Skip to main content

How will Telco's need to adapt in the Web 2.0 world

The internet is adapting faster than ever before. Web 2.0 is seeing innovation at an increasing rate and social networking platforms, mashups, online collaboration and Software as a Service (SaaS) is showing what can be achieved and still have customer service as a core value.

Telco's are renowned for over engineering seeking the elusive 5 9's (99.999%) when in reality less is more. Skype can suffer lower voice quality but generally the quality is more than adequate for the average user. Compare this to mobile call quality from a network centric operator and where the results can be shocking.

The Web 2.0 is driving customers into new levels of collaboration and the Generation Me subscriber expects more from their services. Increasingly the need to immediate response and low cost means that the Telco's have a real challenge, despite the impact [or not] of Skype, Jajah, Gizmo and Vonage, the reality is that the Telco style of service is not good enough for the average Joe Punter.

The wish of IMS and it's any content any screen with it's foundation of SIP based connectivity may not be fast enough for tomorrows consumers. Maybe the cold hard truth is that Telco's need to get out of service creation and marketing and concentrate on their core competency, operating networks.

In an insight for Techdirt I concluded that Telco's need to facilitate the network operation and open up for more MVNO's and companies that know how to bundle content. This is likely to come from cable and media companies who are used to dealing with a fickle customer base and therefore have to interact more closely with them.

In another insight for Techdirt on the disruption that is now seen in TV and Video new business models, more aligned to Web 2.0 and consumer driven content production, was my conclusion for that industry.

Today's Telco's need to understand what mass collaboration can do and how brands are now being created, and broken, on the internet. To succeed the Telco will need to collaborate closely with the end user and content providers to create more depth and width of services that supply the needs of Generation Me subscribers. This means learning how to be more open and use Web 2.0 platforms to change the dynamics of the transaction.

Download the insight "Adapt a Telco to Survive"
Download the insight "Video 2.0"
Read the article on Light Reading "Why Telco's need Web 2.0"

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

PC over IP - The Teradici Effect

Teradici are hoping to blur the lines between PC and Data Centre. Their solution allows a use to view multiple screens and control the blade PC over IP. This is kind of like the dumb terminals with a new edgy deployment. The intention is that all of the computing power is performed offsite in a centralized area, the Data Centre, and this will save on power and maintenance costs as the engineers are co-located with the hardware and therefore don't have to go out to the client site for basic maintenance. The Teradici Company Article found in the Wall Street Journal

e-Olympics

This year's Olympics should be the best ever for coverage. Fring are looking for onsite commentators and as a means to encourage people are offering a 3.5G phone as your reporters tool. I hope that this will be the games of the micro blog. The potential for services like Twitter or Jaiku to open up access to the games in a way never seen before is encouraging. Essentially there are three dimensions to the games: Nation Event Athlete Typically broadcast of the games ha content defined by the nation. The USA channels closely follow the USA squad, the same for UK, NZ Australia etc. This is targeted at the national pride. For those people who are actively engaged in an event themselves, marathon, it's the event that is king. There will still be an element of "my country" but this is equally balanced by "my sport". The final element is the followers of a specific athlete. Friends, family and fans may elect to follow all of the events surrounding a person. ...

Cashless Society? Micropayments up for disruption

New Zealand, although small, is a long way ahead in many aspects compared to the UK. Some of their new schemes are being adopted by the UK government. What I remember from my first trip here 6 years ago was the impact of the EFTPOS system. Long before the UK was using Chip and PIN New Zealand was moving towards a cashless society with the ubiquitous EFTPOS (Electronic Funds Transfer Point of Sale) cards and terminals. The system is good and robust. But the one place you can't find it for some of those micropayments is on the public transport system. Buses would benefit from some form of electronic payment system. There is one drawback of the system in it's implementation today, the time taking to pay. For small payments, say a Moro (think Mars) Bar at the local dairy (corner shop) is the time taken for the system to recognise the card and for the user to select the account (Cheque, Savings or Card) and input their PIN. This would certainly slow down the boarding process...