Will 4G Boost ARPU?

There would be little reason for a mobile service provider to launch a fourth-generation network if it did not expect a financial return, in the form of enhanced revenue, lower operating costs, reduced churn, better customer acquisition or some other combination of value with a clear financial impact.

But researchers at Ovum suggest that the immediate returns will come more from operating cost advantages than revenue lift. In part, that will be because the overwhelming number of customers and accounts will remain on the 3G networks for some time. By definition, it will take some time before the number of 4G customers and revenue sources are big enough to affect revenue and earnings, one way or the other.

As Verizon, T-Mobile USA and AT&T activate their own 4G networks to compete with the existing Sprint Nextel and Clearwire networks, pricing should be under pressure as well.

One might also speculate that tablet and other connected devices, such as PC dongles and mobile hotspot devices, might initially provide the bulk of subscription revenues for all of the 4G services. The issue is whether those revenue sources will remain dominant as more 4G smartphones become available.

Verizon's 4G advantage is coverage | Telecom Awards:

Sprint, T-Mobile To Sell 4G Tablets in 2011

Sprint Nextel Corp. and T-Mobile USA are planning to sell tablet computers in 2011. That isn't surprising, given the momentum tablets seem to have, coupled with the launch of new fourth-generation networks that, for the moment, do not offer the handset diversity of 3G networks and arguably are designed for PC and other devices more than traditional voice and texting.

The longer term issue will be the extent to which 4G networks enable new application and revenue models 3G has not. The focus on tablets, though partly practical (suppliers have not yet begun to produce 4G smartphones in great variety), might also suggest the ways 4G could underpin a new wave of development based on connected devices more than traditional smartphones.

A tablet would round out Sprint's portfolio of 4G wireless products, which is crucial to sustaining momentum as its rivals ramp up their own next-generation wireless efforts. It could also potentially offer Sprint a unique halo product to rally behind following the successful launch of two 4G smartphones, which has spurred the company's turnaround, the Wall Street Journal says.

UPDATE: Sprint, T-Mobile To Sell 4G Tablets Next Year - WSJ.com

Mobile Workforce Now is the Norm

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Most people would agree that "work" these days requires some degree of mobility, though not every associate needs the same degree of mobile support. So the new question is how many devices starts to be too much.

Android Represents 80% Of Verizon's Smartphone Sales -- InformationWeek

In October 2009, BlackBerries represented a whopping 93 percent of Verizon Wireless' smartphone sales. In just two months, that number dropped by half to about 48 percent. The Motorola Droid was the primary reason, as Motorola's share of Verizon's smartphone sales jumped from three percent to 36 percent, according to Matthew Goodmam, analyst at ITG Investment Research.

RIM dropped 45 percent at Verizon between the third quarter of 2009 and the third quarter of 2010, and Goodman believes RIM will be down 49 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010.

In November 2010, RIM owns about 19 percent of Verizon's smartphone sales, while Motorola accounts for about 38 percent of Verizon's smartphone sales.

HTC ranks third at Verizon with 18 percent of sales, LG ranks fourth with 14 percent, Samsung ranks fifth with 10 percent, and Palm represents one percent of Verizon's smartphone sales in November.

Android Represents 80% Of Verizon's Smartphone Sales -- InformationWeek

51% of U.K. Mobile Users Use Mobile Commerce; 41% of Brands Will Create Mobile Apps or Sites

About 41 percent  of U.K. retail brands expect to have a transactional mobile site or application within the next year, according to a study by the Association for Interactive Media and Entertainment, the Internet Advertising Bureau and Interactive Media in Retail Group.

But 51 percent of mobile phone-owning UK consumers (22.95 million people) have used mobile commerce apps and features.

About 43 percent have used their mobiles to conduct research. About 35 percent report they have used mobile to enhance the shopping experience.

About 37 percent have charged a purchase to their mobile phone bills and 27 percent have used their mobiles to buy goods and charged the purchase to their debit card, credit card or PayPal account.

The study found that while mobile commerce is still very much at the consideration stage, the majority of retailers surveyed expect mobile commerce to be part of their main strategy within the next 12 months.

The survey of 140 marketing professionals from the retail, advertising and mobile service provider sectors in the U.K. also found that 59 percent of the senior-level representatives from U.K. retail brands that took part expected their mobile revenues to increase over the next 12 months, and 94 percent saw it as a real opportunity for their business.

Each month in the U.K. 4.2 million consumers are visiting retailers’ websites using the mobile internet. However, just four out of the top 20 most frequently visited retailer websites are presently optimized for mobile, and only eight of the top 20 have any kind of mobile application for smartphones like the iPhone, Blackberry or Android powered devices.

Whilst most retailers believe their mobile revenues will increase over the next few years, currently around 63 percent either make less than one percent of their total revenues via mobile, or don’t measure their mobile revenues at all at present.

read more here

80% Of CIOs Want To Buy Tablets

Paget Alves, Sprint president of business markets, expects a number of Sprint’s tablet buyers to be business users, noting that 70 to 80 percent of the chief information officers that Sprint talks to are interested in deploying tablets to their employees in some fashion.

