Will OTT Video Save Consumers Money? It Depends

Though it is not a consumer’s task to worry about product provider profit margins, revenue, stock prices and such, consumers, in the end, pay for all costs of developing and supplying any product.

So it matters whether new video delivery platforms will lead to lower prices, irrespective of what happens with content volume, the number of channels or shows.

That noted, one might question whether cost per hour of consumption of over-the-top video will necessarily be a better value for most consumers than linear video.

With the caveat that all prices will change over time as the market moves in the direction of over the top, on demand or a la carte delivery, it is not true that over the top video now available to consumers costs less than linear video subscriptions do, on a cost per hour basis.

True, consumers might not care. They might only care about out of pocket costs. On that basis, for some consumers, OTT video offers higher value.

For heavy users, though, OTT video costs more, per unit. The cost to use an hour of linear TV (expanded basic only, not including any premium services such as HBO), might be about 25 cents an hour. Using Hulu already costs $1.69 per hour, while using Netflix costs 89 cents per hour.

To be sure, all that depends on how much video actually is consumed each month. How many Netflix customers actually watch 34 hours of video every week, as is quite common for most linear video subscribers?

It might easy enough to predict the outcome of a market that moves massively in the direction of over the top video. Economic viability of most programming networks will be called into question, as advertising-dependent business models will not work for networks with small audiences.

Independent channels, especially, will suffer as affiliate revenues (payments made by distributors for rights to carry a channel) also dwindle because of skinny bundles and lower gross revenues for linear services.

For better or worse, content diversity will take a hit. That might, or might not, be such a problem, in one sense. Out of hundreds of options, most linear video consumers watch 17  or fewer channels on a regular basis. So, arguably, not many actually want to spend money for most content, and most channels.

source: Nielsen

source: The Atlantic

What if Telecom Consumers Can Not be Made "Really Happy?"

“Compared to what?” often is a reasonable principle to be kept in mind whenever we look at consumer satisfaction ratings.

Some industries, including the Internet service provider, cable TV, airline, mobile services and fixed network voice services, typically score towards the bottom of multi-industry surveys of consumer sentiment.

There are some logical potential strategy implications for service providers who want to do better.

If a whole industry tends to score poorly, then it likely does not make sense to invest “too much” to improve consumer experience, to obtain higher consumer satisfaction ratings. In fact, it might well not be possible to improve scores all that much.

Some industries--such as the airlines--simply never rank anywhere but near the bottom of satisfaction ratings, undoubtedly for structural reasons. Cable TV and telecom services likewise always are at the bottom of multi-industry satisfaction ratings.

Most people could think of plausible reasons why dissatisfaction would be high for airlines, communication services or health insurance.

Insurance claims processes are complex and arguably more frequently used than other types of insurance interactions. That means the odds something will prove irritating is higher than for some other products.

High premiums, deductibles and co-pays also provide easy sources of irritation. Constant price hikes for video subscriptions are a constant irritant. It might be harder to understand the unhappiness with Internet access services, though prices (value, compared to price) is an issue.

Airlines have very high “experience” barriers. Airline service unhappiness due to perceived low service quality has declined as providers have struggled to provide the low fares people want, and still earn a profit.

People want low fares, but the effort to do so has lead to base fares and add-on costs for baggage and so forth. The additional charges are an irritant, even when people also say--and act as though they value--they want low fares.

And even under the best of circumstances, travel delays and other irritations are a constant threat.

Granted, suppliers arguably can, and should, invest enough to gain advantage.

But it might not be wise to spend “any amount,” since the best that often can be hoped for is relatively better scores compared to key competitors, not a breakout compared to all other industries.

In other words, it is possible that--no matter how much is done--even the best providers in some industries can only advance so much.

One survey of mobile Internet access by Vasona Networks found improving satisfaction with mobile Internet access.

In the U.S. market, though, satisfaction with nearly every consumer communications or entertainment service fell in early 2015.

Customer satisfaction scores for subscription TV, Internet, mobile and fixed line telephone service, plus computer software, collectively dipped 3.4 percent to an ACSI score of 68.8 on a 0 to 100 scale, the lowest level in seven years.

