Mobile World Congress Recap: Informa Telecoms & Media Webinar Highlights

Posted: March 9th, 2012 | Author: Ulla Koivukoski | Filed under: Events, Telecom Trends | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

There’s been much buzz around last week’s Mobile World Congress, and Comptel can attest to the thought-provoking discussions and ideas that were generated at the show. Analyst firm Informa Telecoms & Media recently held a webinar recapping the main themes and hot topics from Barcelona.

One key takeaway was the emergence of global players including over-the-top (OTT) providers, card networks and device manufacturers. According to Informa, these players stole the headlines and are now dominating the agenda for the telecom industry, as operators are becoming their local partners and distributors. They went on to say that with OTT players, operators must strike a balance and find a way to work together, but just how they will effectively do so is still in the works. An example of this balance coming to fruition is Facebook’s decision to work collaboratively with operators in the billing process; however, the keynote sessions indicated that there is still some friction in the operator/OTT player relationship. For instance, OTT providers are generating revenue by using traffic from operators’ networks, which is a sore source of contention.

Further, Informa noted that operators were focusing less on technology and more on the role of pricing to appeal to consumers. Some of the interesting discussions were around the concept of moving away from unlimited pricing models toward those that are much more value-centric. At the show and over the past year in fact, there’s been much talk about this change, but some operators are struggling with implementing it largely because of challengers still pushing the unlimited model. However, other operators have revealed that a successful tiered plan is possible if the pricing is structured correctly and the value proposition is effectively communicated to consumers.

In all, Mobile World Congress was a great meeting of the minds, and we’re certainly looking forward to seeing how these developments unfold in the coming year. Which trends did you find most interesting at the show?

Mobile World Congress, Day 2: Busy in Barcelona

Posted: February 15th, 2011 | Author: Olivier Suard | Filed under: Events | Tags: , , , , , | 3 Comments »

We’re only half way into this year’s Mobile World Congress, but like I mentioned yesterday, this is the GSMA’s—and Comptel’s—busiest conference yet! Our booth’s three meeting rooms were completely booked up, and there was significant overflow into our general lounge area throughout the day.

Although most of Comptelians’ time was spent at the booth, we were able to participate in a couple of other networking activities around the Fira Barcelona and city. CALA vice president Diego Becker sat down for a few minutes to record a video interview with TeleSemana. In the following Spanish language clip, he discusses our commissioned research showing that consumers are willing to pay extra for a higher quality of experience (QoE) and greater service personalization, as well as how policy control is becoming essential for communications service providers to offer differentiated, convergent broadband services and guarantee that QoE.

And this evening, I attended Light Reading’s Meet the Editors & Analysts ‘Speed Dating’ reception at Gran Foc. It was nice to catch up with old friends from Heavy Reading like Ari Banerjee and Graham Finnie, and meet others from across the OSS and greater telco industry.

Overall, we have been very pleased with the high attendance in Barcelona as well as the productive meetings being conducted with customers, prospects, partners, media and industry analysts. Don’t forget to come visit us in Hall 1 at Stand #1C06 if you have not done so already!