FCC Forces Charter to Overbuild 1 Millon Homes

As often is the case, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission put some conditions on its approval of the merger between Charter Communications and Time Warner Cable.

Broadly, Charter has agreed to not impose broadband usage caps on its customers for seven years.

Charter also will provide “no charge” interconnection for online video providers and will be subject to  restrictions on its ability to keep programming from being available on online platforms.

Charter furthermore will offer high-speed broadband to two million more homes and offer a low-income broadband program for eligible households.

Somewhat unusually, the FCC also requires Charter to “overbuild” at least a million households already served by another cable TV operator offering high speed access of at least 25 Mbps downstream speeds.

That last clause is unusual. It essentially requires that Charter compete with another cable TV operator, something cable TV operators have been historically loathe to do.

Predictably, an organization representing small cable operators is worried that provision will mean not only competition, but ruinous competition for its members.

American Cable Association President and CEO Matthew M. Polka says harm will occur because Charter has scale advantages, and will “have an economic incentive to choose locations served by smaller providers because Charter can most easily drive them out of the market.”

Of the merger conditions, it is the requirement to overbuild which is the most unusual.

Google Fiber Seems to be Sustainable

For many years a reasonable rule of thumb has been that a competent provider in the fixed network consumer communications services business could reasonably expect to get 30 percent market share within the first few years of operation.

That was true for cable TV operators getting into the voice business, for telcos getting into the linear video subscription business, and for telcos and cable TV providers getting into the Internet access business.

It now appears Google Fiber is getting to the 30 percent threshold in its first few markets. If so, then Google Fiber is a sustainable endeavor.

In the mobile business, similar rules of thumb suggest that any single mobile operator requires market share around 30 percent to sustain itself long term.

source: McKinsey

But there is a major caveat. All such analyses are based on current notions of capital investment and operating costs. Should capital or operating expense assumptions change dramatically, the conceivable market structure could also change dramatically.

In other words, under different assumptions about the cost of market entry, more competitors could survive. Equally plausibly, lower-cost competitors could imperil the existence of legacy providers.

One might note that the emergence of platforms using unlicensed spectrum, or shared spectrum, could change assumptions about the range of sustainable business models, as well as the viability of firms with high cost structures.

Games Generate 90% of Google Play App Revenue

Since 2012, Google Play downloads grew by almost 400 percent, while  app store-related revenue has gone up by a staggering 3500 percent, according to App Annie.

Also, Google Play is gaining market share the fastest in emerging markets like India, Vietnam and Pakistan.

Four of the top-10-grossing Google Play games of all time were driven almost entirely by store revenue in Japan.

Casual-style games were nine of the top-10 downloaded Google Play games of all time, representing approximately 40 percent of total all-time downloads and approximately 90 percent  of total all-time revenue.

source: App Annie

Excluding games, the remaining 10 percent of total revenue is generated by communications and social apps.

EC Blocks O2-Three Merger

As many expected, the European Commission has blocked the $15 billion merger of the U.K.’s Three and O2, At the heart of the concern is the belief that a minimum of four mobile operators are required to sustain robust competition in a market.

According to the Commission, the O2-Three merger would have led to less choice and higher prices for consumers, by reducing the number of network-owning operators from four to three.

Looking at mobile market structure, a report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development notes that the “most significant” of constraints are the limited amount of spectrum and substantial economies of scale in building network facilities.

The mobile communication sector is characterised by a number of factors that significantly influence market structure, OECD says.

The most significant of these are constraints due to the limited amount of radio spectrum available and substantial economies of scale in building network facilities.

But it has to be noted: all such determinations are founded in present business models built on use of scarce licensed spectrum. But the ability to use “scarce” spectrum is dictated by interference control mechanisms that can be more efficiently designed.

In other words, existing frameworks are inefficient because they allocate spectrum on an exclusive basis, even when the primary licensee is not using a resource. Allowing spectrum sharing would dramatically increase the amount of usable spectrum, presumably changes the economics of operating a mobile business.

The point is that the long-term mobile market structure could change radically if spectrum cost constraints are altered.

