Posts by Thomas Husson (bio)

Thomas Husson | October 01, 2008, 02:42 AM
Twitter

Like my colleague, I am also a late joiner in the Twitter dance. I had always been reluctant to join the micro-blogging phenomenon (I started this blog 3 years ago) but was finally intrigued by the fact that the company would stop delivering SMS alerts for free outside the US. So, I decided to discover it by myself a month ago. I am still not 100% convinced but begin to see the value from a PR / news / interaction perspective.

Anyway, you can join me at http://twitter.com/Thomas_Husson

Thomas Husson | September 30, 2008, 08:21 AM
European Mobile Forecast, 2008-2013 - Part 2

I spoke yesterday at IIR Converged Messaging Conference in Munich.

Once again, it was quite challenging & interesting to play the devil's advocate in front of an operator-centric audience. My first message was to bring a bad news: SMS cash cow is and will continue to be threatened by declining prices. I had some feedback with people saying volumes continue to increase. Looking at SMS volumes in the UK or in Portugal, it would be difficult to disagree with this fact. However, increase in volumes will not compensate for the decline in average prices. The vast majority of the traffic is concentrated among heavy young users and once they have viewed SMS as a commodity, why would they pay for other services? At the end of the day, for the younder generation, it will probably be a data / Internet package with different services bundled such as social networking, IM or communication with presence / location to stay in touch with your community of friends / relatives.

There were lots of discussion about MMS, e-mail and mobile IM with the long hope to be able to offer a seamless and transparent solution for end-users that would meet all their communication needs whatever the bearer. But at the end of the day, and as posted here, this is about controlling the social address book and operators are not necessarily the only ones fighting for this and the best placed to deliver a compelling user-experience. A good sign is Nokia's acquisition of OZ announced yesterday. Some operators however are embracing the trend and offering very interesting solutions such as the Vodafone Connect To Friends' Facebook plug-in.

Jupiter's new report, European Messaging Forecast 2008 to 2013: compensating for the decline in SMS revenues has just been published and is available here for clients.

Thomas Husson | September 30, 2008, 03:06 AM
French telecom dynamics

I did not take the time to comment some of the recent news on the French Telecom market, so here's a wrap up:

- Arcep published its recommendation (available here in French) to the French government of how to best allocate spectrum: 10-15 Mhz to be quickly allocated to a new entrant. Iliad (Free, one the leading ISPs) is by far the most credible new entrant despite some interest from Kertel, Bollore Telecom and Inquam Broadband. The government decided not to decide and to launch a debate in Parliament before final decision to be made in l'Elysee...A tricky political choice between a consumer-friendly approach (enabling Free to reduce prices) and operators' efficient lobbying.

- Arcep also recently calculated new long-term termination rates between 0.01 and 0.02 €/min versus 0.065 € currently. At this stage, there are no indications of when those tariffs could be implemented, but this is bad news for operators. Also, it means tariff differences when calling from a fixed line will vanish and make it all the more interesting to launch multi-play offerings.

- MVNOs still facing hurdles here with less than 5% market share. Virgin Mobile is the leading player with 900k customers reached during August 2008 (100k with sister company Breizh Mobile) and confirmed its target of 2M to be reached in 2010. Wholesale tariffs and market conditions are simply not enough attractive. Bouygues recently decided to host KPN as a MVNO. After Numericable, this decision was viewed by some skeptical players as a way to be perceived as more open to avoid a 4th 3G player. In my opinion, both issues are not and should not necessarily be opposed.

- Neuf Cegetel brand to disappear in favor of SFR. SFR to launch a new communication campaign with a new tagline: "The world is yours". The question is the extent to which this will impact acquisitions in the forthcoming quarter given 9Cegetel brand awareness in the fixed business. Bouygues Telecom will also at last launch its own broadband offering in coming weeks. This appears as a late me-too strategy but mainly aims at avoiding churn to Orange, SFR or Free broadband offerings. The viral marketing campaign to generate buzz is pretty cool.

