Operators hesitating over new charging models - study
One of the biggest challenges still facing mobile operators is how to drive additional revenues from new services, according to the findings of a report published by wireless network specialist Radisys on Thursday.
Conducted by consultancy Senza Fili, the survey of 33 operators split across North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific showed that operators are struggling to realise the fiscal benefit of offering more services, functionality, and connectivity.
"We have to move away from flat, speed-based [price] plans; these are blunt instruments. We need to gain a more granular ability to provide to customers what they want. It may be off-peak pricing or application-based options," said one anonymous North American operator in the report. "I do not think anybody has figured it out yet."
According to the study, a pervading air of uncertainty is causing operators to hesitate over launching new charging models.
"From the interviews, we got a sense that operators are actively exploring many opportunities, solutions, and approaches, but that they are not confident that any of them will bring in sufficient revenues to justify a big bet," claimed Radisys.
The survey also garnered opinion on what operators consider will be the most disruptive mobile developments over the next three years.
New mobile devices, voice over LTE (VoLTE), small cells, WiFi offload, and LTE Advanced were among the key technologies that operators identified.
Interestingly, despite almost universal enthusiasm among the respondents for VoLTE as an essential service, 25% predicted it will have a negative impact on revenues as voice services increasingly move to flat-rate tariffs.
"We do need VoLTE to gradually reduce our dependency on legacy 3G and 2G networks, to a point where we will feel comfortable to turn them off. But it will take a long time," noted one Asia-Pacific operator.
Meanwhile 58% of operators said they expect LTE Advanced to have a highly positive impact on revenues and customer experience, although 66% said operators will not see any meaningful benefit for at least three years.
In addition, the survey revealed geographic discrepancies related to the commercial deployment of LTE Advanced. 67% of North American respondents said they expect LTE Advanced to roll out within two
years compared with 33% of Asia-Pacific and European respondents.
Operators also discussed how WiFi offload and small cells would ease the load on mobile networks, with most operators seeing the two as complementary technologies.
"A crucial element to ensure continued success of WiFi offload is to make the connection to WiFi completely transparent, so that the subscriber does not even need to know whether WiFi is used," a North American survey participant claimed.
Indeed, ongoing efforts to offer a seamless WiFi experience have been gathering momentum this week. The Wireless Broadband Alliance
predicted on Thursday that seamless WiFi hand-off solutions will be deployed within the next 12 months.
However, "today it is WiFi offload, but in the long-term small cells will become more important to increase capacity," another operator argued.