Bouygues Telecom Expands Service for Voice and SMS Over Wi-Fi

French mobile operator Bouygues Telecom said that its voice and SMS over Wi-Fi services are now available more widely, at no extra charge, as the list of compatible smartphones has expanded to include more models. The operator began offering voice over Wi-Fi (VoWiFi) to its enterprise customers in September 2017 and first introduced SMS over Wi-Fi on selected handsets last year. The two services are now available to all the operator’s mobile customers and on more phone brands, including Apple, Samsung, Huawei/Honor, Sony and OnePlus.

Once customers have activated voice/SMS over Wi-Fi, they can call or send/receive text messages (but not MMS) over any Wi-Fi network. This happens automatically when mobile coverage is not available or too weak. Any calls and texts are treated according to the allowance included in the customer’s mobile plan. 

Wi-Fi’s utility in terms of filling in when cellular signals are weak or unavailable is well known, of course, but that applies to data use in most cases. Voice and SMS over Wi-Fi is far less prevalent and requires special device compatibility to work. Bouygues has apparently determined that its initial offering of the service was a success and sees a greater market for it.

The rollout of the service was to enterprise clients only, which makes sense as a first foray because enterprises are likely to have large numbers of employees working in complex structures where cellular signal may be blocked. Alternately, employees in the field may encounter challenging conditions that impede cellular service in other ways. In either case, these employees would still need to continue communicating with each other and with outside clients; therefore voice and text over Wi-Fi is an excellent backstop.

Having seen that it worked well, presumably, and found favor with business customers, Bouygues now is ready to offer it to consumers, as well. The increase in the number of compatible devices is a key factor in this expansion, because while a large company may be willing to invest in devices to issue to its employees, consumers inevitably will be making diverse choices in this regard. Not until a critical mass of different devices are compatible will it make sense to offer voice and SMS over Wi-Fi. This, apparently, has finally occurred, so the time is ripe for a consumer-targeted expansion.

As far as pricing is concerned, voice and SMS over Wi-Fi is not analogous to Wi-Fi data. Consumers may be disappointed if they imagine that voice over Wi-Fi is free (if one has unlimited data) or only counts against their data allowance. Bouygues intends to charge for calls and texts sent over the Wi-Fi service—or count them against voice and text allowances—as if they were made over cellular. As long as the operator describes and markets the service appropriately so that customers are aware that the purpose of the service is to ensure connectivity rather than to save money, this should not be a problem. 

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 

Sunrise Launches Daily Unlimited Plan

Swiss operator Sunrise is extending its unlimited mobile offer to prepaid customers, offering unlimited communications for 24 hours for CHF 2.50 (US $2.57). This includes unlimited calls, SMS and MMS in Switzerland, as well as unlimited data at up to 300 Mbps. The 24-hour period starts whenever the user initiates the first call, text or data connection. Sunrise said the offer will work well for tourists and other customers who may not use their phone everyday.

Sunrise also introduced new mobile broadband offers for users of laptops, tablets or mobile Wi-Fi hotspots, replacing its previous Take Away Freedom subscriptions. All three new plans come with unlimited data, while the price varies according to speed, at CHF 9.00 (US $9.25) per month for up to 2 Mbps, CHF 19.00 (US $19.52) for up to 10 Mbps and CHF 49.00 (US $50.34) for the maximum 300 Mbps plus 1 GB of roaming data in its Region 1, which includes Europe, the United States and Canada. No minimum contract is required with the plans, and customers with a Freedom or Home subscription receive a 10 percent discount. In addition to a mobile hotspot from CHF 1.00 (US $1.03), Sunrise also offers a SIM for CHF 9.00 (US $9.25) per month that allows customers to use their smartphone plan on another device.

With these offers, Sunrise is responding to increased consumer demand for both flexibility and generous data. Unlimited offers have traditionally been aimed at higher-end postpaid customers. Offering unlimited calls and data not only to prepaid customers but on an ultra-short-term, essentially pay-as-you-go basis is unusual, and appears to address the needs of a niche demographic—tourists and travelers who will not need the service long-term or even every day during their trip, but who will use their smartphones heavily when they do use them. As an alternative to international roaming charges (for users from outside the EU, of course, after the end of such surcharges there in June), Sunrise’s offer seems like a very good one, with the daily price low enough not to be a deterrent to use.

