Prepaid is not such a problem for i-mode. You can use prepaid for SMS - it
just
means the account has a credit limit as opposed to having none.
Prepaid was a great way for the operators to take up the slack in the youth
and
first-time market. Now that most of this has been captured, they're looking
to
move this people onto contract.
Graham
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-----Original Message-----From: keitai-l-bounce@appelsiini.net
[mailto:keitai-l-bounce@appelsiini.net]On Behalf Of Tony Chan
Sent: 30 July 2001 08:24
To: keitai-l@appelsiini.net
Subject: (keitai-l) prepaid and i-mode
Prepaid is big in Europe and I assume with KPN as well. Then there is
the i-mode business model, which inherently relies on DoCoMo's billing
relationship with the end users and content providers -- in order to
charge monthly subscriptions to content sites and then share that
revenue with the content provider. So how will i-mode work with prepaid
customers who have no billing connection with operators and or the
content provider.
There are other payment methods for content providers, credit cards,
prepaid vouchers for the content, and so on, but there are obvious
problems with these (credit card for micropayments, distribution for
prepaid vouchers, etc).
Any thoughts, especially with prepaid already taking off in Europe?
FIY, I'm a journalist and currently working on such a story. I will not
quote any opinions off this list without the permission of the writer.
Facts, such as "prepaid mobile in Italy is now about 90%," will be
verified but not attributed to the writer. You can also contact me
off-list for a more indept discussion.
Cheers,
Tony Chan
Editor
Wireless Asia
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Received on Mon Jul 30 21:09:33 2001