This week's Sunday Times reports that 3, the mobile operator owned by Hutchison Whampoa has relaunched itself ahead of a potential flotation. Bob Fuller, 3's CEO declared that 3 was the embodiment of convergence: "we are not a telco, we are not a media company, we are not a technology company... our business is radically different because we are all three."
Does this claim sound familiar? A throwback to the dotcom era perhaps?
3's data revenues from services such as ringtones, video calling etc. today amount to less than a quarter of its total revenue and widespread interest is unproven.
However, the ringtone phenomenon has the mobile operators and entertainment companies are salivating at the prospect of delivering mobile content such as television and music downloads via 3G networks. And 3 is betting that mobile phones and not iPods or portable games consoles will be the device of choice for people to consume this content whilst on the move.
I'm yet to be convinced. The take up of such services, even by early adopters, has been hindered by expensive data tariffs which need to fall considerably, to an affordable "all you can eat" or capped usage fixed price to attract greater experimentation and adoption by the mass market. And I suspect most premium data services will be less of an attraction than simple mobile web access.
Comments