Sunrise also extends the unlimited concept to long-term plans, at least as far as data is concerned, and again with flexibility in mind, as embodied in the no-contract provision and in the SIM offer allowing the plan features to be accessible from another device.  

Since unlimited data offers are a gamble for operators, there is an incentive to hedge them in some way. In this case, we wonder whether the strategy of differentiating the plan levels by data speed is a sound one. The trend in the worldwide mobile marketplace is toward ever-greater speed, and consumers increasingly use apps and services (such as streaming entertainment content) that demand very high data speeds. Therefore, lower prices contingent on lower speeds may not be particularly appealing to the targeted users—even if those speeds are adequate for most purposes. 

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 

GSMA: Almost Half of Mobile Users Talk and Text Only

Nearly half the world’s mobile phone users still only use their devices to make voice calls and send SMS messages, according to a report from GSMA Intelligence. The Global Mobile Engagement Index classifies users into four categories, from “Aficionados” (most engaged), down through “Pragmatists” and “Networkers” down to “Talkers” (least engaged.)
 
In 2016 the Talkers—those who only use their mobile phones to make voice calls and send SMS—accounted for 47 percent of adult mobile phone owners worldwide. However, the GSMA predicts that this segment will shrink to 29 percent of the total by 2030, as users in the developing world become more engaged with data use and advances in mobile technology make it more available and affordable.
 
The GSMA’s survey, which took in 56 global markets representing 80 percent of the world’s population, shows that the three highest-scoring countries in terms of mobile engagement in 2016 were South Korea, Qatar and the United States.

 
This report from the GSMA is very interesting and valuable as a reminder of where we are in the mobile market, and it suggests some strategies for operators. For all the talk of the mobile data revolution sweeping the globe—including in these pages—the report makes it strikingly clear that uptake of data services has barely broken the 50 percent mark.
 
Of course, that figure is an average that masks a great imbalance between developed and developing markets. However, the report indicates that the dichotomy may not be as stark as some might suppose: For example, it found that even in France and the United States, SMS is still more frequently used than IP messaging such as Apple’s iMessage or OTT solutions such as Skype and WhatsApp.
 
In our view, the GSMA statistic points to two paths ahead for mobile operators: Of course MNOs (and device manufacturers, too) will and should continue to innovate in order to make data services more affordable and available, continue to increase 4G/LTE network coverage, and keep on incentivizing customers to take up data use and then increase their usage. On the other hand, operators should not neglect the “Talkers.” Even though the report predicts that their ranks will shrink to a 29 percent global share by 2030, that is still a large number, and 2030 is still a long way off. Therefore, catering to the needs of the talk-and-text-only user should remain an important priority for MNOs now and in the future.
 
Not only are traditional mobile services far from dead, they are the only services for a large enough cohort of users that operators must tailor plans to them and maintain services for them—including methods for accessing popular content such as Facebook without a data connection—even as they encourage them to upgrade to data.

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 

Free Telecom for Vodafone Portugal While 3 UK Asks Britons to Turn Phones Off

Vodafone Portugal is offering free communications on 24 and 25 December for its customers. They can choose one of two options: voice, SMS and MMS communications or free data for internet access. The offer is valid for the first 500,000 individual customers and must be activated by 21 December in the My Vodafone App, or by calling the number 1275. Meantime, 3 UK has launched a marketing campaign encouraging Britons to not use their phones at all on Christmas Day. The “Go Cold Turkey” campaign will run on social media, urging people to “properly enjoy the wonders of a delicious Christmas dinner, paper hats and watching TV repeats with loved ones,” the mobile operator said. A short film produced by the company—viewable on Three’s YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter pages—speaks of “a Britain afflicted with extreme device addiction” and shows the extremes to which people will go in order to use their smartphones, such as unplugging the Christmas lights to charge a phone.

 
 

Christmas has traditionally been a time for creative and generous promotions from mobile operators, who offer discounts and free services in celebration of the holiday. Such initiatives can increase customer satisfaction and loyalty and thereby boost retention—while costing the operators relatively little. This season, we were struck by the sharp contrast between two approaches by two operators in two different countries. While Vodafone Portugal takes the tried and true road of offering free communications—with a choice of either voice and text or data—3 UK is actually encouraging Britons—and not just its subscribers but all Britons—not to use telecom services at all during the holiday.

