Jeff,
I'm not sure if I would go this far. I'm with you on the Minitel/PC
example, but SMS is still the driving force behind keitai usage in all
markets around the world, including Japan. Our research of 14,000+ users
in Japan showed that across all age, income, gender (and pretty much all
other) demographic segments, SMS (short/medium length email messages) made
up at least 75% of total MobileNet usage. And over 50% of all respondents
use the MobileNet for less than 5 minutes a day. So the clear winner, even
in this market remains email/chat.
We're also working on a comparative study (a final student thesis that
should be published in mid-June) that compares and contrasts usage
behaviors and patters between European and Japanese users, and another one
comparing behaviors between Indonesian and Japanese users (due to be
completed in September). The initial results we've already collected are
also showing that Communication is the driving force behind mobile Internet
use, not data. This dovetails with Forrester's report "Conversational
Content" which pretty much says that Data alone won't rule the
day. Melding it together with "Communication" or conversations will.
So irrespective of whether Bouygues, Orange or Telkomsel are trying to
increase ARPU by migrating usage from SMS to higher revenue content, if
they approach it without fully understanding the drivers of consumer
behavior (we're finding that these are directly related to an individual's
feelings and aspirations regarding their mobile device and the level of
importance they place on it in the overall process of communications),
they're going to be S.O.L.
I gave a short lecture on this last November at the GLOCOM wireless forum,
which Daniel Scuka from Wireless Watch Japan covered
here: http://www.wirelesswatchjapan.com/vp/43.shtml.
So, although I know you've done a lot more work in this area than I have, I
think that there are far more effective business models that can and will
succeed outside of Japan. I personally don't believe that Push strategies,
even with the most modern and well-equipped phones, will be nearly as
powerful as those that Pull. Especially those that pull with the hook of
more effectively enhancing communications.
--Philip
At 07:41 AM 5/9/2003 +0900, you wrote:
>At 18:12 03/05/08 +0900, you wrote:
>
> >Jeff,
> >
> >Why would European operators prefer browsing instead of pulled downloads?
>there are a number of different actors in the system. content providers
>that would like to offer more sophisticated contents can only do this with
>browsing services. Users that want these contents will have to use browsers
>to get them (but they won't understand this until they see the contents).
>And operators that want to offer these more sophisticated contents can only
>do this with browsing services. For example, this is the strategy of KPN
>and Bouygues Telecom. But they need to tap into the success of SMS and
>offer the successful SMS virtual communities (e.g., the TV chat groups that
>I cited in the previous example) an easy link to the i-mode services.
>Clearly SMS is a short-term solution and will be replaced by the mobile
>Internet just as Minitel is being replaced by the PC Internet. How this
>occurs will to some extent determine the winners and losers in european
>telecom field over the next few years. WAP Push appears to be an
>interesting way that this might occur.
>Jeff
>
>
>
>This mail was sent to address psidel@iuj.ac.jp
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Philip Sidel
Assistant Professor of Marketing
The International University of Japan
Graduate School of International Management
Phone: 81-(0)25-779-1400
Fax: 81-(0)25-779-4443
Email: psidel@iuj.ac.jp
Received on Fri May 9 03:49:18 2003