Etisalat Offers Data and Voice Bundle to Dubai Taxi Drivers

Hala, the Dubai taxi joint venture between the Roads & Transport Authority (RTA) and Careem, has partnered with UAE operator Etisalat to offer its cab drivers a data bundle and international minutes package. Around 25,000 taxi drivers in Dubai will benefit from the year-long postpaid package, which can be activated on any existing or new Etisalat UAE mobile number. 

The offer began on 10 February and is one of several initiatives by Hala to improve the lives of cab drivers through partnerships under the guidance of the RTA. Hala is also helping drivers by providing advanced mapping and journey-planning tools. By way of this in-car technology, drivers can have access to a wider passenger base and get to their next pick-up in the shortest time possible.

We think this partnership between an MNO, Etisalat, and a taxi consortium is an excellent example of a public-spirited private-sector collaboration in the mobile marketplace. The in-car solutions, which make it easier for taxi drivers to conduct their business, use technology that is requires mobile connectivity to function. So it is a natural extension of Hala’s previous initiatives to offer a special package of mobile data and voice minutes for the drivers to use for their smartphones, which they also use as an integral part of their work process.

The fact that the package is offered on a postpaid basis will tend to keep the drivers in Etisalat’s ecosystem on a longer-term basis. That will also help Hala to maintain consistency in its relationship with its drivers. Finally, it should be noted that the number of taxi drivers in Dubai, 25,000, is quite substantial and therefore constitute an important potential customer base for the operator. As long as the price is right, it should do well for the operator in terms of customer retention and acquisition.

Tarifica is the global leader in monitoring and analyzing telecom pricing. Covering hundreds of operators in every region of the globe, Tarifica’s databases of mobile and fixed line data and voice tariffs are among the largest and most in-depth in the world. Tarifica is also a leading publisher of benchmark and other pricing reports, and its analysts are recognized authorities in the telecom industry, relied upon by operators and businesses worldwide for pricing insight and guidance.  

To learn more about Tarifica, please visit www.tarifica.com 

Deutsche Telekom and UC Berkeley to Present Earthquake Warning System

At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, held from February 22–25, German-based international operator Deutsche Telekom and the University of California, Berkeley, plan to present an early-warning earthquake protection system called MyShake. The jointly developed app leverages the built-in accelerometers in smartphones, taking advantage of their ability to sense motion. Data collected by many phones in a given area is aggregated and analyzed by cloud-based software, which determines, based on the GPS locations of the phones in question, whether enough seismic activity is taking place to indicate an earthquake. The partners claim that MyShake is sensitive enough to record earthquakes of at least magnitude 5—strong enough to do damage—within a radius of 10 kilometers. The MyShake app runs in the background on a smartphone, using very little power, so it can be monitoring earth movement day and night. The hope of DT and UC Berkeley is that eventually a worldwide network of smartphones running MyShake will be established. We find this to be a very innovative idea and one that incarnates a quality unique to mobile communications technology—its ability to link people together in productive ways. MyShake can achieve real utility only if a critical mass of users has the app installed on their phones, because this kind of data sharing needs large-scale participation in order to bear fruit. However, unlike mobile advertising, which is also a form of data sharing (in which companies harvest information about consumption from huge numbers of consumers), this seismic initiative does not promise to generate revenue. It appears not to impose any great cost—or possibly any cost at all—on the mobile customers whose phones would run the app, but the mobile operators that would provide the service (assuming that DT were to sell or license it to other operators) would most likely not be able to monetize it to any significant extent. However, the idea of linking people all over the world to help protect each other against natural disaster is appealing enough that it could very well give operators a public image boost and shore up customer loyalty and goodwill. In any case, we find the idea of leveraging a basic functionality of smartphones to do a new job and creating a network out of those phones in a non-invasive way to be very thought-provoking. It points to the fact that even as mobile services are taken for granted and sometimes even thought to have reach their maximum potential, innovative systems such as MyShake remind us that there is much untapped potential in these technologies, and that that potential can be directed toward human welfare in the largest sense.