So, at a high-level perspective, it looks like the market is beginning to be more structured with 2 main large integrated operators (Orange and SFR), a mobile operator (Bouygues) about to launching a broadband offering and a broadband operator (Free) willing to enter the mobile market, plus a bunch of small players.

From a mobile data perspective a significant shift occured (that we are now forecasting across European countries) with the inclusion of unlimited consumer mobile Internet tariffs: Origami new pay-monhtly contracts, SFR Illymythics and more recently Bouygues Telecom's compelling offering: Neo 2.

Thomas Husson | September 16, 2008, 11:43 AM
Controlling the social address book

There were lots of recent announcements in the mobile space around adress book / calendar back-ups, tools to save and share content (from pictures to video and messaging).

Vodafone's acquisition of ZYB (still wondering which services were really available commercially or if they only bought competences), o2's launch of Bluebook or SFR's Ma Sfere are good examples on the operator front.

Bluebook is by far the most advanced project with a significant marketing campaign launched last March. I quite like the idea that memories are goind digital and that "now, when you lose your phone, you won't lose your memories". But let's face it, this all about controlling the social adress book. Operators are often viewed by other stakeholders as players who consider to "own the customer".

Reality is that customers own their contacts and use communication services not only from operators but also from Internet players (social networking sites, Instant Messaging,...), particularly the younger generation.

Handset manufacturers (Nokia's OVI, Apple's MobileMe,...) and Internet Players (Yahoo! One connect) are entering the space and want to interact directly with consumers. In the context of PC/mobile convergence, those services will increasingly deliver value. In my opinion, key success factors are:

- ease of use / simplicity. That's not an easy one particularly when you have to sync your device with a PC

- quality / reliability. Consumers are afraid (or should be afraid, see the Edvige debate on related but not that different topic) that their personal data / privacy can be used out of context. If you add into the equation the fact that their location will increasingly be shared via tags and GPS chipsets embedded in phones, there is a need to reassure them.

- interoperability / open Internet. Identity is by definition multiple. You may feel Italian but also European, love football but also rugby and be a member of different niche social networks. You may use Windows Live for IM but have a Yahoo! mail, be a member of Facebook, Bebo and use Google's calendar. The point is not about creating communities (they pre-exist) but giving consumers tools to interconnect on different platforms and to interact with many different contacts. I haven't tested Yahoo! One Connect yet but in this regard, I quite like how open their approach is (aggregator of different social networks, use of tools from competitors).

For French readers, this article of La Tribune sums it up.

Thomas Husson | September 15, 2008, 09:23 AM
Keitai shosetsu

This Japanese expression relates to books or short stories written for mobile phones. There is a good article published in Le Monde the other day. Nothing really new in the sense that these have been available for a while in Japan and recently introduced in Europe, see a recent post here.

However, I was really amazed by the high level of downloads. Apparently, one the latest books (just made available in physical bookstores), Koizora, has already been read by 25,000,000 Japanese.
The buzz around Amazon's Kindle should be put in perspective.

Thomas Husson | September 15, 2008, 08:39 AM
My "Fun" Blackberry - part 2

Echoing my colleague's post on RIM's move in the consumer segment, here's a pic taken a few months ago in the London Tube.

Sorry for the pic quality, it was actually taken with a camera phone (won't say anything about the brand / model):-)

Also, see here an interesting interview with one of the team members of Blackberry's Partner Fund.

Thomas Husson | August 28, 2008, 05:34 PM
Mobile Social Networking

o2 & MySpace or Orange & Bebo were among the most striking deals between European mobile operators and online social networking sites in 2007. Many have followed since then and a bunch of mobile-only players are also claiming to have great audiences.

Handset manufacturers have also embraced the trend and the recent announcement that Nokia would made a Friendster widget available (via Widset) on the brand new N79 is a good example of that. Not to mention m.facebook.com or the iPhone facebook app and many many others.

My colleague Julie Ask just published a very interesting report on this precise topic: Mobile Social Networking: Assessing Social Strategies for Carriers and Handset Manufacturers. A must read.

Thomas Husson | August 26, 2008, 04:48 AM
GPS Phones

.

