Monday, 31 October 2022
What is the P-GW or GGSN and why do more IoT, MVNO and Enterprises have their own?
Wednesday, 18 May 2022
New Short videos and commentary on what has changed for HSS and P-GW in 2022
Tuesday, 15 December 2020
MVNO Gold Rule #5 - Launch your MVNO with a single goal and stick with it, best one is Loyalty imo
So you can see from this diagram, from the very beginning an mvno needs to work out if it's going to be:
premium or discount or
whether it's doing an MVNO either for the revenue as a new revenue stream or it's doing it for the loyalty and
Obviously these can change over time, and they do - that's life, right? However life is a lot easier if you know what you're doing, or at least try to plan what you are doing in the beginning and you build your platform and your solution, and you choose your partners around this.
So an example being the two arrows that we have off to the left if you're going to be a discount operator then you may choose a customer service that's low cost which which is kind of at odds with you being premium but it may also impacts your ability to use this product as a revenue service because people probably will see this low-cost and then you won't necessarily contract happy customers and even as a loyalty product because this customer service that you choose may be at odds with how your customers want to be supported with regards to the rest of your business.
Then other things to think around that are for example the branding the marketing the pricing and your channels, so again, what I've seen happening in many MVNOs is that a big established company will decide: “right, I am going to be an mvno I will employ xy&z salesperson from mobile to make sure my mvno is a success as I have heard the worse thing in the world is a failed MVNO, right?”
Wrong! if you are setting that up from a pure loyalty perspective then establishing the mvno in all the 3rd party channels is not a good idea because
a) it's a very expensive way to sell and
b) it's going to place your product where all the competitors are and so
c) you've just wasted a lot of money and commission on a channel, people and processes that is at odds with the whole concept of your loyalty.
d) your cost of acquisition has just doubled or tripled the RoI
To give you an example, a supermarket mvno in the beginning made most of its sales via its own online channel on a Monday and Tuesday... This is not a coincidence, this is because people were shopping in that supermarket during the weekend and looked at their phones in their supermarket, and the ones that did not buy directly in the store decided to have a little look online to make sure it was a good deal, or just waste their time as customers have every right to do when making a purchase, and then went direct to the customer’s online store.
Why would you then enable this large amount of customers, who have been into your store, then they have been onto your website, all in your colours, your brand, your flavour of how things are done... to then give them the option to further delay the purchase and go to one of the indirect channels where you are going to pay commission and there is a risk that you will lose that customer in the process, and the experience that customer experience is outside of your control and indeed the customer service post service is likely to be inferior, or at the very least different: It just does not make sense, however that is the situation I find myself in time and time again when launching an MVNO within a large organisation.
Just because you don't have experience in mobile does not mean that as a successful business, having launched many different products and services in many different horizontals and verticals you should not ask, question, double question and then triple question: “why am I doing this in mobile?”: Does it make sense or is it just because I've employed somebody who was in mobile and that's the way they did it for a product and a service that is in a completely different space on this diagram above.
At the end of the day, if its a brand play, mobile is all about brand loyalty...
These are all points that I've put here on this blog, but I covered differently in the vlog, sorry video so to get the full low down, experience The Full Monty the full hoo-ha the 360 the total immersive experience you need to check out the video as well as read this and you need to read this again probably after the video and then like comment subscribe hit the notification button if you liked it anyone more content like this … thanks!
Monday, 11 May 2015
NFV cloud MVNO conference 2015
Cloud NFV MVNO MVNE round table #MVNOIS 2015
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NFV MVNOs and MVNEs making way for more disruptive, flexible, global / local mobile services |
NFV Cloud MVNO makes it easier and good for Global
NFV cloud essentially brings IT plus Telco together: good for LTE & WiFi
NFV cloud MVNOs and the eSIM
NFV is more disruptive
NFV is not pure cloud and still needs localisation
NFV is about standardised hardware
Thursday, 11 July 2013
MVNO Conference 2013 Rome LTE MVNO opportunity
The Opportiunities for LTE in MVNO and LTE wholesale are huge |
In assessing the LTE MVNO opportunity, we need to look at the facts, not 3G+ |
Please can we not see MVNOs still launching with 3G SIM cards 7 years from now like with 3G |
4G has had a lot of marketing spend and will be big, but a 4G MVNO campaign does not need huge spend |
Clever Twitter and social marketing by MVNOs that is too risky for MNOs can hit at core 4G data market with low SAC |
So you got past 4G and LTE contractual, MNO roadmap and other issues: is your MVNO platforms operationally ready? |
By enabling the most advanced OTA MVNO data settings on the market we have seen huge growth in data usage in even markets which the MVNO would never assume they could generate usage.