Some segments fared worse than others. Customer satisfaction with subscription TV service dropped to 63, the absolute worst score among 43 industries covered by the Index.

But Internet access service, which one might think would fare better, had the same score of 63, at the bottom of the index, across industries.

ACSI says the decline results from poor customer service and higher prices. The price issue is a bit of a paradox. For the most part, ISPs have been boosting speeds, while holding prices roughly steady, while adding higher-performance tiers, sold at higher prices.

In a survey conducted by Vasona Networks, 67 percent of U.K. consumers said they expect “good mobile data performance all of the time, with no temporary hiccups or outages.”

On the other hand. those same consumers do not appear to base their buying decisions on mobile data performance. When choosing a provider, mobile data remains a low priority in the minds of consumers.

Only 23 percent of respondents say they choose a carrier based on its mobile data experience.

Also, as often is the case, the access provider gets the blame when devices or apps do not work well. Some 53 percent of responsdents blame their mobile operator if apps do not work.

Some 40 percent of U.K. respondents think switching suppliers would help, the corollary being that 60 percent believe even switching providers would not help.

Vasona's research highlighted that improving web page loading speeds is a key area which mobile operators should focus on to alleviate the biggest problem which consumers have with current networks. Some 63 percent of respondents say “web pages loading slowly or not at all” is the single most frustrating issue with mobile broadband.

FCC Clears Altice Acquisition of Suddenlink

The Federal Communications Commission has found the acquisition of Suddenlink by Altice “in the public interest,” clearing the way for transaction approval, assuming there is no objection by antitrust authorities.

Altice is a holding company incorporated in the Netherlands, providing fixed and mobile voice, video, and broadband services in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Portugal, Switzerland, Israel, the French Caribbean and Indian Ocean regions, and the Dominican Republic. Altice serves approximately 34.5 million subscribers worldwide.

The Suddenlink transaction represents the first major entry into the U.S. cable TV market by an international operator. Japan’s Softbank already is among the top four U.S. mobile operators, as is Germany’s T-Mobile US (although T-Mobile is expected to sell those assets and exit the U.S. market, eventually).

Suddenlink is the seventh largest cable operator in the United States, providing broadband Internet access, cable television, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), and certain competitive telecommunications services to more than 1.5 million customers in 17 states.

almost half of its current existing network serves rural areas, and approximately 85 percent of Suddenlink’s nearly 900 cable franchises have fewer than 2,000 customer homes per franchise.

Suddenlink offers a high speed data product to more than 97.5 percent of its homes passed on a nationwide basis: 80 percent of these homes have speeds of 150 Mbps or faster, and another 10 percent have access to speeds of at least 50 Mbps.

Suddenlink also is in the midst of a program to upgrade most locations to gigabit speed Internet access.

Bitcoin or Blockchain?

What is the bigger opportunity: currencies, or the system of exchanging currency or conducting other transactions. In other words, is the store of value or trust the more interesting new development around virtual currencies?

Is Bitcoin or Blockchain the bigger innovation?

source: Business Insider

Nonlinear Rates of Change Pose Greatest Risk to Service Provider Transformation Plans

Nonlinear change is likely among the greatest dangers any business or industry can face, and that is true for cable TV, satellite TV and telco service providers alike. The overall direction of changes in revenue sources, the rate of growth or decline are fairly well understood.

But what could upset plans to replace revenue sources is an unexpected and large shift in the rates of change, especially from legacy services. As typically is the case, revenue losses in the legacy business will tend to affect business models more than unexpected upside surprises for growth businesses.

With the caveat that revenue is not profit, U.S. cable TV operator revenue trends are clear enough: business services and high speed access are projected to drive revenue growth through 2020. LInear video and voice will fall, while advertising remains roughly stable.

But everything hinges on what happens with high speed access, video entertainment and business services. A predictable pace of decline for video, with predictable growth of high speed access and business services, will allow a smooth transition of revenue sources.

The danger: nonlinear changes to the downside in video or high speed access could imperil revenue stability. The is the same set of strategic dangers faced by telcos, as well.

Cable TV providers face two sets of issues: declining units sold and declining profit margin on those units, even if average revenue per unit can eke out gains. Declining ability to wring free cash flow out of video means it is necessary to maintain high growth rates in business services and high speed access, while maintaining profit margins.