The issue now is whether another company might emerge as a buyer for O2’s assets, as owner Telefonica wants to exit the U.K. market. Liberty Global, for example, is expected to enter the mobile business in virtually all of its European markets, and already had said it would consider buying any spectrum divested in the wake of a successful O2-Three merger.

source: Shape Networks

“We had strong concerns that consumers would have had less choice finding a mobile package that suits their needs and paid more than without the deal,” said Margrethe Vestager, EU competition minister. “It would also have hampered innovation and the development of network infrastructure in the UK.”

At least in part, the decision was justified on the grounds that a merger would have been bad for mobile virtual network operators.  

The Commission noted that the combined operation would have had a market share of over 40%, and would have had less incentive than its constituent parts to compete with rivals Vodafone and EE.

Ofcom, the U.K. telecom regulator, also opposed the merger.

Artificial Intelligence Will Boost Virtualized Network and Business Processes

As it would have been unwise to ignore the impact of computing and the Internet on the legacy telecommunications business, so too should artificial intelligence likewise be taken seriously, both as an enabler of productivity gains, but also as a development that has serious social, economic, social and political implications.

In one sense, virtualizing networks is a trend that AI could reinforce. So too, “big data” analytics will be enhanced by use of AI, allowing virtualized networks and processes to work better, and faster.

And it is hard to imagine that AI will not also lead to changes in sales and marketing practices. If AI can be used to predict usage and therefore demand, AI also can help organizations adjust demand “on the fly.”

But AI also will reduce the number of jobs required to run any telecom business, as AI is expected to reduce demand in other industries.

Graduate recruitment at auditors and accountants could fall by as much as 50 percent by 2020 due to the impact of artificial intelligence, according to Steve Varley, EY chairman and managing partner for the UK and Ireland. “Over time our graduate needs are coming down."

source: World Economic Forum

The World Economic Forum estimates that AI, robotics, and automation could replace five million jobs around the world by 2020.

Citi estimated that 35 percent of jobs in the UK are at risk of being replaced by automation,

Likewise, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has estimated that 47 percent of U.S. jobs are at risk, and across the OECD as a whole an average of 57 percent of jobs are at risk. In China, the risk of automation is as high as 77 percent.

AI will help. It also will “harm,” in the area of employment. The issue is whether, on a net basis, more jobs are gained than are lost.

Customer Satisfaction Might be Important, It Just Is Not Predictive of Behavior

Most firms consider “customer satisfaction” an important business outcome, the belief being that satisfied customers are repeat buyers; “loyal” customers less likely to desert a firm for a rival. In other words, happy customers are supposed to be loyal customers.

source: B2B International

But even repeat buyers are not necessarily “loyal” in the sense that they are relatively immune from churn.

However logical that thought might be, the evidence suggests that even satisfied customers are not loyal customers.

source: Fiserv

For example, Juniper Research has found that 98 percent of surveyed U.K. mobile banking users are “very happy” or “quite happy” with their service.

But the survey also found that 31 percent of mobile banking users would consider changing banks if they had a bad experience with their service.

In the U.S. market, where respondents have similar levels of satisfaction with mobile banking, about 16 percent of those surveyed would consider leaving their current bank if the experience was unsettling.

In other words, customer churn, in the consumer services realm, is a problem even when customers say they are highly-satisfied with a service.

That is not to argue that customer satisfaction scores are unimportant: they might be generally significant. Virtually non-existent is the company executive that believes customer perceived satisfaction is unimportant.

The issue is simply that consumers who say they are satisfied are not necessarily loyal, in the sense that they are relatively immune to offers from rival firms.

"Featuring" Apps Drives Downloads, Especially for Games, Especially in South Korea

The impact of featuring on downloads was substantially greater for games than for apps outside of games, though being featured help both types of apps, according to an analysis by App Annie.

Featuring had a clear positive impact on app downloads (both game and non-game), with a median effect around four times larger for games.