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Global Data Traffic to Approach 197,000 PB by 2019

Data traffic generated by smartphones, feature phones and tablets will approach 197,000 petabytes by 2019, with average monthly data usage by smartphone and tablet users doubling, according to a recent study. The research also showed that only 41 percent of the data generated will be carried over cellular networks by 2019, with the majority of mobile data traffic offloaded to Wi-Fi networks. Video traffic over smartphones will increase by nearly eight times between 2014 and 2019. Video currently accounts for around 60 percent of global IP traffic. These findings are interesting in light of the “Wi-Fi first” phenomenon. Within the next five years, it appears that more data will go over Wi-Fi networks than over cellular. We are seeing a blurring of the boundaries between traditional cellular and Wi-Fi, for voice as well as data, aided by the proliferation of OTT service providers. Mobile operators must take note of this trend and devise ways to meet the challenge, including creating their own Wi-Fi networks.

Tarifica is the global leader in monitoring and analyzing telecom pricing. Covering hundreds of operators in every region of the globe, Tarifica’s databases of mobile and fixed line data and voice tariffs are among the largest and most in-depth in the world. Tarifica is also a leading publisher of benchmark and other pricing reports, and its analysts are recognized authorities in the telecom industry, relied upon by operators and businesses worldwide for pricing insight and guidance. To contact an analyst at Tarifica,click here.

Orange Kenya, CIC Insurance Launch Orange Bima

Orange Kenya, the country’s third-largest mobile operator, has partnered with CIC Insurance to launch Orange Bima, a service that enables the operator’s subscribers to insure their mobile phones up to a value of KES 40,000 (US $453.77) and also to sign up for life insurance that will pay out up to KES 100,000 (US $1134.43). Bundled together, the two insurance policies have an annual premium cost of KES 2,000 (US $22.69). The device policy insures mobile devices against theft and damage resulting from certain situations, and the life insurance policy covers accidental and natural death. Subscribers may purchase the life insurance policy without the device policy and will be able to pay for their premiums for both policies by using their airtime.

Kenya, which has the largest economy in east and central Africa as well as a minority wealthy population that lives in the country’s urban areas, still has 38 percent of its people living in poverty. In such developing countries, mobile operators have assumed a role far beyond communication providers. With Orange Bima, the operator may be able to increase the number of Kenyans who have insurance coverage—especially life insurance. CIC Insurance Group will benefit by tapping into Orange’s subscriber base and offering them its services. In the world’s developing nations that have under-banked and under-insured populations, yet growing telecommunications sectors, it is not surprising to see mobile operators partnering with other industries to bring these services to subscribers. If MNO customers view the offerings as convenient and affordable, the services will drive additional revenue for the operator, as well.

 

“In emerging markets, smartphones, including high-end devices, are now being seen as such vital parts of people’s lives that they are choosing to insure them. While Orange Bima offers its subscribers a life insurance policy on its own, the fact that the operator bundles life insurance with device insurance indicates that mobile devices play such a large role in subscribers’ lives that they cannot afford to be without them.”

Kamely Hayes,

Managing Editor, The Tarifica Alert

The above item appeared in a recent issue of The Tarifica Alert, a weekly resource that analyzes noteworthy developments in the telecoms industry from around the world. To access all of the latest articles and issues:  http://www.tarifica.com/TarificaAlert.aspx

 

More Than 70% of Consumers Use Mobile Phones for Work.

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Mozilla to Launch Firefox Smartphones in India

Mozilla will start selling the first Firefox OS smartphone models in India in July, according to reports. The devices will be available at retail prices of US $50 or less. The U.S.-based software company launched its smartphones in July 2013 in Latin America and Europe and to date has sold about 1 million units worldwide. Low-cost chips and an open-source operating system help keep the phones’ prices very low.