 

It certainly seems counter-intuitive and even self-destructive for a telecom operator to try and inhibit use of its core services, but arguably 3’s strange initiative could actually serve a similar purpose to that of the Portuguese promotion. By identifying “device addiction” as a social ill and making a token gesture toward fighting it, 3 UK will potentially accrue positive feelings from customers, which could have the effect of bolstering the company’s image and brand and thus helping with retention and even acquisition. And from a different angle, it is possible that taking a one- or two-day hiatus from mobile services could have the effect of increasing customers’ appetite for those services after the hiatus is over and end up driving up net consumption.

 

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 

Be-Bound Offers Web Access Without Data Service

French startup Be-Bound says it has found a way to allow smartphone owners to continue using their internet and connected apps where there is no 3G or 4G/LTE coverage. The company states that it offers “the first solution that allows users to stay connected anywhere there is a working phone signal. We use the SMS network as an alternative transport layer to bring users a true app experience when there is no internet network and reach even the most remote regions.” Be-Bound has developed a patented compression algorithm to reduce the data traffic generated by its apps. “Even when our e-mail app is working with 3G/4G, users consume up to 5 times less data than when using standard e-mail,” the company’s website states, adding that the start-up is opening its technology to mobile app and IoT developers who want to reach wider populations.    Solutions to allow internet access to non-3G/4G users and even to feature-phone users are nothing particularly new. Be-Bound’s technology, however, promises a rich experience akin to true smartphone high-speed data. While other solutions have been marketed mainly to customers in developing markets who do not yet have smartphones and data plans but still wish to connect to Facebook and surf the web—with the hope of encouraging them to eventually adopt data use—Be-Bound’s system seems targeted to smartphone and data users who experience spotty access to high-speed signals, a problem that occurs in many areas, developed and developing alike. Whether or not its technology delivers these impressive results, of course, remains to be seen, but the promised increase in data efficiency, if fulfilled, could resound beyond the current specific application.

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

Tuenti Ecuador Launches Referral Offer

Spain-based international operator Telefónica has announced the launch of a friends’ referral scheme to help boost uptake of its Tuenti Movil MVNO service in Ecuador. Under the offer, any Tuenti prepaid customer can access their account online and send an invitation to friends via email, Facebook or Twitter. The friend who sets up a Tuenti account and as the friend who made the referral each receives US $5.00 in promotional credit. Tuenti Ecuador offers a series of data-focused prepaid plans, ranging from a 7-day bundle with 100 MB of data, 15 minutes of calls and 15 SMS for US $5.00 to a 30-day bundle with 400 MB of data, 60 minutes of calls and 60 SMS for US $15.00.

  

The MVNO market in Ecuador is in its infancy; when Telefónica, which operates under the brand name of Movistar there, launched Tuenti there in June 2015, it was the first MVNO in the country. There are currently no independent MVNOs in Ecuador. So while Tuenti has no direct competitors, it still needs to establish itself in a marketplace that is unused to such offerings. In order to distinguish itself from Movistar’s other offerings, as well as from those of competitor MNOs, Tuenti has emphasized the social media angle with unlimited zero-rated WhatsApp and Facebook usage. This brand identity harmonizes well with a socially driven promotion campaign such as this friends’ referral scheme, which operates via social media, as well as email. We believe that it is particularly persuasive, in that the amounts of credit received for a referral is quite large in the context of Tuenti’s prepaid tariffs, since it is equivalent to a week’s worth of services. In addition, the fact that both the referred friend and the one making the referral get a credit makes the offer even more attractive.

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

Messaging Revenues to Decline to US $112.9 Billion in 2019

The global messaging market will decline to US $112.9 billion in 2019 from US $113.5 billion in 2014,according to a report. However, overall messaging traffic is expected to double by 2019. This trend is being driven by OTT messaging applications such as WhatsApp and Line,which have seen a threefold increase in message traffic to 100 trillion by 2019 globally from almost 31 trillion in 2014.Revenue generated from each OTT message is forecast be less than 1 percent of that generated by SMS and MMS in 2019.  

