It is not a secret that tier-one telcos have not been the fastest-moving firms where it comes to rapid creation of new services and applications. In fairness, very large organizations built on global standards, with many legacy systems to support and lots of government and regulatory oversight, have lots of reasons to move more slowly when making changes, only to avoid the danger of inadvertently “breaking something” that was not planned.
Historically, telcos have essentially outsourced technology and services innovation to third parties, be they AT&T Bell Laboratories, Bell Communications Research, leading industry suppliers and global standards groups.
So the recent trend of large telcos creating new venture capital organizations is not out of character.
T-Venture, the venture fund owned by Deutsche Telekom, has a total budget of about 450 million euros ($566 million) for investments.
Deutsche Telekom's T-Venture so far has assets worth 750 million euros invested in about 80 companies. But Deutsche Telekom now wants T-Venture to make faster decisions and take majority stakes in firms.
Aside from any internal discussions about the speed with which any of the larger telcos is “getting to market,” there always are going to be questions about how any smaller app or service is going to “move the revenue needle” for any entity that routinely books scores of billions in annual revenue.
In Spain,Telefonica runs a program dubbed “Wayra,” which nurtures companies in Europe and Latin America. Telefonica receives a 10 percent stake in each business and a preference right to buy a successful product.
Telefonica has also started Amerigo, an international network of technology venture capital funds, supported by the governments of Spain, Colombia, Chile and Brazil, as well as financial institutions, the company said in a statement today.
Though it certainly is correct to note that telcos might do better by insulating venture efforts from the day to day operating units, it also is correct to note that this is the traditional way larger telcos have innovated in the past.
The perhaps growing issue, as more such activity occurs, is how fast the innovations will have a significant revenue impact for the sponsoring telcos.
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
Telco Venture Arms are Quite Traditional, in Some Ways
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Android Builds U.S. Market Share lead in July 2012
For the three-month average period ending in July, 2012, 234 million Americans age 13 and older used mobile devices, with Samsung ranked as the top manufacturer with 25.6 percent of U.S. mobile handset users, followed by LG with 18.4 percent share.
Samsung and LG experienced slight share drops, but Apple gained share, up to 16.3 percent.
| Top Mobile OEMs 3 Month Avg. Ending Jul. 2012 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Apr. 2012 Total U.S. Mobile Subscribers (Smartphone & Non-Smartphone) Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens | |||
| Share (%) of Mobile Subscribers | |||
| Apr-12 | Jul-12 | Point Change | |
| Total Mobile Subscribers | 100.0% | 100.0% | N/A |
| Samsung | 25.9% | 25.6% | -0.3 |
| LG | 19.2% | 18.4% | -0.8 |
| Apple | 14.4% | 16.3% | 1.9 |
| Motorola | 12.5% | 11.2% | -1.3 |
| HTC | 6.0% | 6.4% | 0.4 |
More than 114 million people used smart phones during the three months ending in July, 2012, up seven percent over April 2012. Google Android ranked as the top smart phone platform with 52.2 percent market share (up 1.4 percentage points), while Apple’s share increased two percentage points to 33.4 percent.
RIM ranked third with 9.5 percent share, followed by Microsoft (3.6 percent) and Symbian (0.8 percent).
| Top Smartphone Platforms 3 Month Avg. Ending Jul. 2012 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Apr. 2012 Total U.S. Smartphone Subscribers Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens | |||
| Share (%) of Smartphone Subscribers | |||
| Apr-12 | Jul-12 | Point Change | |
| Total Smartphone Subscribers | 100.0% | 100.0% | N/A |
| 50.8% | 52.2% | 1.4 | |
| Apple | 31.4% | 33.4% | 2.0 |
| RIM | 11.6% | 9.5% | -2.1 |
| Microsoft | 4.0% | 3.6% | -0.4 |
| Symbian | 1.3% | 0.8% | -0.5 |
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Galaxy S III Sales Surpass Apple's iPhone 4S
For the first time since it launched last October, Apple's iPhone 4S was not the top selling smartphone in the U.S., as the newly released Samsung Galaxy S III took the top spot in the month of August, according to Canaccord Genuity.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
A Look at U.S. E-Commerce
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
EU to Approve U.K. Mobile Payments Consortium
European Union regulators will approve plans by British mobile operators Vodafone, O2 and Everything Everywhere to set up a mobile payments joint venture, Reuters reports. The consortium therefore would represent 92 percent of all U.K. mobile subscribers.
Known informally as "Project Oscar," the venture will create a mobile wallet platform and an advertising sales effort aimed at about 74 million subscribers to all of the partner mobile networks, or about 92 percent of all mobile subscribers in the United Kingdom.
Known informally as "Project Oscar," the venture will create a mobile wallet platform and an advertising sales effort aimed at about 74 million subscribers to all of the partner mobile networks, or about 92 percent of all mobile subscribers in the United Kingdom.
The project is designed to enable extensive "data mining" on consumption habits, location and demographics of customers, which would in turn allow creation of highly-targeted advertising and other loyalty services.
Customers would be able to store debit and credit card details on their phones and pay for goods and services either online at retail locations by using their near field communications equipped smart phones.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Mobile Service Providers in Spectrum Race?
AT&T is putting together approximately $2.6 billion in spectrum deals, proposing at least 24 deals in the last four months, in a bid to narrow the spectrum gap between itself and Verizon Wireless.
Verizon recently bought airwave rights from four major cable companies for $3.9 billion, adding even more spectrum at frequencies ideally suited for in-building signal penetration and signal range.
Some argue there is no need for more spectrum, but most observers would agree more spectrum is necessary.
That said, there are multiple techniques for increasing the amount of usable spectrum, including more efficient coding, use of small cells and cell dividing.
Nobody disagrees that mobile demand is going to outstrip existing capacity.
Verizon recently bought airwave rights from four major cable companies for $3.9 billion, adding even more spectrum at frequencies ideally suited for in-building signal penetration and signal range.
That said, there are multiple techniques for increasing the amount of usable spectrum, including more efficient coding, use of small cells and cell dividing.
Nobody disagrees that mobile demand is going to outstrip existing capacity.
For more, read the perspective.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
Voice Mail Messages Decline 8% in a Year
People seem to be leaving significantly fewer voice mail messages, compared to a year ago, according to an analysis by Vonage. The number of voice mail messages left on user accounts was down eight percent in July 2012 from a year ago.
Retrieved voice mail fell 14 percent among Vonage users as well,according to Vonage.
Retrieved voice mail fell 14 percent among Vonage users as well,according to Vonage.
Gary Kim has been a digital infra analyst and journalist for more than 30 years, covering the business impact of technology, pre- and post-internet. He sees a similar evolution coming with AI. General-purpose technologies do not come along very often, but when they do, they change life, economies and industries.
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