** Network spend -
I've seen numbers of between three and five billion euros for the UK, France
or Germany, which is for stand-alone networks as opposed to shared systems.
That would work out at between Eu30 and Eu80 per pop, or Eu50-115 per sub.
Even if you multiply that by four operators, you're still nowhere near $750
(Eu862).
I haven't looked at DoCoMO's 3G capex estimates. $750 per current Japanese
mobile subscriber would work out at $46.5 Billion. There's no way on earth
that's the right number. Working it the other way, $5 bn infrastructure
spend (i.e. top end of what the Europeans are saying) and $750 per sub would
equal 6.66m subs. Anyone believe that's where Foma will top out in Japan?
There are more people than that in Tokyo!
**Market share
If you've already got 30 million 2G subs, it's relatively easy to move them
to 3G.If you have none, and the market is at 80% penetration (as it will be
by the end of 2002), then you have to get all your customers out of churn of
existing operators networks. Which is harder.
** Business case
In the UK, licence fees per sub per month are equal to 13.5% of fixed
revenues per sub per line. Either you believe that everyone will use their
mobile, or you don't. If you do, then 50% of fixed revenues go to mobile and
huge piles of cash come spining out of the business even without services.
If not, not.
What if fixed operators cut their rates to near-zero? So what? Even if they
could - i.e. run at a loss to preserve market share - mobile still beats
wired.
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Received on Fri May 18 16:49:20 2001