While the free or low-cost offerings of OTT messaging providers are causing users to switch from SMS and MMS, OTTs are having trouble generating revenue with these services, and SMS and MMS still drive most of the messaging revenue worldwide, even though the sector is shrinking. In particular, MNOs are benefiting from growth in the A2P (application-to person) sector.To date, OTT providers have not been able to derive enough revenue from advertising, and therefore must devise new strategies, such as offering diversified services beyond simple messaging; an example is mobile payments. 

Tarifica is the 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. Click here to contact a Tarifica Analyst.

Polish Tabloid Launches MVNO Fakt Mobile

Polish tabloid Fakt announced that it plans to launch an MVNO called Fakt Mobile, which will run on the P4 Play network. A starter package will be attached to the newspaper on 11 June, and each Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, the newspaper will print codes allowing free calls, SMS and data on the Fakt Mobile network. MVNOs have been taking an increasing share of the Polish mobile market, and the sector is getting more and more crowded. We believe that a newspaper is a good candidate to launch an MVNO, because it has a pre-existing potential subscriber base in its print subscribers. Also, the newspaper is an excellent medium for advertising promotions, which can help build up the subscriber base and reinforce customer loyalty.

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. Click here to contact a Tarifica Analyst.

DiGi Wins Most Top Value Awards

In the most recent Tarifica Score™ rankings of consumer value, DiGi, Malaysia’s third largest mobile operator, was awarded the top honors for offering the best consumer value on mobile plans.

Tarifica Scores are based on an algorithm that ranks mobile plans by their consumer value. “Top Value Plan” awards are issued to the highest scoring plan in each of 10 price-based market segments. Additionally, the best overall ‘with phone’ and SIM-only plans are recognized as the “Top Values in Country.”

Digi defeated its larger rivals earning the “Top Value in Country” award for ‘with phone’ plans and winning an impressive eight of 10 “Top Value Plan” awards. Digi’s plans simply include greater volumes of minutes, SMS and particularly data than similarly priced plans from competing operators. Further many of its plans include features like bundled iDiGi apps that provide substantial benefits to many consumers.

While not performing as well as Digi, Celcom still had a solid showing, earning the “Top Value in Country” award for SIM-only plans and two “Top Value Plan” awards. Although Celcom did not have winning plans at as many price points as Digi, its highest scoring plans – the First Prime 128 and First with Max Up All 135 – were among the best plans in the market. The high consumer value of these plans was driven by their large included data volumes, coupled with Celcom’s average download speeds which are the fastest in Malaysia.

Compared with its smaller rivals, plans from Malaysia’s largest mobile operator, Maxis, simply did not offer competitive consumer value. The operator did not win any “Top Value Plan” awards — meaning at every price point there are plans available from other operators that provide consumers with better value. “Maxis’ plans tend to include significantly less data than similarly priced plans from DiGi and Celcom. Moreover, Maxis offers fewer value added features and promotions than its competitors.

The Tarifica Score is an algorithm that quantifies and ranks postpaid mobile plans by their consumer value. It weighs a plan’s included services (minutes, SMS, data, etc.) against its costs and the operator’s network strength. Scores range from 0 to 100. The Tarifica Score has been used to evaluate and rank mobile plans around the world.

“In today’s mobile marketplace, consumers are flooded with hundreds of plan variations and constantly shifting promotions and deals — the majority of which come with different costs and services, and access networks of differing strengths.  Consumers can use Tarifica Scores to help cut through the clutter and identify those plans in every market segment that offer the best value for the money,” Tarifica Program Manager, Will Watts.

Tarifica has been the leading provider of telecom pricing information for close to four decades. It maintains the most robust, in-depth and up-to-date pricing database in the industry, which includes mobile and fixed line rates from over 400 operators in 85 countries, as well as historical data going back to 1997. Tarifica also produces reports, surveys, publications and custom analyses. Its clients include operators, regulators, enterprises and consultants in every region of the globe. 

To contact an analyst at Tarifica, click here.