Here is a pic of the new Nokia N85 just announced by Nokia as "The definitive entertainment package". Indeed, there are quite a few cool features such as:

- 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics (when the N81 it is replacing only had 2MP) with a nice 2.6" OLED screen + 30 fps for video
- 10 pre-loaded N-Gage Games (needless to say this will make a difference in terms of adoption)
- Music playback of 30 hours with dedicated media keys, connection to Nokia Music Store, plus availability to connect to RDS Radio.

Nokia also announces the N79 (replacement of N78) with pretty much the same features but with less memory (4 instead of 8 GB inbox microSD memory card). Both phones are expected to begin shipping in October 2008.

Interestingly N79 and N85 comes with in-built GPS receivers and support for A-GPS. In-built A-GPS providing turn-by-turn navigation - for walking or driving - comes with a three month integrated license. Images can also be geotagged to specific locations and then uploaded directly to Share on Ovi or third party services.

Nokia has made it clear that in a few years time half of its device portfolio will be satnav / GPS enabled and that in 2008 alone it expects to ship 35M SatNav / GPS phones worlwide.

In a report published last week, Jupiter has quantified some of the needs of mobile upgraders (consumers willing to upgrade their mobile phones). "Accessing maps" ranked quite high on the list, actually in 3rd position just after "sharing content" and "listening to music".
Otherwise, it seems like other functionalities are becoming more and more standard and that key differentiation will increasingly come through improved design, aesthetics, and user interfaces. It will also come from both improvements in and smoother integration of existing capabilities.

More information available here.

Satnav GPS is thus one of the few really new functionalities on mobile devices. Well, not necessarily that new when you realize first LBS offerings were launched in early 2000s and that pionneer WayFinder's history (Itinerary Systems at that time) comes back to 1995 when it was created by the former head of R&D at Ericsson's mobile phone division. Conceptually, it has always made a lot of sense to assert that "location is the defining element" in mobile (to reuse Loopt' CEO own words). However, execution has improved dramatically over the last year or so and a range of new services is emerging, not only location-based services (such as turn-by-turn directions, child trackers or traffic alerts) but also existing services improved by the ability to be located.

Jupiter will publish a new report on location-based services in the coming weeks. So if you want to brief me, chat about it or simply let me know your thoughts, please reach out to thusson at jupiterresearch dot com.

Thomas Husson | August 25, 2008, 10:49 AM
Digital Politics

I had read some of my colleagues comments about the importance of digital in the US Presidential elections: see here and here.

However, after a week in the US, I now realize how strong a component mobile has become in the digital communication campaign for Presidential elections. The name of Obama's running mate was to be announced via SMS and there were so many discussions about it in the main press, in the social media space and even in bars, that it made me think of how laggards French candidates have been a year ago. See my post on "Nicolas, Segolene & Francois sont dans un bateau" at that time.

In an interesting point of view in Les Echos, Franck Louvrier (media advisor to Nicolas Sarkozy) draws a comparison between Kennedy in the TV era in 1960 and Obama in today's social networking era. Looking at the number of French politicians' friends on Facebook or MySpace, it seems there is lots of work to be done to reconcile youth with politics...

I would be curious to see some US traffic stats on the mobile Internet in the coming months and the apps to be created. Google has kicked off. See here on Google's official blog.

Thomas Husson | August 11, 2008, 12:06 PM
European Mobile Forecast, 2008-2013

Phenomenal growth in mobile adoption and in SMS volumes over the last decade has resulted in very high expectations in the industry about the future of new mobile services, raising hopes that they will follow similar adoption rates.

Reality is they failed to do so until recently despite (too?) early launches at the beginning of the decade. However, drivers are now in place for mobile services to reach critical mass. This new report aims at quantifying the main market trends in Europe with a new set of data with detailled forecast for 17 European countries.