The key issues around negotiating LTE MVNO and getting an MVNO 4G ready |
Every informative case study should end with a shameless plug for our services Virtuser MVNO consultancy :) |
Sunday, 20 January 2013
mvno from a customer acquisition perspective
MVNO from a Customer Acquisition Perspective
One thing that is often overlooked by MVNOs is to look at the MVNO from the customer's perspective. This is important, as one of the quickest routes to failed MVNO bin is to create a mini-me mobile network, as you essentially create a product that has no differentiation but somebody else's version has much more marketing, retail presence, support, existing customers, etc.The customer perspective is an important reminder if the fact that as an MVNO, while you are a partner of one MNO, you are a competitor of the other MNOs, other MVNOs on your host network, and more importantly, your host MNO if you are not careful. Why is this important? Never lose site of the fact that tmobile he wholesale business is all about acquire customers, a
MNO to the Customer
MVNO to the customer
Customer to the MVNO
Original MVNO from customer perspective page
To Fully understand the MVNO, and moreover Next Generation MVNOs, we have to look outside the legacy network led definitions of an MVNO, as an MVNO is customer driven, and therefore business driven business model. From a customer perspective both the MNO and the MVNO are their "Network Provider". That is Virgin Mobile is seen to its customer as their network provider, not the host MNO, just as an MNO is seen as a network provider. The benefit here for the MNO is sales without marketing spend, but more often than not sales the MNO was unlikely to reach on its own.
A service provider, or airtime provider would be like Martin Dawes in the UK for example, which was one of the originally mandated airtime providers in the UK; here, both the host 'MNO' and the 'Service Provider' are seen to provide the service to the customer. This was sometimes confusing, and of little value-add to the customer, with the only differentiation coming in the shape of price and maybe some differentiated billing. In general however, the customer seems to prefer a single brand. The same is the case for the "powered by" model - the customer does not care which MNO powered their MVNO, they have already chosen their "network". Hence Virgin Mobile being voted the best network every year in a row since launch in the UK. Similarly, there would be little value in the MVNE and MVNO brand being apparent to the customer.
Other Diagrams:
©Copyright 2001-2005 Christian Borrman, All Rights Reserved. Reproduction ProhibitedMVNO and the brand MVNO from the customer perspective Back to main page Other Resources: Fixed-Mobile Convergence Virtuser Next Generation MVNO Report |
Thursday, 29 November 2012
Tuesday, 8 May 2012
emerging market MVNOs and spare capacity
Emerging Market MVNO markets
An interesting comment on the MVNO explained page posted such an interesting question I have decided to post about it in its own right:Emerging market MVNO struggle
- No network runs at full capacity all the time, like every and any service, there are peaks and troughs, and no two networks in the same country have the same profiles either.
- These peaks and troughs are very significant in both MNOs and MVNOs alike, with their networks running at eighty-some or ninety-some percent at peaks for a short period of the day, but typically at anything between 30-50% during the day, and obviously pretty much 0% all night.
- No two networks in the same country have the same load profiles, in operators I have seen over the years across many countries have very different profiles due to having attracted a very different customer base.
- network capacity varies geographically as well
- some types off traffic are more consuming of resources than others, for example now data makes up 80%+ of MNO network costs, but does not make anywhere near that percentage contribution in revenue or profits...
- As data requirements and mobile penetration expand, if the MNO cannot even handle voice and SMS now, how are they going to tackle data and provide the country with the infrastructure it needs to grow??? If they are tackling this issue properly, voice and SMS capacity for MVNOs should not be a problem...
- Some MNOs state that they run a very efficient network and therefore are not actively looking for MVNOs however, they do still run some pretty major MVNOs, they are just more selective and chose ones that complement their profile
MVNO African Story
At the time of the original article (2012) and this update (2013) there key barrier example used in Africa is "network capacity" as per above example. I shall be brief:In short: if a network were running at full capacity all the time, it would not just be congested as per the argument against MVNOs, but the network would actually fall over and cause major outages for long periods from a functional perspective. Furthermore the operator would surely be falling short of the service/coverage commitments they will have made to get a licence and become an operator in the first place, and certainly will not be able to cope with the data expansion that is needed for a country to grow in this internet age: Whoever is upholding full capacity as a barrier to MVNOs is either conspiring with a short-sighted MNO or MNOs, or having the wool pulled over their eyes by a short-sighted MNO(s)!
