Category Archives: Blog

4G paradox: Countries with highest population last served

When OpenSignal issued its latest State of LTE report today, it again showed that South Korea and Japan lead the world in actual 4G LTE availability: In July to September, a Korean 4G smartphone was on 4G 96% of time  whereas a Japanese 4G smartphone was on 4G 92% of time.

These figures are impressive and come as a result of significant operator investments to cover populated areas – also indoors.

In this blog, we focus on the State of LTE in Europe. And we ask ourselves: What’s wrong with this picture?

“Many of Western Europe’s biggest economies are languishing below the 60% mark, including France, Germany, Italy and the U.K.”

Snip from OpenSignal’s map – the darker the higher 4G availability.

Continue reading 4G paradox: Countries with highest population last served

We’re not subsidizing. We’re just selling phones for less than what we bought them for.

The four largest wireless carriers in the US – Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint – all claim that they have (essentially) abandoned the two-year-binding-contract-with-subsidized-phone model.

At least in the consumer market; the model is still around in the business market.

But have they? Continue reading We’re not subsidizing. We’re just selling phones for less than what we bought them for.

Smartphone users in almost all mature markets spend more time on Wi-Fi than on 3G/4G

For the first time, OpenSignal, the company that provides an app to crowdsource actual network performance and coverage data, has published a report showing how much time smartphones were connected to Wi-Fi – as opposed to 3G/4G.

The stats are provided for 95 countries. Continue reading Smartphone users in almost all mature markets spend more time on Wi-Fi than on 3G/4G

Without an attractive iPhone, operators’ EBITDA margin surges

Canning FokWhen Canning Fok, the co-managing director of CK Hutchison (the group that owns ‘3‘), in the earnings webcast yesterday attributed the revenue headwinds of the group to oil, foreign currency and the iPhone, two things became clear: Continue reading Without an attractive iPhone, operators’ EBITDA margin surges

Roam Like Home – the beta

Review of the present Roam Like Home offers in France, the UK, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland

Roam like home EU

15 June 2017 will be a milestone in the history of European telecoms: From this day, not only goods, workers, services and capital can move freely across EU borders: Also mobile phone calls, messages and data can start to move freely across the borders when the mobile roaming fees – after ten years of regulation – finally are abolished within the European Union. Continue reading Roam Like Home – the beta

Analysis of the development of mobile data monetisation in a specific country

Analysis, 2016

Analysis of the mobile market in a specific country: Development of market shares, subscription tiers, churn, offerings, pricing, data usage, revenue, ARPU, margin, network coverage and CAPEX for all operators.

Special focus on the development of mobile data monetisation and mobile TV/video over time.

Comparisons done to other countries.

Commissioned by a global solutions provider.

Instant messaging and ad blocking – the new normal?

There has been a lot of talk – and increasing irritation – about pigeonholing, especially the younger (18 to 24 year olds), consumers to a tightly defined segment. Generalisations can be dangerous, especially for those companies that still primarily make the effort of engaging with their customers when they are buying something and spend most of their marketing dollars in digital and other forms of advertising.

Concert

But loyalty comes from understanding what makes your customers tick – and this knowledge can only be derived from active conversations with the community, regardless if they are Millennials or those labelled Generation X. Nevertheless, it is useful to understand broadly how the different consumer segments are behaving and what motivates them. But we’ll come back to this in a bit. Continue reading Instant messaging and ad blocking – the new normal?

Wi-Fi Calling – read all about it…

Wi-Fi Calling is relatively new – and then, not really. In 2014, Apple’s launch of iOS 8 with embedded Wi-Fi Calling marked a milestone for voice calling with mobile devices, despite several years of Voice over Wi-Fi services in various guises preceding iOS 8.

Aptilo Networks – a leading provider of carrier-class systems to manage data services with advanced functions for authentication, policy control and charging – has released a White Paper titled “Seamless Next Generation Wi-Fi Calling”, which is written by Allan Greve of tefficient.

L_C898.tmp Continue reading Wi-Fi Calling – read all about it…

Nordic operators’ networks have no equal in speed. On 3G.

4G coverage is great as well – but 4G speeds are slowing

Having ran the Nordic operator benchmark four years in a row now we know that Nordic operators have world-leading network quality.

OpenSignalOpenSignal just issued its first State of Mobile Networks report covering the four Nordic countries Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway. Based on 34 million crowdsourced tests taken in Q1 2016, OpenSignal shows which country (and which operator in it) that has the best:

  • 4G coverage
  • 4G download speed
  • 3G download speed
  • Combined download speed
  • 4G latency
  • 3G latency

And it is a race of high standards and tight results. Continue reading Nordic operators’ networks have no equal in speed. On 3G.

German operators: We listened to your customers. Maybe you should too?

This innocent tweet – based on official statistics from the German and Finnish telecom regulators – has currently been read by more than 90 000 people:

Continue reading German operators: We listened to your customers. Maybe you should too?