It will soon be followed by 2 new reports: Mobile Messaging Forecast and Mobile Media Forecast. For the first time they will include some activity levels (free audiences) to be able to seize the advertising opportunity as the industry is moving away from a pure paid content approach. We have also included flat-rate adoption rates (for mobile Internet tariff), a key metric to follow now that operators are bundling data options in their pay monthly tariffs (such as Orange with its Origami offering or Vodafone, see here). After voice (per minute), voice packages, SMS per units, SMS options, unlimited SMS bundled into voice, data options, unlimited data packages from 2005 onwards (Web'n'walk, X-series...). Now comes the time of voice+unlimited data and this will be a game changer, even if such a transition will not happen overnight.

Thomas Husson | July 30, 2008, 12:07 PM
Declining prices for mobile banner ads

Not sure why but there were some articles today about the deal between Virgin Media and mobile advertising firm 4th Screen deal.
4th Screen was already selling ads for Virgin Mobile, but it may well be an extension of the deal with 4th Screen collaborating with Virgin's in-house advertising unit ids to plan and execute cross-platform efforts spanning mobile, television and the web.

With o2 as main client, 4th Screen had gained lots of traction in the last few months in the UK market. Yahoo! runs mobile ads for 3, T-Mobile and Vodafone. Not many news from ScreenTonic (MSFT) and a few off-portal deals for Nokia and others...

According to my colleague Nate Elliott, "Banner prices are today artificially inflated by the scarcity of mobile advertising inventory". As mentionned several times here, expect those prices to go down over time, as inventory rises. This already started to happen when O2 active inventory was made available.

Thomas Husson | July 30, 2008, 11:39 AM
EA/Gameloft mobile revenues

Both Gameloft and EA have just released their financial results for q2 2008.

Revenues of the two main players in the mobile game arena are on par: 25.3M euros for Gameloft vs $44M for EA.

Interestingly, North America now accounts for a significant 29% of Gameloft worldwide revenues. The company is delivering an impressive list of games for new mobile platforms (iPhone, N-Gage,...) but also for consoles (a new revenue stream).

On the contrary, EA Mobile revenues are growing but represented still a limited 5.5% of EAs total revenue. Year on year, revenues increased by a significant 44% between q2 2007 and q2 2008.

I like this business because it is not as hyped as mobile music or mobile TV, but delivering more revenues than these 2 content categories combined...

Here is some press coverage of the Developer 08 mobile gaming conference.

Thomas Husson | July 30, 2008, 06:16 AM
Golden Frequencies - another good signal for telecom players

During my holiday break, the report from my colleague Laurence Meyer has been published: Terrestrial TV and the Digital Dividend: Assessing the Role of High Definition in the DTT Market. See here.

Following my previous post, no political decision has been made yet in France.

According to an interesting article (as always from Jamal Henni) in Les Echos, this should be the case before September. The article mentions that the CSA (media regularory body) has finally decided to postpone the launch of 3 new HD channels in order not to preempt the digital dividend.

Another good signal for the telecom sector...

Thomas Husson | July 10, 2008, 03:23 AM
Digital Dividend: the golden spectrum fight

UHF frequency band (470-862 Mhz) is currently being used by broadcasters (TV and radios). However, new spectrum resources freed by the digital switchover (move from analog to digital TV) will be re-allocated in the coming years in all European countries.

In France, administrative authorities have ruled until recently in favor of TV stations, particularly the largest groups (TF1, M6 and Canal+). Broadcasters intend to use the UHF band to increase the number of DTT channels, expand DTT coverage to 85 percent of the French population and to launch HDTV. My colleague, Laurence Meyer, will soon publish a piece on this complex issue.

However, telecom operators are looking for new spectrum to optimize the launch of mobile TV and nationwide mobile broadband. They are arguing that they should benefit from the digital dividend since:

• They had to pay to acquire spectrum (e.g. 3G licenses) contrary to broadcasters (who have specific obligations to assume though)

• Low frequencies (< 1GHz) are the best solution to economically roll out mobile networks. Mobile broadband being in the 2GHz band, it is more difficult to offer nationwide geographical and indoor coverage in a cost-effective way.

• With the forthcoming roll-out of high-speed Internet broadband in urban areas (France is leading FTTH or IPTV European investment plans), rural areas will be totally outpaced.

• DVB-H is optimized for the UHF band. It could also be launched in the L band, but not with a viable business model.