MVNO Latin American Emerging markets
There was a great presentation at the MVNO Conference just recently in Barcelona on the Mexican Market and how they managed to get the regulator to open up the market, basically by creating a group, and ringing the regulator and government departments every single day, among other things, very interesting, and good luck; however, I will end on three notes:- you need to arm yourself with facts and show that these arguments have no substance at the same time
- you can use the cases of the Spanish and Italian markets, which needed the regulator to open the market in 2006/2007, some of the last markets to adapt MVNOs which opened the floodgate for MVNOs
- There is nothing like some prospects to get the market going... post Virgin mobile UK, every man and his dog approached t-mobile UK (then one2one) with an idea on a napkin to become an MVNO, most of them had no clue... if there is an opportunity, or many smaller opportunities that actually address a market the MNO is not addressing, then this helps as well.
Monday, 16 April 2012
Ad funded mvno business model and the MVNO industry summit
Ad funded MVNO
As the MVNO summit is just around the corner; a question that is often asked and/or a comment often made in MVNO conferences is:- will MVNO business model X work in Y country/market, or
- X MVNO business failed so that MVNO model does not work...
Is the ad-funded MVNO model still viable?
The ad -funded model is one of them, and as such has been part of my new blogs and old legacy MVNO blog for a while and can be found here: MVNO business models. You then of course have the other end of the scale, usually those who argues against MVNOs from the beginning and have now had to swallow their words as MVNOs make bigger and bigger percentages of MNO bottom lines: people who say that MVNOs as a whole don't work when one happens to fail! Back on the more moderate heckler let's deal with One of the most frequent is that, if Blyk failed then the ad funded model does not work... This is just plain wrong on a few levels:- 50% of all new businesses fail. In this respect, MVNOs are probably one of the best businesses you can invest in, as the failure rate is actually in single % figures in most countries over time. It has been higher, for example in France at first, when the regulator forced MVNOs, the result was that the network operator agreements were so restrictive that they strangled the first MVNOs... however they were all absorbed by the host MNO, so you could argue it was intentional: if they were proper failures the MNO would have set them out to dry rather than absorbing them. Blyk was also absorbed by its MNO - an MNO has full visibility of an MVNOs activities and potential, and they do not flog a dead horse!
- The "ad" is very generic. If you look at the add business over the last few years you will see most of the traditional spend has all but disappeared and been replaced with display ads, Blyk started with a model based on ads that suddenly went into decline.
- Mobile advertising is still in its infancy, it has been for 5 years, however this is now changing
Will the Brand MVNO, supermarket MVNO model, etc work in my country?
In short, what does this mean? well it means that there has never been a better time to launch an ad funded business, as long as you are choosing the right type of ads, when to send them and, like any business, are careful how you spend and manage cash flow.So, with the biggest MVNO summit to date, now extended to three days, let's make the MVNO Summit about where and how we are moving models like the ad funded model; add funded voice, data and SMS/MMS, to market in new countries, and maybe even take part in the MVNO challenge...
I will be adding to this list over the coming months, feel free to comment, like the MVNO Facebook page, MVNO Google+ page or follow @MVNO_ on Twitter if you want to be notified of these updates
Tuesday, 7 February 2012
MVNO VAS
There are a few reasons for this:
Click here to read on
Monday, 23 January 2012
Mobile Roaming Conference Chair's Digest 2011
Mobile Roaming 2011 Digest
The Mobile Roaming Conference was also a great event, and a very successful one too, with a packed schedule of presentations, and a great story built as the presentations moved through the day: starting with the issues, then following with some great case studies and then other strategies for maximising roaming revenue, and making roaming as efficient as possible, from centralising roaming to hubbing to wholesale as part of the roaming strategy... To boot the Hotel was great and the bar proved popular afterwards... so I hear, anyway :)Roamaing Conference Overview
- It may be no surprise that volume is increasing as margins are decreasing...
- Data is growing, VAS is growing, voice and SMS is shrinking, just like retail
- Roaming and Wholesale are merging
- We had a great presentation and case study on roaming segmentation which saw a 35% increase in usage, 21% increase in revenue and 13% increase in margin
- EC Roaming regulations require huge amounts of caffeine to sit through... more below
- The IPX is central to CDMA but not yet GSM VAS
- Centralised group roaming departments are doing more group level agreements in a month that they previously did on a country level in a year!
Roaming Conference Presentations:
- As volumes increase but margins decrease things have to change: centralisation, segmentation, more attention to settlement, centralised negotiations by group volume and hubbing...
- The bilateral "spaghetti" model is moving to a more centralised, hubbed "cannelloni" model (yes that second analogy was used).
- Downsizing can just be migrating of smaller routes...
- Data is growing and some interesting VAS were emerging, such a service specific, i.e. Facebook and Twitter daily bundles for example...
