Comreg’s latest quarterly market report is just out

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The latest COMREG quarterly telecomms market report is out.

These reports are useful for anyone in the Irish telecoms industry.  They cover fixed voice, mobile voice, broadband and broadcasting.

A few points stand out in the mobile section of the latest report:

  • Overall Irish mobile revenue is down 1.2% in the last twelve months (p. 6).
  • The mobile penetration rate was 118.3% including mobile broadband and Machine to Machine subscriptions, and 99.5% excluding mobile broadband and Machine to Machine [M2M] subscriptions (p.8).
  • Fixed voice subscriptions have grown 3.9% in the last 12 months (That seems counterintuitive – perhaps it’s being driven by the growth in converged bundles?).
  • Two-thirds of all voice call minutes are from mobile (p. 12). No surprise there.
  • There are 340k ‘Machine-to-machine’ subscriptions within the mobile base (p. 49) which equates to 7.4% of the lit SIMs. O2 have the lion’s share of the market (p. 60). Well done O2!
  • Fig. 4.2.2 suggests the growth in postpay subscribers is coming from M2M and broadband subscriptions – interesting.  It seems that if we exclude the data-only SIMs, prepaid voice is declining a little, and postpaid voice is falling faster.

    Prepaid and postpaid

    The impact of M2M and broadband subscriptions on prepaid and postpaid subscriptions. source: Comreg

  • Fig 4.3.1 shows that voice minutes continue to decline, and SMS messages outnumber voice minutes for the first time.  This has been a long time coming.  I had lunch with a former CEO of Eircell last week, where he reminded me of the surprise in the telecoms industry when Eircell achieved half a million text messages a month.  How far we have come!  Moreover, the uptick in SMS volumes gives the lie to the notion that over-the-top (OTT) services are heavily cannibalising SMS traffic.

    Voics SMS MMS volumes

    Voice, SMS and MMS volumes over time. Source: Comreg.

  • Eircom (Meteor & eMobile) report a 1% jump in market share in the last quarter (p. 62).
  • Vodafone’s and Three’s ARPU outstrip that of their rivals (Compare the traffic market shares with revenue markets shares on pp. 62-63).
  • Since mobile number porting started nine years ago, nearly 3 million ports have taken place. That’s over half today’s number of subscriptions.

Overall, the quarterly report is a handy resource for telecoms industry professionals, and is worth a look through each quarter.

Joyn, the GSMA’s answer to OTT services, seems to be struggling

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Joyn is the GSM association’s attempt to offer a telco-controlled competitor to over-the-top (OTT) services like WhatsApp and Viber. As described in this article, the survey reports that most telcos so not believe it is the answer.

http://www.telecomtv.com/comspace_newsDetail.aspx?n=50361&id=e9381817-0593-417a-8639-c4c53e2a2a10

It’s rather sad, but I guess, as the article, points out, any new product that relies on the cooperation of the majority of mobile telcos worldwide is highly unlikely to succeed nowadays. Back in the 1990s, roaming and SMS were implemented across the GSM world – but would the same happen again if they were developed today?

Perhaps the best hope for a telco response to OTT services would be a basic OTT service that worked anywhere but that gave enhanced features & benefits where supported by a participating telco.

Finally, let’s remember that this is a survey of the telcos. Far more important would be the opinion of the market!

Bees and warfare

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The honeybee has a long history of being dragged into the wars that humans fight.  They have been used as weapons – in sieges (in attack and defence), on ships and on the battlefield.  Their honey has been used to poison opponents or, as mead, to stupefy them.  Their brains and flying skills are being copied by DARPA and others in the development of micro-air vehicles for reconnaisance and for killing.

It’s a fascinating subject.  I recently gave a lecture on the topic at the Irish Beekeeping summer school in Gormanston, Co. Meath.  For those who want more information, here are some of the more useful references:

If you have questions or comments, please contact me.

Eight things every (young) person should take time to learn

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There are some life skills that we are bound to learn – like reading and writing, riding a bicycle and basic maths.  There are some other things that are usually not on any curriculum but are well worth investing the time in learning.

Here in no particular order are eight that in my humble opinion that once learned will pay back tenfold in time or money saved, pleasure, pain avoided or social standing – yet are often neglected:

  1. How to eat with chopsticks (if you are used to a knife and fork)
  2. A party piece – a song or a poem
  3. Twenty of so of the most useful Windows (computer) shortcuts.  There’s a long list here.
  4. How to cook a meal to be proud of
  5. Basic maintenance of clothes: ironing, replacing buttons, repairing undone stitching and removing stains
  6. Changing a wheel on a car safely
  7. The basics of massage
  8. One or two formal (ballroom or traditional) dances

There are plenty more candidates that come to mind – for example, the skill of public speaking, or a good basic knowledge of human nutrition or of human fertility.  The list, once you get into it, seems endless.  However the above are my first eight.

Some of these I was lucky to learn early in my life, some I learned later and two – to my chagrin – I never mastered.  I certainly wish I had, and really I still should.  I’d suggest you choose one today, take the time and learn it.  You can learn most of these from Youtube these days.

What other life skills should be added to this list?

 

So, ATT are eyeing up parts of Telefonica

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So, ATT are eyeing up parts of Telefonica – with Carlos Slim sniffing around European mobile operators, the game’s starting to change for European mobile operators.

What will the impact be on Ireland? Probably nothing directly, in the short term. The much-rumoured sale of O2 IE to Three probably won’t be impeded, on reflection, and surely Eircom wouldn’t make the mistake of selling their mobile operator a second time? Mind, there was a story a little while back about AT&T buying Vodafone… scurrilous, no doubt!

Thoughts, anyone?

Study claims as many as 40% of under-35s use IP messaging

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This Cellular News article quotes consumer research in Germany, Poland, Spain, the UK and the USA that finds 40% of 18-35s use IP messaging.