Operators’ lobbying actions try to demonstrate the stronger positive impact mobile will have on regional development and economic growth.

It will not be a reality before the full extinction of the analog TV signal, at best at the end of 2011 in France. However, this is a key strategic issue most governments are facing. Last November, ITU decided to allocate five frequency blocks, among which the 790-862MHz band, for use by future mobile telephony technologies. Since then lots of lobbying took place and some claimed 56MHz for telecom players would be enough. Some others say it should be at least 72MHz so that a competition between several players can take place. Whether 56 or 72 or more, many observers say it is too early to be able to quantify precisely the digital dividend.

So what?

Given there are strong economic, social, cultural and military (some frequency bands are used by the army) issues, such an allocation can only be decided at a political level. It will actually be decided in France by the Prime Minister before the end of July.

Given France's role in the ITU decision last November, the importance of mobile broadband, I would not be surprised the debate is ruled for once in favor of telcos, but let's wait and see 2 more weeks.

Will keep you posted when back from holiday.

Thomas Husson | July 09, 2008, 06:51 PM
Stop the hype with Mobile Wimax

The first time I really discovered Mobile Wimax was in 2004 when I attended a conference called "Wifi on steroids". This was 4 years ago.

2 years ago at 3GSM, it was viewed as a potential threat to 3G.

At this year's Mobile World Congress, the debate was more about Wimax being an alternative or even a complement to LTE.

So I am not sure I understand all the hype around Mobile Wimax.

Yes, there might be a case in the US (see my colleague's report here). Yes, I have followed the press with the never-ending story on Sprint / Clearwire and more recently about Intel / Google ambitions. Yes, I know that the rationale is that in developing countries with very limited fixed infrastructures and no 3G networks, it might be an opportunity and that it will bring costs down, particularly if volumes are there with large countries such as India.

Yes, I know that Clearwire has several licenses in Europe. I have also read the press saying that a network was live in the Netherlands, that Free (the second largest ISP in France) and Bollore may well be discussing with Google, Intel and some investment funds.

But I still don't buy that Wimax will play a significant role in the next 2-3 years in Western Europe.

- fixed Wimax may be a niche opportunity as a DSL substitute in some regions and mobile Wimax has probably a role to play for some specific segments such as mobile broadband (with embedded Wimax in laptops) but it will not compete with HSPA in the short term

- Indeed, HSPA is strongly supported by the industry and by operators in particular.

- Where are the Wimax phones?

- Many operators that had planned to launch have delayed or postponed their launches due to standardization and certification issues

- Many Wimax licenses prohibit mobile usage

So, if some alternative operators (e.g. Free) fail to obtain 3G spectrum and have enough money to invest beyond Fiber, this might be an alternative. But at this stage, it seems to me the Wimax opportunity is more likely to happen in America, AsiaPac or Africa.

So, in a nutshell, there is way too much hype about Mobile Wimax in Western Europe. Might well be a component of 4G in the next decade but I doubt it can achieve more before 2010.

Thomas Husson | July 04, 2008, 05:11 AM
Together we can do more

Orange's New Vision and Brand Campaign - Premiers in the UK tomorrow with its new “I am” film.

So exit "the Future is bright" and welcome the new vision expressed in the statement "together we can do more".

The rationale behind this global campaign is quite interesting. See excerpt from the PR: “The Orange brand was originally developed for one technology in one market – mobile telephones in the U.K” says Caroline Mille, Senior Vice President, Brand and Communications. Orange. “Today, just 14 years later, the brand now spans a range of technologies (internet, T.V content) and reaches consumers in 26 countries, covering very different cultures".

So contrary to some sarcastic comments I read in the UK press, this is not only about boosting the UK business but about positioning the company as the leading global provider of digital communications.

Interestingly and logically, Orange's claim that "Bringing people together is why Orange is here in the first place" is not that far from a certain "Connecting People".

