Category Archives: Web / Voice / Telco 2.0

Upcoming Conferences: 4GWE, Broadband World Forum, Oracle SDP in Action

I hope you managed to have an enjoyable summer break.  With the end of the summer holidays comes conference season… At the 4G Wireless Evolution conference next week in LA I’ll be moderating the session “The Ecosystem of Application Developers” (4G1-04), on Tuesday 1st Sept, 2:00-3:15pm.  On the panel will be: Shai Berger, CEO Fonolo; […]

Let’s Not Forget the Customer Service Basics in the Race to Innovate: Poor Customer Service Example from T-Mobile US

As a consumer, of all my bills my mobile/wireless phone bill remains the most troublesome.  Electricity, water, gas, broadband, TV and even fixed/VoIP telephony appear with few surprises.  A quick search online shows there is a significant problem with mobile operator’s billing.  My recent experience with T-Mobile US made me realize they do not understand […]

Cable Labs Summer Conference “2009: Year of the App Stores & Development Platforms”

The Cable Labs Summer Conference was held at Keystone Colorado.  Its a gathering of the North Amercia cable industry, its similar to the Mobile World Congress for meeting with many of the industry’s execs as you walk between meetings.  Given most MSOs do not directly compete, there’s lots of friendly and open discussions on technical […]

The Stranded Service Provider

OpenCloud ran a great panel discussion event last week entitled “The Stranded Service Provider,” accompanied by a white paper that’s available on their website. On the panel were myself and: Tereza Borges, head of NSN’s next gen applications Keith Dyer, Editor of Mobile Europe John Logsdon, MD of NetDev Marlon Bowser, MD of HTK Kris […]

TelstraOne Experience: ODP Re-Emergence?

Earlier this week I discovered Telstra have launched an integrated storefront experience called the TelstraOne Experience: across the phone’s features, web, content, games, customer relationship management, and all the other services they provide.  Critically, its front-and-center of the customer’s phone experience and aimed at one-click access.  See picture and video below on its operation.  Its […]

Cricket’s MyHomeScreen shows the industry how to take on the Consumer Electronics and Operating System App Stores

In the article Reinventing the On Device Portal – The App Store, I reviewed how Apple’s implementation of its App Store on the iPhone provides a template for operators and how the struggling ODP (On Device Portal) can come into its own. I’ve reviewed the ODP landscape, its struggles and evolution in previous weblog articles.  […]

Service Delivery Platform Virtualization

Virtualization is a hot topic, made more so by IBM’s potential acquisition of Sun; two leading proponents of virtualization and cloud computing.  From an enterprise perspective the drivers for virtualization are saving cost; and improving employee efficiency, manageability of IT and enterprise security.  Take for example desktop virtualization, e.g Sun Ray thin clients, it’s your […]

Why the Mobile Industry needs to keep an eye on Cable’s Canoe Ventures

In the Mobile World Congress Summary weblog entry I made reference to the Cable industries targeted advertising initiative, Canoe Ventures. Canoe Ventures is backed by most of the US cablecos, including Comcast, Cox, Cablevision, Charter, Bright House, and Time Warner.  Its purpose is to make cable’s advanced advertising applications easier to buy and use, and […]

Options on how the Telco industry can work with the App Development Industry

Examining the factors necessary for app store success: Direct customer access: a critical factor in Apple’s success, and why operator third party developer initiatives continue to languish.  However, this is changing.  O2 Litmus was launched with direct customer access at its heart.  Similarly Vodafone’s Betavine Widget Zone is also allowing direct customer access.  Critically the […]

The Three Dimensions across which customers pay: ‘Customer Pay-Space’ or a 2 State System?

Following up on my presentation at eComm last week, I was asked to provide a little more background on my comment about the three degrees upon which customers pay.  They pay on three dimensions: cash, time and privacy; creating a ‘Customer Pay-Space.’  It’s important to remember with the non-cash dimensions (time and privacy) value is […]