Micro Enterprises in Developing Nations Rely Heavily on Mobile Voice, Internet Apps, Including WhatsApp, Facebook

Mobile apps--even those generally considered “consumer apps”--matter for small business in developing countries, and are, as always the reason people and businesses want to use the Internet in the first place.

To be sure, mobile communications and Internet access arguably are among the most-important tools any micro business has access to. But it is the apps that arguably matter most.

Almost all of surveyed micro business entrepreneurs (96 percent) in Ghana said they accessed the mobile internet in some way each day.

For 70 percent of those respondent s, WhatsApp is their primary mobile application for business, while 40 percent identify Facebook as the second most important application for their business,  a Vodafone report suggests.

But education levels seem to matter greatly.

Some 90 percent of  entrepreneurs with a junior high education prefer WhatsApp as their primary mobile internet application. The use of Facebook, email, Viber and Google search is almost absent among micro-entrepreneurs with just junior high education.

In a culture where there is a preference for rich interpersonal communication (face-to-face), micro-entrepreneurs surveyed also appreciate the ability to visually depict their products or services to customers who are not physically present.

Many Ghanaian MSMEs consist of one person, an owner-manager, who usually has limited formal education, limited access to and use of new technologies, market information and formal credit.

Mobiles, especially smartphones providing internet access, offer scope to improve the sustainability of these enterprises.

In Ghana, there are an estimated 121 mobile subscriptions per 100 inhabitants as of December 2015. The mobile internet penetration rates are growing rapidly, having increased by approximately 30 percentage points in Ghana in the three years between January 2013 and December 2015.

About 70 percent of Ghana survey respondents running micro-sized businesses consider mobile phones with Internet access  to be the most important ICT tool for their business. And that value represents monthly spending by a majority of the micro-entrepreneurs of US$10 or less each month on voice, and roughly the same amount for data.

The average monthly expenditure is US$14.4 for voice and US$7.1 for internet. The expenditure with highest frequency is US$6 for both voice (16.3 percent) and internet (17.8 percent). Seven out of 10 microentrepreneurs reportedly spend more than half of their monthly voice expenditure on business activities. Just under five out of 10 spend more than half of their monthly data expenditure on business activities.  

WhatsApp users spend less on mobile data than their peers. They also make and receive fewer voice calls.
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Spectrum Futures, to be held in Singapore, 19-21 October 2016, brings together the whole ecosystem supplying Internet access for everyone across South Asia and Southeast Asia, and features topics and speakers addressing why, how, when and where the most-important developments are happening.
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IoT Revenues Might be Necessary to Help Expand Rural Internet Access

As other mobile operators likely would attest, a relatively small number of cell sites generate the bulk of a mobile service provider’s  revenue. And that is why rural Internet access to lower-income potential customers is such a challenge.

The top 10 percent of total sites contribute over 30 percent of total revenue, whereas the bottom 50 percent of sites contribute under 10 percent of revenue, a Vodafone report says.

Of the top sites, just 10 percent are in rural areas.

Data revenues represent a much greater proportion of revenue at the highest earning cell sites than at the lowest earning sites; the top 1,000 sites contribute 37 percent of total data revenues, whereas the bottom 2,000 sites contribute less than one percent of total data revenues.

That illustrates the importance of lower-cost infrastructure to supply communications and Internet access in rural areas.

As always is the case for ubiquitous networks, more-profitable customers and portions of the network subsidize the less-profitable customers and portions of the network. Analysis of individual cell site revenues and costs suggests that around 30 percent of Vodacom’s cell sites would not be profitable on a standalone basis, for example.

That also suggests the importance of potentially big new revenue sources such as Internet of Things. Mobile and other network platforms might require the profit such services provider to business and enterprise customers to generate the surplus that allows more support of rural access facilities that will not generate much net revenue or profit.

That is one reason why Spectrum Futures, a conference promoting Internet access for everyone across South Asia and Southeast Asia, this year will focus extensively on apps, app development, partnerships with ISPs and business models for new apps.