- Data is still nowhere near as high as it should be as many just turn data roaming off as the smartphone takes grip, even so it is the growing trend: engaging the "sleeper roamer"!
- 40% of travellers do not roam at all...
- Thank you messages work... why just AoC roaming welcome messages
- There were a couple of differing views on the EC roaming regulation, especially round the single IMSI, single IMSI breakout or dual IMSI approach... to be honest it is quite clear to me who will go which way (MNOs, MVNOs and hubs), but there is plenty to debate here.
- An interesting point of view was the fact that the breakout model will just drive global revenues to silicon valley, i.e. the Google mobile revenue fund and the Apple mobile revenue share fund
- There is an inbound vs outbound and how bundles should or could make their way from retail into wholesale. We already see it (and very successful!) with some MNOs and MVNOs (we have enabled a few services via the Roaming Welcome message AoC so can see).
- 15% of roaming traffic from one operator was identified as "honey moon" traffic... let's hope it was to elate on happiness and not seek council...
- hubbing not only sees synergies in efficiency, but also revenue assurance!
- MVNOs will drive hub adoption, especially with two month compliance for roaming access in EU roaming regulations
- An analogy was likening the Roaming market to an aviation analogy: air miles, code sharing and alliances are the way forward... there is something in it, though I am not expecting a movie with George Clooney about mobile roaming points anytime soon...
- Airline similarities continue obviously as roaming revenues track airline travel increase... and airline traffic is still growing
- Wholesale is seen a key way to attract the 40% who do not roam at all as well as other "sleeper revenue", VAS is seen as way to get both wholesale and own roaming revenues up, the latter also cannot argue with the stats on segmentation (the former segments itself generally).
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
MVNO Networking Paris Congress Chair Digest 2011
MVNO Networking Congress 2011 (November) Digest
The MVNO Conference Overview
- We have seen and continuing to see significant growth in MVNO, so far we have only touched the surface, even in the overcrowded ethnic and low costs space
- MVNO churn is the lowest in pretty much every market
- VAS are key: Data, payments, Social Networking, all generating more value, loyalty and even contributing to any MRG
- Channels are expanding: social, online, new retail
- MVNO growth is now starting in value, as well as size due to previous points
MVNO networking Conference 2012 Presentations:
MVNO Networking Conference “highlights”:
- 6 million MVNO customers in France, 50% increase in 2010-2011
- Churn is generally lower in MVNOs (3 sources, 2 continents)
- Annual MVNO churn in France is sub 20% (annual!)
- MVNO customers 14% of UK Market
- “Wholesale is better than no-sale” Old KPN quote was reborn in a pres, good to see!
- One non-full MVNO going full MVNO to have more control over VAS and data provisioning infrastructure as data becomes a key part of their differentiation and marketing strategy
- Another non-full MVNO going full to be able to potentially leverage multiple hosts (not advised, so many MNVOs forget that their host is like their big brother in the playground – even if you do not like him and he may not even care much for you, but if you are on good terms, he can save you getting a wedgie or a swirlie) i.e. you will generally get more from an engaged single MNO than you would ever get by trying to trade MNOs off against each other. This is the case even at initial negotiation stage.
- On this note we had an MNO likening the MVNO to a clown fish and the operator to the sea anemone, with one protecting the other from the rest of the creatures (sharks) in the sea… This MNO is actively seeking clownfish!
- The MNO used to use the MVNE as a filter, now more flexible and used as a solution
- La Poste has 2.2 Million customers in Italy, looking to move to full MVNO due to scale, it is a “buy” vs. “make” strategy.
- La Poste MVNO have the lowest churn in Italy.
- 50% of La Poste customers have made a mobile payments transaction via the card linked with the mobile account.
- Colruyt supermarket MVNO launched in Belgium, a la Tesco Mobile model: the key is a line from the music industry “once a hit, always a hit” if a model has been successful in one country, it is likely to do the same in another, again and again.
- MVNOs managed to make a “per min” and “per message” business back in a “bundle” market space, they are doing the same in data, charging a premium in “per meg” data. In Denmark the main MVNO is doing this at a premium of 2.5x market rate.
- Online is the key channel to avoid “shelf overload”. The customer now has so much choice in the typical retail establishments. Telmore has reached 800,000 subscribers in Denmark (over 12% of Danish market in just one MVNO) mostly via online.
- If not online, other innovative channels are required, especially in places like the Austrian market, where €10 gets you 1000 mins and 1000 SMS, an MVNO has to do more than just traditional channels.
- Social Networking is becoming a key differentiator
- Some interesting comments on the EC Roaming regulation (its all relative, they were interesting as roaming regulation comments, but not interesting enough for a blog!) but if someone is interested enough I can dig them out...