       

Mobile Money

We have written extensively in our weekly publication, The Tarifica Alert, about the explosion of mobile money services in developing economies, beginning with the launch of M-Pesa in Kenya, and about how developed economies are now playing mobile money catch-up, with ventures forming to try to incentivize the relatively affluent to use these services. The growth of the mobile money ecosystems is playing out very differently in these different economies. In developing nations, mobile money was initially introduced as a simple money transfer scheme, targeted at individuals who have no access to banks but own a mobile phone, and furthermore trust their mobile operators more than they would ever trust a bank. Using SMS, with which they are very familiar, “unbanked” individuals are able to transfer money to similarly unbanked family members, friends and businesses, many of which are used to dealing only in cash. The mobile operator charges a small fee for each transaction and holds money, or airtime, in accounts for their customers. In Kenya, less than 10 years after its launch, Safaricom’s M-Pesa service is being used by more than 70 percent of the population and has completely disrupted the financial landscape, as banks have formed partnerships with mobile operators to get into the game and offer their more traditional financial services, including credit offerings, to this newly accessible population. Leveraging the phenomenal success of M-Pesa, Seattle- and Nairobi-based software company Kopo Kopo has built a merchant platform that includes mobile payments and is now in widespread use by merchants, schools, restaurants and other entities, further changing the way business is conducted in emerging economies. A similar story is playing out in Latin American countries such as El Salvador and Honduras, as mobile operators introduce the unbanked to very basic financial services. We will likely see banks and retailers getting involved there as well, intending to capture a piece of this market by offering more traditional financial services. By contrast, in developed nations, most individuals are working with banks already, be it through checking and savings accounts or credit cards. As many of these individuals value convenience and efficiency above all, mobile payment technologies will only succeed if they can make life easier. For the less tech-savvy consumer, encouragement may initially come in the form of consortiums of MNOs and retailers offering some value-added aspect—either loyalty points, bonus, or easy payment method. We have seen this with the NFC City Berlin launch and in the U.S. with the recent roll-out of the American Express loyalty program in partnership with AT&T, Macy’s, Rite Aid and others. We also think the speed and convenience offered by mobile wallet apps like Apple Pay and Google Wallet will encourage traditional credit card users to switch to mobile phone payments. We are beginning to see combinations of players offering different payment approaches, some of which, like the Merchant Customer Exchange are trying to circumvent the 2 to 3 percent fees retailers must pay credit card companies when customers swipe their cards. We predict that these efforts will begin to shake up the strong hold credit card companies have on the retail market. At the same time, third-party apps have been seizing the opportunity to provide mobile money services to a more tech-savvy younger generation and we think these apps will change the way the younger generation views traditional checks, credit cards and savings accounts. For example, the app Venmo allows users to transfer money to friends and keep a balance in their Venmo account to cover future expenses; many users are doing just that, instead of “cashing out” and transferring the payment into their bank account. We expect to see many more mobile payment approaches that will disrupt how we use traditional financial services.

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.

Vodafone Spain Doubles Data Allowance in Yu Prepaid Plans

Vodafone Spain launched a promotion that gives its Super Yuser and Mega Yuser subscribers double the amount of data for 30 days. In order to take advantage of this promotion, users need to sign up via Vodafone’s Yu app before 31 March. The Super Yuser plan currently includes 1.2 GB of mobile data, 60 voice minutes and 60 SMS and costs €15.00 (US $16.28) per month. Mega Yuser, which is priced at €20.00 (US $21.71), has 1.6 GB of data, 100 minutes and unlimited SMS. Both plans also include unlimited on-net minutes and SMS.

As we have reported, more and more operators are not only expanding the value of their postpaid plans but are also including more value-added services in their prepaid offers. Some prepaid packages are now just as attractive as long-term postpaid subscriptions in terms of such services. Additionally, mobile subscribers prefer flexibility, especially when it comes to contract lengths, and since prepaid offers do not require long-term contact commitments, customers very often opt for them.

Spain has one of the largest mobile markets in Europe, served by four mobile network operators and a continually growing number of MVNOs. Based on the recent reports, Telefónica continues to lose market share, while Orange and Vodafone are increasing theirs. Yoigo maintains its position as Spain’s fourth-biggest operator. Moreover, recent reports indicate that the number of mobile subscribers in Spain has fallen since 2011 as customers terminate their subscriptions mainly due to the economic crisis. Therefore, all service providers are under pressure to create offerings that not only help them to increase or stabilize their position on the market.

By increasing the data allotment in its prepaid plans without additional cost, Vodafone has raised the overall value of both plans. Additionally, by making this offering available via the Vodafone Yu app, the operator has created a unique channel of communication with the subscribers.

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 or to speak with the research team: http://www.tarifica.com/contactus.aspx