Internet of Things apps--in addition to consumer apps such as Facebook and WhatsApp--will be part of the conversation at Spectrum Futures. V. Shrinath is one of the app development specialists who will share his views at the event.

European Auto Manufacturers, Telcos to Test Connected and Automated Driving

Europe’s leading trade associations for the telecommunications and the automotive sectors, including the European Automobile Manufacturers Association, the European Association of Automotive Suppliers, GSMA, ETNO and ECTA, announced a project to test connected and automated driving.

The main objective is to “strengthen Europe’s leadership in connected and automated driving.”

The industry-led project will focus on use cases and test functionalities in three main areas: automated driving, road safety and traffic efficiency, and the digitalization of transport and logistics.

That will include testing of high-density platooning, cooperative collision avoidance, remote control parking, local-hazard warnings and traffic flow optimisation. High definition maps will be updated with a fast connection to the internet on phone or other mobile devices.

Safety, cyber-security and protection of personal data, quality of service and network latency, will be prioritised and addressed during the different use cases and functionalities’ testing.

A first phase, to run from 2017 until 2019, will feature tests on available communication technologies, such as LTE – Long-Term Evolution – (4G) technology.

A second phase, to run until 2021, will be based on both 4G and 5G networks.

New Speakers Confirmed for Spectrum Futures, Singapore 19-21 October 2016

New Confirmed Speakers:

Leo Sugandhi, spectrum frequency planning analyst for mobile services at Directorate of Spectrum Planning and Policy; Ministry of ICT, West Java Province, Indonesia

B. Shadrach, Independent Consultant, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Asia Coordinator, Alliance for Affordable Internet, New Delhi Area, India

Mr. Sushil Kumar, IoT standards and implementation, Telecommunication Engineering Center, Department of Telecom (DoT),  India. (will speak about IoT opportunities in India in several industries)

Syed Ismail Shah, Chairman, Pakistan Telecommunications Authority, Pakistan

Confirmed Speakers:

Chris Weasler, Facebook, Director of Global Connectivity

Greg Leon, Google Product Manager

Jay Fajardo, Founder, LaunchGarage

Praveen Sharma, Tata Communications, Head of Regulatory Affairs

Rajan S. Mathews, Cellular Operators Association of India, Director General

Shrinath V, Product Management & Design Thinking Consultant and Google Developer Expert

Mohamed El-Moghazi, National Telecom Regulatory Authority of Egypt, Director of Radio Spectrum Research and Studies

Camilo Alberto Jiménez Santofimio, Comisión de Regulación de Comunicaciones, Colombia, Senior Advisor

Reza Arefi, Intel Corporation, Director of Spectrum Strategy

Bob Horton, Horton Consulting, Director & Principal

Vern Fotheringham, V-Satcast, LLC, Executive Chairman

Josh Gordon, Red Pocket Mobile, President

Narendra K. Saini, Telecommunication Engineering Center (TEC), India, Chair - Smart Governance WG

Rajnesh Singh, Internet Society, Director, Asia-Pacific Regional Bureau

Muhammad Rashid Shafi, Multinet Pakistan (PVT.) LTD., CEO Global Business & Chief Strategy Officer

Devid Gubiani, Bolt Super 4G - PT First Media, CEO

New speakers will be added every week this summer. Join us at Spectrum Futures, sponsored by the Pacific Telecommunications Council.

India's TRAI Preparing Mobile Average Speed Rules

The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of India appears to be preparing for new quality of service measures related to minimum mobile Internet access speeds. The new rules might focus on minimum average speeds.

TRAI also reports India’s mobile data usage  grew 58 percent to 451,185 TB in March 2016, year over years.

Mobile  Internet subscribers grew 16 percent, year over year, reaching 30 percent of the mobile subscriber base.