“The adoption rate for tablets in the business sector is much, much faster than we expected,” said Alves. Most users are “knowledge workers” searching for a lighter, cheaper alternative to a laptop, particularly for travel. While a company’s entire workforce would likely not receive a tablet, a “meaningful proportion” probably would, said Alves.

Sprint Says 4G Tablet Coming In 2011, 80% Of CIOs Want To Buy Tablets

Mobile Drives 40% of NPR Traffic

Fully 40 percent of NPR's Internet traffic can be traced back to its mobile platforms. Almost shocking.

NPR's iPhone and iPad Apps, Developed by Bottle Rocket Apps, Win Advertising Age 2010 Media Vanguard Award

Social Media Boosts Ratings

There’s debate about exactly how much online conversation is driving TV ratings, but “Bravo Talk Bubble” appears to have delivered a 10 percent lift to "The Real Housewives of New York."

Water-cooler conversation about TV shows has been a staple of office conversation for quite some time. What is different is the effort now to boost TV ratings as they occur by harnessing social networks.

Other networks have claimed even higher. We’re still in the early days of measuring and leveraging these stats, but the real-time information is already in place.

How Social Media is Changing the Business of Television

Will Verizon And DirecTV Market a Video-Plus-Broadband Bundle?

One problem any fixed network provider has is that antitrust considerations generally bar, and are expected to bar, any firm from serving the entire country. A general rule of thumb might be that any single fixed-line provider getting close to 50 percent coverage of U.S. homes would trigger an antitrust or regulatory review of some sort.

But there are advantages to a national footprint. DirecTV, Dish Network, Hughes Network Systems, Wildblue, AT&T, Sprint, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile USA, for example, all have a national footprint, though using wireless, which has not historically triggered antitrust or regulatory review.

One thought that therefore has occurred, and should occur, to executives is the ability to use wireless to contend for customers on a national basis for multiple products. It appears Verizon Wireless and DirecTV might be gearing up to provide a broadband access and TV service on a national basis.

The bundle presumably would be based on the new Verizon Wireless fourth-generation Long Term Evolution network, combined with DirecTV's video service.

You might wonder why that is necessary, given that a customer could simply buy the Verizon LTE service directly. A customer can do that. But Verizon apparently thinks it can provide the fastest speeds by using a roof-mounted antenna and then in-home wireless router.

Since DirecTV already has a nationwide installation capability, DirecTV could provide the installation services.

For DirecTV, the partnership would mean it could sell a broadband bundle for the first time. For Verizon, the offer allows the company to compete with a "landline-equivalent broadband access service" across the entire country.

Verizon And DirecTV Test 4G Wireless In A Product Bundle

30% of Enterprises Have Deployed UC; 28% Doing So

About 30 percent of enterprises surveyed by Frost & Sullivan say they have already deployed unified communications and 28 percent are in the process of doing so. Four percent are planning or evaluating and 18 percent have no plans to deploy unified communications.

Less than 40 percent of companies have deployed IP telephony. IM and videoconferencing get the highest usage scores, with just over 50 percent of companies saying employees use each of those technologies.

No Jitter | blog | Enterprise Communications in 2011: Buyers Reveal Top Priorities

Sprint Officially Launches 4G in Denver Dec. 19....

Sprint's Tweet here.  But the network has been live since at least Nov. 12th.

read more here

Who Uses Location-Based Services?

Location-based social networks aren't actually used by that many people. Forrester Research says only four percent of U.S. online adults have ever used location-based social networks, such as FourSquare and Brightkite, on their mobile phones, with only one percent using them more than once a week.

The Data Digest: Who Uses Location-Based Services? | Forrester Blogs

Google Tests Near Field Communications for Location Services

CenturyLink Apparently Rekindles Qwest Video Interest

The CenturyLink acquisition of Qwest is bound to have lots of implications for Qwest and Qwest's former customers. It appears one of the possible changes is a new interest on the part of the new company to provide video entertainment services, something Qwest had tested, before concluding it did not provide a strong-enough business case.

Qwest decided to rely on partner DirecTV to offer the video portion of a triple-play offering. But CenturyLink routinely offers video services to its customers, so thinking appears to have changed.

But Qwest executives now are reported to be talking about getting a state-level video franchise that would allow it to offer multichannel video services in Colorado, for example. Qwest also had tried to get such a franchise three years ago, but failed to get enough lawmakers to agree.

Qwest revisits video franchising with lawmakers - The Denver Post

IP Backbone Traffic: Volume Up 54%, Price-Per-Bit Down, 25% Per Year

The companies that run the world's IP backbone networks are used to two trends: Traffic grows every year and the price-per-gigabit declines every year. IP transit prices, one of the best ways to quantify the cost of using global backbone networks, have declined by 25 percent per year, on a cost-per-bit basis, in major hub cities since 2007.