France Telecom/Orange is entering a new stage of change, highlighted by recent news announced by the company:

- TeliaSonera's abandoned merger. "Too bad, we shall start by taking modest actions, which will not be on the front page of newspapers but rather in page 25" said CEO Didier Lombard. Indeed, there are few equivalent targets that could offer such a complementary geographic expansion, to the exception of Telenor. Strategically, it was also a way to be able to compete with the Internet giants and handset manufacturers with a larger installed base (handset procurement negotiations, return on investment on content/media investments, capacity to negotiate...). So now the company will continue its fight with other operators (Ghana is a good example) to acquire smaller companies in the developing world.

- new content strategy symbolized by the satelitte TV offering launched yesterday and the forthcoming Orange Foot channel. By the way, I attended a panel discussion at a conference from Daily les Echos the other day and was amazed by the agressive tone between Roverato (Orange) and Lafarge (Canal+). Not that common for such high-level executives.

- flaw of constant innovation with services just launched or announced in the coming months such as: Orange Musique Max, 3D TV (nice show off effect from the demo I saw - to be launched end 2009?), Warhammer Online (a MMORPG game expected in H2 2008), My personal TV adviser (easy and simple access to discover the VOD catalogue of 24/24 video - to be launched in 2009), Orange Maps (to le launched in q3 2008 in the UK, q4 in France and q1 2009 in Spain).

Thomas Husson | June 24, 2008, 02:40 AM
Nokia to acquire Symbian

Well, more precisely Nokia has announced it will acquire the approximately 52% of Symbian Limited shares it does not already own.

Simultaneously, a Symbian Foundation is to be established to provide a royalty-free open platform. Such initiative is announced to be backed by Sony Ericsson, LG, Samsung (the 3 manufacturers will have no more shares in Symbian and LG/Samsung are involved in Google's Android project) Motorola, and by operators such as NTT DoCoMo, Orange and Vodafone: more information is available here.

That's a way to counter the free open source approach that will be promoted by the backers of the Linux kernel. It will be interesting to see how the game will change between Microsoft, RIM, Apple, Linux-based environments and Symbian over the coming years. Who will enable the best user-experience and who will provide the most flexible solution?

With more than 200M devices shipped since launch in 2000, Symbian is the dominant player and has proved its capacity to provide stability, performance, security to its clients. Its main advantage today is its existing relatinships with operators and an existing installed base that developpers can already tap into.

Expect more to come today from my colleagues.

Thomas Husson | June 23, 2008, 08:57 AM
Nokia to acquire Plazes

Plazes is a start-up providing context-aware social-activity service.

The company headquartered in Zurich is quite small but its team has a good expertise in adding the elements of "place" and "time" to social networking.

From Loopt to Gypsii, a couple of players have embraced this trend, which seems key in the mobile space. I had a recent demo of Share on Ovi (with automatic updating of geo-tagged pics taken with your camera phone) and little by little, step by step, acquisition per acquition, Nokia's Internet approach is revealed.

I am really curious to see how 2 trends will evolve moving forward:

- when and to which extent will traditional social networking sites integrate those kind of features / services for their existing members?

- when and to which extent will traditional media companies integrate social networking features do their own websites?

Thomas Husson | June 17, 2008, 03:14 AM
AdMob Stats for Europe

Like Julie Ask, I am a regular reader of AdMob Mobile Metrics report. The forthcoming monthly report will have a focus on Western Europe stats. As stated by Admob, it only offers a snapshot of the data in their network. It is indeed dependent on the development of the off-portal business and of Admob's commercial presence but it clearly provides insight into trends in the mobile ecosystem. The strong US biais in worlwide stats (45% of ad requests) can easily be seen by the fact that the top 3 handset models are Motorola phones, but not that surprising to see the Razr so high (more than 100M sales worlwide).

Anyway a few interesting results for Europe:

- 2 European countries in the Top 10: UK and...Romania

- not surprisingly, Symbian / Nokia are the leading players. Sony Ericsson K800i is performing quite well in several countries.