The rate of change makes a huge difference, even if the direction of change is anticipated. Small single-digit increases in abandonment of video, or a few digits annual change in revenue growth rates for high speed access, would put severe pressure on the business model, some argue.

Between 2015 and 2020, the leading cable operators might see a decline of 33 percent in video revenues, with margins dipping to nine percent from 24 percent.

High speed access revenues are forecast to grow 52 percent. Commercial revenues are projected to grow from $6 billion to $13 billion, an increase of more than 100 percent.

An accelerated rate of decline for linear video would seem the biggest downside risk, but a slowing rate of revenue growth in high speed access is likely the second-largest potential risk, as telcos shift to higher-speed access services and third parties such as Google Fiber take more share.

source: Business Insider

source: Business Insider

Canada Gets a Potential "Four Leaders" Opportunity in Mobile

The most important numbers in most mobile service provider markets are “three” and “four.”

Three tends to be the number many believe provides both competition and sustainability, while four is the number policy advocates and government regulators prefer, primarily because four contestants are believed to provide more robust levels of competition.

The Shaw Communications acquisition of Wind Mobile Corp., despite Wind’s small market share (about three percent) means there will be four national wireless carriers, all backed by four big national telecom conglomerates, instead of just three.

Wind says it is  Canada's largest non-incumbent wireless services provider, serving approximately 940,000 subscribers across Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta with 50MHz of spectrum in each of these regions.

Wind has a bit over three percent market share in the Canadian mobile market.

Wind has yet to begin building a fourth generation Long Term Evolution (LTE) network, so that undoubtedly will be on the agenda, as Shaw prepares to step up competition with the leading mobile providers in Canada.

Though Canadian regulators recently had used a familiar tactic--creating spectrum reserves for new and upstart providers--some would argue that no meaningful change happened.

In March 2015, Wind Mobile Corp., Videotron Ltd. and Eastlink Wireless won significant blocks of AWS-3 (advanced wireless services) spectrum covering most of the country for a combined total of less than $100 million, while Telus Corp. and BCE together will spent about $2-billion for the licenses they won.

The new entrants paid an average of 11 cents per megahertz per person (MHz-Pop)

Telus paid $3.02 per MHz/Pop and BCE paid $2.96 per MHz/Pop.

What Will Mature Internet Access Lifecycle Look Like?

How soon will Internet access become a legacy product, past its peak of growth, in the U.S. and other markets where fixed networks have been a typical access platform? And, when that happens, what form will the decline take?

In other words, how soon will high speed access start looking like voice and linear video, products that have become saturated, to be followed by a decline? And, when that happens, what form will the decline take?

In the prior maturations, people simply stopped buying the product altogether. It is in many ways hard to envision that scenario for high speed access, if one assumes it is a foundation product for most other entertainment, communications and transaction services.

One possible outcome is that the market saturates, but does not actually result in abandonment. The market simply stops growing, but consumers keep buying. Decline then does not take the form of abandonment, but revenue decline.

The pattern there would be different than the cases of voice or linear video, where the actual number and percentage of people stopped buying. 

Instead, perhaps the matuation takes a different form. It is possible that revenue first flattens, and then declines, as people keep their connections, but pay less. 

In that sense, maturity would not necessarily involve abandonment, but only lower prices paid by consumers, and declining revenue for suppliers.

A traditional pattern based on substitution would have fixed access abandonment in in favor of Wi-Fi or mobile or some other new alternative, for example. That is hard to see, at the moment, but 5G could represent a breakthrough.

To some extent there is mobile substitution, where people choose mobile access rather than fixed access. Whether 5G can accelerate that process is the issue.

That we are close to saturation is easy to see. In 2015, 85 percent of U.S residents say they use the Internet. And many of those non-users do not want to buy. Still, the point is that we are within 10 percentage points or so of virtually complete adoption.

Market share shifts are the other issue. One might argue that cable TV companies will continue to take share from telcos. One might argue that third parties will take share from telcos and cable TV.

But if the market is saturated, and if telcos continue to substitute fiber connections for copper, even market share shifts will be more difficult.