How much will present connectivity business trends enforced by efforts to defeat the Covid-19 pandemic continue post pandemic? The throwaway answer is “most of them.”
There will be more cloud computing, remote work, virtual collaboration driven by lower density work environments, more dispersed network access volumes (and possibly lower traffic volumes), shifts in use of smartphones for content consumption, higher voice usage and possible shifts of peak hour traffic. Upstream capacity is likely to be more important for home broadband users.
But one might argue that many of those trends shift traffic, revenue and geographic traffic patterns without necessarily causing significant permanent changes in industry dynamics.
A more-subtle and perhaps more satisfying answer might be that the pandemic and the business response accelerated many changes that would have taken longer. The typical phrase is that “changes that would have taken years happened in months,” referring to data consumption, for example, use of video conferencing or remote work apps.
Permanent changes--qualitative and quantitative--are more likely if Covid-19 becomes a permanent affliction, ever-present as are colds and flus.
But other industries likely will be much more affected than the telecom industry. Retail, travel and lodging, real estate, supply chains and hospitality (restaurants, for example) are likely to see bigger shifts of customer demand than are connectivity service providers.
Instead, the core business problems for connectivity service providers are likely to remain the same ones that were bedeviling before the pandemic: saturated demand, lower average revenue per user or service or account, more stranded assets, margin pressure and a change in the value of connectivity, compared to apps, devices or business platforms.
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