- In countries where iPhone is sold through operator partnerships, iPhone is among the top devices by traffic: 2nd in France, 1st in Germany but not in the UK. Interestingly, the iPod touch ranks second in Germany

- the Hiptop (Danger device) is grabbing the #1 device spot in Netherlands commanding 8.7% share of traffic, and explaining disproportionate Windows Mobile market share

- despite very different market sizes, Sweden and Germany have almost the same number of requests on AdMob servers. Another confirmation that Sweden is a more sophisticated mobile market and that German data pricing needs some revamping.

Thomas Husson | June 16, 2008, 10:20 AM
Green Porno

Green porno represents an experiment in storytelling for digital platforms according to the Sundance website.

These short series about sex life of insects (?) have been specifically designed for the small screen.

Not a joke at all. Budget of 70,000 $. Conceived, written, directed by and featuring Isabelle Rossellini. Bought by the Sundance Institute (Robert Redford's festival). I missed that when in MWC in Barcelona but a recent Le monde article has an in interesting take on it.

Beyond the fun, this is a very interesting approach from a creative perspective.

More info here.

Thomas Husson | June 12, 2008, 04:35 AM
SFR Music

Echoing Mark's Mulligan take on Orange Musique max and the launch of Napster Mobile, unlimited music subscriptions are gaining ground and are welcomed by the music industry in the fight against piracy.

Despite the price (TDC in Denmark launched a similar but not equivalent offering for free last April), Orange's offering looks quite compelling and the 2-month free promotion is interesting to foster subscription to the brand new Origami Star package and discovery of mobile music. It is by the way another sign that mobile music aims at achieving various goals for telcos and is very far from being a pure content revenue play.

I think one key element is to make sure that once you upgrade your phone (of if it is lost or stolen), you will still be easily able to access your digital collection. This is true for many content categories (not only music) and for your own adress book and a key issue in maintainng satisfaction and loyalty among customers.

In the same vain, SFR just announced an equivalent offering (also priced at 12 euros a month but with a more limited catalogue) and they announced to have passed the 100,000 subscribers mark to SFR Music. It went almost unnoticed that 2 years ago, SFR had launched an unlimited offering! However, the context is here very different and the marketing approach is simply excellent. 2 weeks ago I attended a music gig in le Zenith (one of the largest concert halls in Paris), leaflets promoting SFR Music were distributed on every single seat:

The interesting point here is that SFR music subscribers will also get rewards such as 10% discounts on their preferred music gigs via SFR billeterie. SFR also partnered with La Cigale (another concert hall) where interesting concepts such as live events and mobile tickets are experienced.

As part of SFR's music strategy, it is also worth having a look at SFR Jeunes Talents (a website to promote and discover young artists).

Thomas Husson | June 10, 2008, 01:24 AM
iPhone 2 - a new business model

So the iPhone 2 has finally officially been announced. Lots has already been said on the device: A-GPS (but with no navigation software embedded), HSDPA-enabled (a must-have), Microsoft Exchange support, 2MP camera only (no auto-focus, no flash; btw not a big deal if there is no front facing video camera since the market is not mature for videocalling yet).

Julie's take on MusicMe and Michael's insistance on the software platform are interesting lenses to the announcement beyond the focus on hardware.

So the speculation now ends, as expressed in this BBC news article. Just to put figures in perspective, the 350,000 shipments in Europe referred to in this article come from announcements made by T-Mobile, Orange and O2 at the beginning of Januaury 08 when Apple had officially announced 4M sales. Since then, an additional 1.7M iPhones have been sold in Q1 2008. Again, to put figures in perspective HTC sold 11.8M devices in 2007 (including 2M HTC Touch), Nokia sold 38M NSeries (N95 sold in the range of 1M units in the UK alone), RIM sold 14M Blackberry, Symbian sold more than 70M devices. Bear with me, those figures are obviously not directly comparable since those smartphones have been released at different periods of the year and on different territories. The fact that the new iPhone will be distibuted worldwide by many operators is in that sense a good news. But anyway, the key idea is that with such a high price point iPhone V1 could not be a volume play in Europe where most operators subsidize devices.

