Transcript State of the Wireless Marketplace: Mobile versus Fixed Usage

FOV Round Table
Agenda for Action
ITU Workshop
15-16 January 2007
Summarizing the two days
 Consensus
 Confusion
 Contention
Consensus
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Voice is on the move: from fixed to mobile, from PSTN
to IP, but…
Voice delivered by circuit switched fixed networks will
disappear.
Voice is vital and demanded by users.
Voice is the core of telecoms revenue (about 80%)
Voice fixed lines and ARPU are falling, just opposite for
mobile.
Voice trends vary widely by country (viz. U.S.)
Voice pricing is moving toward flat rate and bundles
Voice can be enhanced by combining with data (e.g.,
online social networking services, or telemedicine)
Consensus (cont’d)
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The incremental cost of voice is nil
Price discrimination needed as a revenue
source
Product differentiation (e.g., branding and
marketing) can be used to sell costless services
Mobile and SMS termination and international
roaming pricing are exorbitant
Confusion
How to structure interconnection pricing of
asymmetric networks, VoIP services.
 Imbalance between rich and poor users,
and rich and poor countries.
 Impact of vertical separation on fixed voice
delivery.
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Contention
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Traditional fixed (and possibly mobile) service
providers are doomed.
Unbundling incumbent fixed networks is
antithetical to investment necessary to maintain
the voice network, and to innovate
Voice access market is workably competitive vs.
market power is inevitable and regulation is
prescribed