India is a very promising market for super-low-priced smartphones. While customers’ budgets are still tight there, on average, use of mobile data is rising rapidly, stimulated by operators’ investments in enhanced networks. According to a recent report, Vodafone India has seen a 230 percent increase in 3G adoption in the country’s rural markets. In order to avail themselves of the opportunities offered by 3G networks, rural customers need smartphones, and with its Firefox phones, Mozilla is well positioned to meet their needs.

The above item appeared in a recent issue of Tarifica's "The Story of The Week", a weekly report that analyzes noteworthy developments in the telecoms industry from around the world. For past issues or to learn more about The Story of The Week :  http://www.tarifica.com/storyoftheweek.aspx

Verizon Wireless to Launch LTE Service for Prepaid Customers

Leading U.S. operator Verizon Wireless is scheduled to begin including LTE service with its prepaid plans starting on 17 July. The Verizon Allset prepaid plan starts at US $45.00 for smartphones, which includes unlimited voice/SMS and 500 MB of data. Customers can purchase Bridge Data packs at US $5.00 for 500 MB, US $10.00 for 1 GB and US $20.00 for 3 GB. Additionally, Verizon has been running a promotion which offers customers who sign up for auto pay an additional 500 MB of data. Combined, a customer could have unlimited talk and text plus 4 GB of data for US $65.00—which is significantly less expensive than its postpaid More Everything plan, which includes the same services. Verizon Wireless is the final US Tier 1 operator to include LTE service with its prepaid offers. AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile have made this service available since early 2013. Verizon Wireless has yet to announce if its prepaid plans will have their maximum LTE capped (as is the case with AT&T) or if they will run at the network’s top available speeds.

This announcement can be seen as further evidence of the saturation of the U.S. mobile market. Verizon had long focused almost exclusively on driving customers into postpaid 24-month contract plans, relying on its superior network reliability to compensate for its higher prices. While this strategy will still generally remain in place (Verizon’s prepaid plans will still be more expensive than those of its rivals), it appears that the operator has been forced to become much more flexible. Compared with the first quarter of 2013, Verizon saw its postpaid subscriber adds decline by 20 percent and its prepaid customer adds down 76 percent. Beyond the general saturation at the high end of the U.S. market, a confluence of factors has worked against the operator: the availability of better preowned smartphones that do not necessitate operator subsidies, increasing consumer discomfort with committing to long contracts and aggressive smaller operators (particularly T-Mobile) willing to push the envelope in terms of price and included plan features. It appears that its increasing marginalization in the more dynamic prepaid market finally forced Verizon Wireless to risk cannibalizing its own postpaid revenues by offering LTE-enabled prepaid plans.

The above item appeared in a recent issue of The Tarifica Alert, a weekly resource that analyzes noteworthy developments in the telecoms industry from around the world. To access all of the latest articles and issues:  http://www.tarifica.com/TarificaAlert.aspx

U.K. Digital Banking Transactions Worth £1 Billion Per Day

Britons are conducting mobile and internet banking transactions worth almost £1 billion (US $1.7 billion) a day, according to a new report from the British Bankers’ Association. Digital banking is now used for transactions worth £6.4 billion (US $11 billion) a week, up from £5.8 billion (US $9.9 billion) in 2013. Banking apps for mobiles and tablets have now been downloaded more than 14.7 million times, a rise of 2.3 million since January 2014. Spending on contactless cards is expected to rise to £6.1 million (US $10.4 million) a week in 2014, up from £3.2 million (US $5.5 million) in 2013. An estimated 77 percent of U.K. consumers use online or mobile banking at least once a month.

While the developing world has been the leader in using mobile technology for the handling of money, the developed world is enthusiastically following suit. In sophisticated, affluent markets like the U.K., smartphones and other devices are increasingly being used not only for the managing of bank accounts but for direct payments. These statistics speak eloquently to the point that even in countries whose populations are hardly “underbanked,” mobile services and money are now intimately intertwined. 

The above item appeared in a recent issue of Tarifica's "The Story of The Week", a weekly report that analyzes noteworthy developments in the telecoms industry from around the world. For past issues or to learn more about The Story of The Week :  http://www.tarifica.com/storyoftheweek.aspx