Only 40% of under 35 smartphone users using IP messaging services like Whatsapp, Facebook chat, Viber, etc?

OK, that research wasn’t done in Ireland but I’d guess in Ireland the percentage using IP messaging is over 70%… no?

Prepaid mobile – has it peaked?

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According to a GSMA Wireless Intelligence report just published, prepaid mobile has peaked. The proportion of mobile customers opting for prepaid plans is forecast to decline as postpaid becomes more popular worldwide, except in the Americas.

This does seem to tally with the facts on the ground as we in Idiro experience them – our mobile operator customers worldwide are finding that their consumer users are switching in larger number from prepaid plans to postpaid.

However, extrapolating this to a long-term trend is not so obvious.

From when Portuguese operator TMN gave us the world’s first real prepaid mobile phone service until the advent of smartphones, the choice of prepaid vs. postpaid plans was, in the developed world, linked to the consumer’s attitude to debt and her ability to get credit. I wrote a thesis (download) on the subject for my MA in marketing back in 1999.

Nowadays, everyone wants a smartphone and a data plan. (Idiro is still reporting high viral contagion of  smartphone purchase among consumers.) And smartphones are expensive – often beyond the reach of the younger consumer. In countries where postpaid handsets are heavily subsidised, postpaid plans offer a way for the less well off consumer to get her hands on a new smartphone, and that seems to be driving the swing to postpaid plans in OECD countries.

But there are problems. Some mobile operators privately report high bad debt rates among new smartphone customers – and attempts by telcos such as T-Mobile USA to unbundle the phone subsidy have run into problems. There are masses of lower-cost smartphones in the pipeline – but it remains to be seen whether these will be cool enough for the consumer in the OECD or cheap enough to be affordable without a subsidy in less advanced markets.

Time will tell whether the postpaid mobile continues to grow at this pace. In my own view the answer is linked to the price of smartphones, the growth of banking and credit checking services in the developing world, and above all to the global economy and its ability to create wealth for consumers.

(A version of this post also appears on Idiro Technologies’ website.)

Building a beekeeper’s barrow

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A beekeeper’s barrow is a handy item to have if, like me, you cannot bring your car right up to your beehives.  One can be built from a frame from an old builder’s barrow and a few bits of scrap wood.

Bee barrow mk 1

Bee barrow Mk I

My first bee barrow was built for me by my late Dad.  This frame has lateral steel strips with holes in (originally to attach the bucket) fore and aft of the legs which allowed Dad to fix the platform directly to the steel strips with bolts.  The platform was made of 12mm marine ply with small pieces of scrap oak (about 15mm x 15mm x 40mm) screwed & glued to the upper side of the platform to stop the hive parts from slipping off.  Notches were cut front and rear to allow a tension strap to fit snugly around the hive parts to hold them together.  My hive parts are 460mm x 460mm National standard.

Bee barrow mk on amphibious duty

Bee barrow Mk I on amphibious duty

As the picture shows, this hive barrow was an amphibious vehicle.  It was a good solid item that lived outdoors with the beehives and served me well for about 5 years, until someone stole it from my Coillte apiary last year.

So I had to make another bee barrow.  Pondering the Mk I design, I perceived some potential improvements:

  1. The load sits above the legs and as such a large proportion of the weight is carried by the driver. It would be better to have the platform further forward.
  2. The platform is canted slightly forward at rest and further forward when in motion. This necessitates the load being very well secured and makes the barrow a little harder to handle on sticky or uneven ground.
Bee barrow mk. II

Bee barrow Mk II

As it happens, the next frame from a builder’s barrow that came my way (you can sometimes see them in skips) was built differently.  It had no lateral steel strip behind the legs, but instead had lugs with holes in on the top of the tubular frame just in front of the wheels.  This allowed me a different design: I sited the platform above the wheel.  The rear of the platform was raised by adding two old decking boards above the steel strip, and the platform rear, decking boards and frame were all bolted together.  Two brackets with holes drilled in at either end were made from an old steel bar and bolted to the lugs on the frame.  These support the platform at the front.  Small angle brackets bolted to the platform hold the steel brackets to the platform.

Bee barrow mk 2, laden with hive and stand

Bee barrow Mk II, laden with hive and stand

The resulting barrow Mk II has proved itself on its maiden voyage.  The load proved stable and the barrow was easier to drive than the Mk I.  The  platform is designed to be level when being driven on level ground – which means that it is canted backwards a little too far for ease of stacking when at rest, so I will point the barrow downhill when loading to compensate.

If I was building one from scratch I would follow the advice of my wise friend Joe Kelly and build it with a bicycle wheel for improved ground clearance.  However, this barrow cost me nothing bar some 12mm marine ply that I had to buy anyway, and scrap timber & spare bolts & steel that I had lying around.  For the parsimonious beekeeper (is there another kind?) the challenge is to find a suitable barrow chassis, with a tyre that’s still serviceable.  I am already looking out for another.  One could of course buy a builder’s barrow from the builder’s merchant, but where’s the fun in that?

NFC payment on mobiles in Ireland?

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Here’s an interesting article on NFC (Near Field Communications) on smartphones. The latest phones can do it, so will it work in Ireland anytime soon? Maybe it already does & a reader can enlighten me.

A few months ago AIB sent out some new VISA debit cards. They’re supposed to work already for NFC by just tapping the card on the till thingy. When the helpful AIB bank employee explained that I’d be hit for a bank transaction charge each time I used it, my interest in using it instead of cash to buy my paper or my sangwidges evaporated. On such small but important details do product launches fail.

Still, it’s be interesting to hear how usable NFC payments are in practice. Have any readers tried to use a NFC-enabled phone to pay for something, anywhere?