think this way, but significantly that media and content executives make the assumption.

Smaller providers might not be able to justify anything other than working with other mobile providers in one way or another. But tier-one providers virtually must be mobile providers, the survey suggests.

Second, future strategies to increase broadband access revenues virtually require the absence of regulatory rules that ban packet priorities and quality of service mechanisms. About 27 percent of respondents believe that telcos must find new revenue sources as a way of improving the economics of the broadband access business. More than 25 percent say more-efficient networks also are required.

Nearly a quarter of the 120 respondents also believe that one of the buest ways to create new revenue streams is to "charge upstream players for value-added services." Aside from building content delivery networks, it is difficult to envision how mobile service providers and fixed-access networks could add value directly to the access product without having the ability to prioritize traffic.

There are, of course, other potential ways to leverage customer relationships, customer data or billing capabilities in ways that partners might find useful. Still, a strict network neutrality regime would severely crimp the ability to add value in the basic access product.

$Multi-Billion Telco 2.0 Growth Opportunities in North America: Can Telcos Act in Time? - STL Partners