The fourth quarter has traditionally been the most difficult for mobile operators in mature markets. Many customers join, but many others are leaving and operators typically dilute margins by having more equipment (and more expensive equipment) in the sales mix compared to the rest of the year.
Subscriber acquisition and retention costs are generally higher in the fourth quarter when the financial discipline of mobile operators is put aside to promote equipment at prices well below the operator purchase costs – as long as existing customers promise to stay or new customers are ready to commit to plans with high monthly fees.
But even though there are temporary setbacks, our industry is gradually moving in a more rational direction: Equipment subsidisation is less frequent today and many operators have stopped binding customers to long, inflexible, contracts. Mobile operators have developed their service offerings and are today capable of explaining why customers should stay – without having to throw in a new iPhone as part of the package. Continue reading 2016 was a great year for mobile customer loyalty→
Our nine predictions for 2016 were designed to be measurable. The outcome doesn’t look bad at all – we project that 7 (or 7 and a half) will be fulfilled – but we need to wait for the fourth quarter reports to give you the final outcome. ETA February.
For 2017, we thought we’d make our predictions more courageous. We think 2017 will be the year when the telecoms industry finally becomes customer oriented and customer friendly having realised that greed and fine print make a bad foundation for business – but that customers who are given attention and choice reward you with their loyalty – and then are surprisingly willing to pay.
Prediction 1: Unlimited mobile data to everyone who pays
Every mobile operator will offer unlimited mobile data in 2017
Nonstop Retention® benchmark: Calculating and comparing the Nonstop Retention Index for mobile brands (MNOs, sub-brands and main MVNOs) in one specific major European market. Identifying best practice and showing current trends. Recommending propositions and actions to improve customer loyalty per brand.
For the 14th time: tefficient’s famous data usage analysis – now covering 32 countries
The mobile data usage continued to grow in 2016, but the growth rates varied much. Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong and Hungary grew the slowest whereas Lithuania, Turkey, Austria and Korea grew the fastest.
In Lithuania, Austria and Korea, premium unlimited plans were introduced and the effect on data usage has been similar to what our previous analyses identified for Finland and Latvia.
Nexterday North 2016 was an as fantastic experience as the first, inaugural, anti-seminar in 2015. Once again, Comptel managed to bring 550 thinkers and doers from around the world to Helsinki and create great buzz around it.
TDC, the market-leading operator in Denmark, has provided us with anonymous data showing the average mobile data usage for the most frequently used phones and tablets.
Certain European incumbents are betting on that copper access will be sufficient for the future communication needs of households and smaller businesses.
But where most incumbents regard copper-based DSL technologies as a fallback for areas where fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) or fiber-to-the-building (FTTB) deployment isn’t financially feasible (or not yet rolled out), a few seem to be determined that copper is it. Continue reading In fiber, leadership is created with a shovel→
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.
Preparing and presenting “How carriers are using Wi-Fi to boost their businesses” for 350 attendees at the Wi-Fi NOW 2016 event in London 25-27 October.
For the fourth consecutive year: Comprehensive business benchmark including a total of 163 revenue, OPEX, CAPEX, TCO, productivity, traffic load and network quality KPIs – with a peer group solely consisting of network sharing joint ventures.
But even though there are temporary setbacks, our industry is gradually moving in a more rational direction: Equipment subsidisation is less frequent today and many operators have stopped binding customers to long, inflexible, contracts. Mobile operators have developed their service offerings and are today capable of explaining why customers should stay – without having to throw in a new iPhone as part of the package. Continue reading 2016 was a great year for mobile customer loyalty 
In this blog, we focus on the State of LTE in Europe. And we ask ourselves: What’s wrong with this picture?