Mobile Mergers: Okay When Resulting Market Has 4 Suppliers

Pakistan mobile  operators Mobilink and Warid Telecom have completed their merger, strengthening Mobilink’s lead in the market, which will be reduced from five suppliers to four. Reductions of that sort have been relatively non-controversial.

Mergers that reduce the number of suppliers from four to three, on the other hand, generally have failed, in recent years.

The combined entity will serve about 50 million subscribers in the Asian nation and will provide 2G, 3G and LTE services across Pakistan.

source: Ali Shah

To gain regulatory approval for a merger between CK Hutchison Holdings 3 Italia with Vimpelcom's Wind, Iliad will be enabled to enter the Italian mobile market on a facilities-based basis.

The deal also creates a new number-one provider in the Italian mobile market (3 Italia).

The arrangement will have France's Iliad entering the Italian market, while CK Hutchison Holdings will be able to merge its 3 Italia with Vimpelcom's Wind, while still preserving a four-provider market structure, something that has proven mandatory in recent European Commission decisions on mobile market mergers.

Illiad will launch its facilities-based attack by selling a 15.1 percent stake Iliad holds in Telecom Italia, and by buying divested assets from Hutchison and Vimpelcom.

The deal notably involves the transfer of  2x35 MHz 3G/4G frequencies (2x5 MHz at 900 MHz, 2x10 MHz at 1800 MHz, 2x10 MHz at 2100 MHz and 2x10 MHz at 2600 MHz), to Iliad from Hutchison and Vimpelcom, for 450 million euros, with payment phased between 2017 and 2019.

Illiad also will acquire several thousand cell sites in densely populated areas offered by Wind/H3G or rented from third parties.

An undertaking either to bring into force a RAN-sharing agreement covering rural areas with Wind/H3G, or to acquire several thousands of macro sites in those areas from Wind/H3G or third parties. - A 2G, 3G and 4G roaming agreement on the merged network, for a period of five years renewable for one further five-year period at the initiative of Iliad.

The agreement, which involves the sale of frequencies and infrastructure assets to Iliad, is subject to European Commission approval as well as to the Commission's approval of the H3G transaction combining Wind with H3G, with a decision due by Sept. 8, 2016.

The total deal has been structured to maintain four Italian mobile telecoms operators, a provision considered necessary to allow Hutchison antitrust approval for a merger that otherwise might leave Telecom Italia  and Vodafone Italia as the only other mobile network competitors in Italy.

Last year, when plans to merge Wind and 3 Italia emerged, many observers believed the consolidation of the number-three and number-four operators would boost profit margins, allowing operators to start investing more heavily in their networks.

Italian mobile operator revenues from mobile services have fallen by 40 percent since 2011, according to GSMA, discouraging investment in Long Term Evolution 4G services.

But the EC regulatory authorities have held the line on mergers that reduce the number of competitors from four to three. In the United Kingdom, Denmark and Italy, proposed mergers that would reduce the number of leading providers in mobile markets from four to three have been denied.

The issue now is what happens to competition, retail prices and competition, as Iliad is known for its spirited low-price attacks.

Skype Meetings: Free Conferencing for Small Business, 3-User Long Term Limit

It always is difficult to sell what one’s competitors give to customers for free. Skype Meetings represents that sort of competition, at the low end of the business market, where a typical requirement might require conferencing involving three people.

Skype Meetings—offered free to small business--is a new online meetings tool that provides small businesses with real-time audio and HD video conferencing.

Anyone in the United States with a business email address and whose organization doesn’t already have Office 365 can sign up for free Skype Meetings at www.skype.com/meetings.

Once signed up, a user can set up meetings for up to 10 people for the first 60 days and up to three people thereafter.

Skype Meetings includes collaboration features like the ability to share screens and content during meetings. During a meeting, participants can instant message, share their screen or PowerPoint presentation or use the laser pointer and whiteboard features.

The meeting organizer also gets professional meeting controls such as the ability to mute the audience in order to be heard.