Convergence Conversation

This is an open invitation to our readers to join strategy leaders from around the world for Telco 2.0's first 'Best Practice Live!' virtual (online) event being broadcast to 3 timezones on 28-30 June 2010. We've collected some of the best Telco 2.0 strategies, case studies and use cases from around the globe. You can register for FREE here.

As well as the Telco 2.0 analysts, leading industry speakers include:

• Hans Vestberg, President and CEO, Ericsson
• Olivier Baujard, Group CTO, Deutsche Telekom
• Dr Hans Wijayasuriya, CEO, Dialog Group
• Sally Davis, CEO, BT Wholesale
• Prof. More...

I have a tremendous amount of respect for Apple and all it has achieved in design and market creation, as well as the precipitous rise in its market cap, which The Dear Leader recently described as "surreal." I have never encountered a CEO of any company who didn't believe (at least in public) that his/her company was undervalued, so this remark in itself is surreal and has a vague whiff of short-bait about it.

Question:

Of a given group of friends / associates, what is the probability that they will either:

a) Share the same mobile operator
b) Share the same mobile device / OS
c) Share the same Internet social network
d) Share the same interoperable multi-operator / multi-device client & service?

Technology, media and telecommunications marketing practitioners are ready to let go of legacy practices and try something that's potentially more effective. eMarketer reports that social media is now developing a reputation for being valuable -- for customer interaction, brand awareness and lead generation.

In February 2010, for example, inbound online marketing platform HubSpot found Twitter usage could double monthly leads, and Onesource reported in January that business-to-business salespeople were looking to LinkedIn for prospecting.

Moreover, according to virtual events provider Unisfair, social media is now the top emerging channel for sales lead generation among technology marketers that they surveyed in May 2010. More...

I'm currently digging into IMS/RCS for what may turn into an "epitaph" research paper. My current spoken and blogged views on it are well-known, but I feel it is worthy of a more weighty and analytical piece.

I'm currently sifting through assorted vendors' websites, GSMA RCS specs, YouTube video demos and so forth.

I'm struck by one very clear question:

On a half-decent phone, why would anyone want to use a multi-headed / aggregated app, hooked into various social networks and messaging services, rather than an optimised one from the underlying Internet service?

For example: More...

Telco 2.0 Top Stories

• Strategy: Telco 2.0 ideas roll out - managed offload, HSPA today beats LTE tomorrow, Ribbit for everyone at BT Business, Safaricom prospers with MPESA
• Online Video: Apple TV 2.0 prepares for launch
• Capital Markets: Apple catches up with and outstrips Microsoft
• Platforms: Nokia-Yahoo: the new economics of platforms and customer data
• Voice 2.0: Skype for iPhone comes with "phone bill"!
• Communism: Management shakeup at China Mobile, Party Style

Telco 2.0 "Idea Watch" No. 1: AT&T is testing managed offload of cellular traffic to WLAN around Times Square in New York - managed offload is something we analyse in depth in our report "New Mobile, Fixed and Wholesale Broadband Business Models". More...

Here's a typically pithy summary of the recent well-attended LTE World Summit in Amsterdam by Dean Bubley, co-author of the Telco 2.0 'New Mobile, Fixed and Wholesale Broadband Models' Strategy Report, founder of Disruptive Analysis, and long time Telco 2.0 Associate.

LTE ('Long Term Evolution') is a new high speed radio network technology standard which is designed to increase the speed and capacity of mobile networks. A good idea in principle given ever increasing demand and current fears of networks choked with mobile data. But is it a viable technical and commercial proposition compared to other strategies, particularly in today's tightened economic environment?

In a previous article on LTE in mid 2009, another Telco 2.0 partner, Arete Research, expressed the view that LTE would prove 'Late, Tempting and Elusive', and from the vote below, delegates at the 9th Telco 2.0 Executive Brainstorm in L More...

Telco 2.0 Top Stories

• More Googlemania/phobia: Hot Androids, Nexus One stalled by OSS, AdMob deal cleared, Google TV launches
• Broadband Connectivity: $10m HSPA software upgrade = twice the iPhones?
• Technology Disruptions: Telstra firsts dual-carrier HSPA
• Strategy & Finance: Indian spectrum auction - first the madness, now the, er, madness...

A striking feature of the latest world smartphone sales numbers, other than the criticism of the methodology, is that they're growing strongly and Androids are going like hot cakes. The latest version of Android is also out, and Google have also been speaking about the difficulties of getting Nexus One to market, getting into trouble over WLAN mapping, getting approval for their acquisition of AdMob (the Mobile Advertising platform), and launching a new TV service. More...