Featured game downloads improved about 140 percent, for featured apps on iPhones (Apple App Store) between 2013 and 2016, App Annie says. Apps other than games gained perhaps 40 percent during the same time period.

source: App Annie  

The impact of featuring on iPhone downloads appears to be decreasing across the board, though at a much quicker pace for apps outside of games.

The higher rate of decline for apps is likely due to differences in the typical lifecycles of games and apps. Users tend to cycle through apps at a lower rate than games, which translates over time to less instances of users actively browsing for apps, App Annie argues.

Featuring boosted downloads as much as 480 percent in South Korea and as low as 90 percent in the United States.

source: App Annie

The impact of featuring has been declining overall, but at a particularly high rate for apps outside of games, going from a roughly 80 percent expected download boost in the second half of 2013 to less than 25 percent in the second half of 2015.

Does Zero Rating Harm Consumers?

Virtually nobody seems to argue that zero rating of mobile Internet access--for one, a few or a bundle of apps--actually harms consumer welfare in the near term. Instead, opponents cite other concerns related generally to preserving competition in the ecosystem.

Whatever the other concerns might be, it seems clear that zero rating actually provides benefits for low-income Internet access customers, or people who do not routinely use mobile Internet apps and services.

“Zero-rating is also poised to play a key role in helping to close the digital divide by addressing cost concerns and strengthening the value proposition offered to skeptical non-users, two key considerations for the millions of Americans who remain offline,” argues the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (MMTC).

source:Disruptive Analysis

One survey found 84 percent of adults would be “extremely/somewhat likely to try a new online service if it is a part of a free data offering,” while 85 percent reported they were “extremely/somewhat likely to use more data if it didn’t count against their monthly data usage.”

That should come as absolutely no surprise.

T-Mobile US, which offers such features as part of its “Binge On” program, found customers watched twice as much content from free streaming sites on plans with limited data. Again, that should not come as a surprise.

But some argue zero rating will have only negligible impact on carrier revenues, one way or the other.

In Asia, Income Inequality Gap Widens, Poverty Declines, Middle Class Grows

source: IMF

Income inequality is rising in China and India, the International Monetary Fund says. 

On the other hand, poverty has dropped since 1990, virtually across the board. 

Also the size of the Asian middle class has grown as well, since 1990, especially in urban areas.

Some might note the tension here, as well as the pattern observed in other economies over time. 

Inequality increases as poverty declines and the middle class grows.

Economists will debate whether, in fact, growth in inequality is an almost necessary evil for an economy that rapidly reduces poverty levels and grows the middle class.

That typically happens when an economy enters a growth phase based on new technology, some would note.

That is a positive underpinning for suppliers of Internet access, but rural gaps illustrate why it is so important to work hard on increasing Internet access in rural areas, where the middle class has not grown nearly as fast as in the urban areas.

As you might guess, there is a correlation between educational attainment levels and income.

The percentage of people with less than four years of schooling is much higher for the poorest quintile than for the richest quintile. This is particularly true in Bhutan, Cambodia, India, and Nepal, among other countries.

source: IMF

Likewise, access to financial services varies with income.  The share of adults with a bank account is much higher in the top 60 percent of the income distribution than in the bottom 40 percent. This is true in a number of Asian economies, including India, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines.

Much the same pattern exists in access to health care.

Don't Let Any "Good" Be the Enemy of the "Greatest Good"

source: Rype

The Pareto distribution can be seen in one’s personal or business life, in business strategy or business performance. The fundamental principle is that effort and outcomes are non-linear. A small number of inputs or instances drive most of the outputs or results.

The practical implication for communications or app providers is that a relatively small number of decisions and priorities actually matter, where it comes to making a transition from legacy to next generation business models.

The corollary is that there are a many “good” or “useful” or “helpful” things any service or app provider can do, but which should not be done, to concentrate on the few areas where breakthroughs are possible.

In other words, the temptation to “do” any number of helpful things actually can be detrimental to strategic success, which requires intense concentration on a relative handful of decisions, investments and effort.

There are always lots of useful or helpful things a company might do, to support its business. Many of those things actually will deliver a measurable result. But most will fail to help a company make a strategic breakthrough.