It seems to me the real news comes from ATT. The US operator clearly stated the revenue sharing with Apple is now over. It means ATT will subsidize the device and look for volumes. In exchange of a 2 years' contract, ATT customers will get the new iPhone for $199 (8G0 version) or $299 (16Go) with a mimimun unlimited voice/data bundle of $70. As pointed out by my colleague Ian Fogg, one can wonder how European operators will translate $ into euros. O2 has just announced some aggressive UK prices (the 8GB model will cost just £99 on a new £30 per month tariff - cheapest tariff has dropped by GBP 5)*.

I have always wondered to what extent Apple could succeed without embracing the traditional mobile eco-system. With the end of the exclusivity approach in several territories, the end of the revenue-share model with ATT and the new subsidy approach, it seems I now have my answer.

There is now a range of very cool devices that will be available in the coming months: iPhone 2, Nokia N96, Samsung Omnia (announced yesterday :-)), HTC Touch Diamond, Sony Ericsson Xperia, Blackberry Thunder...It will be very interesting to see how successful they are.

* UPDATED: since then 02 announced the iPhone 3G 8GB for free for customers paying 45 GBP and T-Mobile Germany annnounced it at 1 euro for customers signing-in for 2 years to a 69 euros service

Thomas Husson | June 06, 2008, 04:23 PM
Where will you watch the Euro 2008?

on such a screen?

I was ironic about it 2 years ago at the time of the World Cup.

Tomorrow, the European football cup will start and last until the end of June. Several operators will try to leverage the event to launch DVB-H. This is the case for Swisscom and 3 Austria: see here

Beyond Austria and Switzerland, KPN (the leading Dutch operator) started broadcasting 10 mobile TV channels this week, available for 10 euros a month. Only 2 handsets are available at launch: LG KB620 and the Samsung P960 (499 euros).

This reinforces my thinking that current commercial launches suffer from a limited range of devices in terms of brand, price, and form factor.

Sports events are good marketing catalysts to raise awareness rather than use. Indeed, they are social events you want to share on a large screen. I would be personally very very disappointed if I had no other choices but to watch France-Italy on my mobile phone...However, I see the benefits to be alerted via SMS when a goal is scored or to watch short videos of the goals.

What if live TV was simply a way to up-sell and cross-sell time-shifting and place-shifting concepts that seem more relevant on the move?

There is clearly a need for well-known channels and programmes to educate the market. This is the reason why French audiovisual regulator CSA has awarded DVB-H personal mobile TV broadcast licences to 11 existing channels and only to 2 new entrants: France Telecom’s Orange Sports and film director Luc Besson’s EuropaCorp TV. I have few doubts the latter will be the most creative one and that it will fit well to the small screen with short formats that meet the need of an early adopter audience.

If you want to know more about this topic, see here our latest report: "Mobile Video and Live TV: Defining the Right Balance Between Two Complementary Offerings".

Thomas Husson | May 22, 2008, 07:18 PM
Mobile Monday Shangai "house rules"

If you guys are in Shangai, I would advise you to attend the next Mobile Monday there: May 26th, from 7pm to 9.30pm at Kathleen’s 5 restaurant and bar (325 Nanjing West Road, inside Museum of Modern Art, angle with Huang Pi Road).

Reading the 10 "house rules", looks like a fun experience:

1 - Friends, family and other animals not allowed. This is not a social gathering.

2 - Kathleen 5 has a great Happy Hours offer. We don’t. Alcohol is limited, please drink moderately

3- No smoking please. Smoking kills. Smoking and dull presentations kill faster.

4- Silence is golden, except for the speakers. Please give them a chance to talk.

5- Please pre-register online. Seats are limited (literally!!) and so are free drinks coupons (more importantly!!).

6- Don’t register if you know you won’t come or you are only 10% sure. You would end up taking someone else’s seat at the event.

7- If you meet our sponsors from Tekes/FinChi, don’t forget to thank them. We need the money.

8- Carry enough name cards, you never know who you will meet (could launch your acting career)

9- Momo is an open community – Don’t hesitate to challenge our speakers and fuel the discussion. Besides, you might be our next speaker, so don’t hesitate to suggest your favorite topic, and let’s make it an event.

10 - Lastly, don’t piss Bruno off. He is a Frenchman! C’est la vie.