So saying “no” to most of those helpful things can be a prerequisite for focusing effort on a few matters that can decisively change a company’s future.

The areas in which Pareto applies are rather large. The Pareto theorem is the underlying principle of the “long tail” approach to freemium pricing, for example, where basic versions of a product are free, and users then pay incrementally more for additional features.

The Pareto rule can guide resource allocation, the principle being that there is some allocation or resources that makes a person or an organization better off, while not harming existing persons or the organization itself.

The principle is popularly understand as the 80/20 rule, which stipulates that about 20 percent of effort produces 80 percent of results.

The Gini coefficient essentially follows Pareto distribution patterns as well, and describes national income inequality patterns as well.

In the United States, the number of homes without a broadband connection follows a Pareto distribution.

It illustrates the law of diminishing returns. The cost of building access loops generally follow Pareto rules, for example. The inverse of the Pareto distribution is that a small number of instances produce most of the “per-line” access cost.

In other words, a small number of remote locations represent a disproportionate share of network cost, based on cost per mile.

source: National Broadband Plan

source: National Broadband Plan

17% of Accounts Drive 60% of India Mobile Operator Revenues

Customers spending more than Rs 300 per month will account for 60 percent of India mobile industry revenues, said CLSA.

In other words, 165 million customers drive 60 percent of total industry revenues. 

If there are now about a billion total Indian mobile accounts active, then 17 percent of accounts drive 60 percent of revenue, a classic demonstration of the Pareto distribution, often called the “80/20 rule,” where a disproportionate amount of results is driven by a relatively small number of instances.

source: Trak

source: CLSA

India and U.S. Decide More Communications Regulation is Needed

Whenever new substitute products arise in the Internet and communications ecosystem, and especially when the new products threaten to cannibalize the legacy products, regulatory strife is inevitable. And the issue always boils down to one question: more or less?

Should existing regulatory burdens on legacy services be lightened, or should challengers be brough under the existing frametworks?

What is not inevitable are the solutions, which broadly fall into several buckets. In the Internet era, substitute products tend to be over the top apps or services, while legacy products tend to be carrier managed services.

So one solution that always seems “obvious” to regulators and policymakers is to impose legacy regulations on the new products and services.

The equally-plausible, but comparatively rarely chosen path is to remove regulations from carrier managed services, and let consumers decide the outcome.

In India and the United States, regulators seem to prefer the former approach rather than the latter: extending legacy regulations to new platforms rather than removing restraints from legacy platforms.

In India, one example is a preference for regulating OTT messaging under legacy telecom regulations, while likely rejecting a Bharti Airtel plan to offer streaming video as a managed service.

In the United States, one example is a recent Federal Communications Commission proposal to bring cable TV operators under common carrier rules for wholesale special access for the first time in history.

There are effects--on investment, revenues, market shares, innovation--no matter which course is taken. But if one policy goal is innovation, extending regulation arguably reduces the amount of innovation, because incentives to do so are reduced.

source: Celcom

Usage-Based Billing Removes One ISP Concern About Growing OTT Video Consumption

Advocates and suppliers quite often differ about the need for usage-based billing of Internet access services. Some argue all usage should be unlimited. Suppliers often argue that is an unsustainable policy.

MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett argues that usage-based billing is important for Internet service providers in one sense because it removes one reason for ISPs to “fight” over the top video apps.

The reason is drop dead simple: ISPs make more money, almost on a linear basis, as more OTT video is consumed by their customers. That aligns usage, network investment and revenues.

SpaceX Successfully Lands Rocket Booster at Sea

SpaceX successfully landed a Falcon 9 rocket booster at sea, the second such successful landing, and a major step on the way to commercializing reusable booster rocket technology. 

That, in turn, will help lower launch costs, an important development for lowering the cost of satellite communications and earth-orbiting manned space stations. 

Lower costs are important for suppliers of satellite high-bandwidth Internet access services, since coming market demand will require cost-per-bit performance orders of magnitude beyond what has been required in the past.