LATAM Telecom

From Mexican newspaper EL UNIVERSAL ( link ), and also reported by Cellular News ( link ), Telcel has finalized negotiations to launch the iPhone in Mexico. Interestingly, this comes the same week when news sources reported that Telefonica was closing an agreement with Apple for iPhone exclusivity in Latin America. As we reported here before, launching the iPhone with Telcel should be a no brainer, as it is the largest operator in Latin America, with almost 50M subscribers. It will be interesting to see what happens in Brazil and Argentina, who are very likely next in line for the launch of this groundbreaking handset.

From adnmundo.com (link here ) and tusbuscadores.com (link here ) we learn that apparently Telefonica is moving to close negotiations for a regional agreement to launch the iPhone in Latin America. We had mentioned here previously that America Movil and Telefonica were both after the distribution and Apple was negotiating on a per country per operator basis. Apparently this may have changed if the rumors that Apple will join forces with Telefonica are true. We had also mentioned that negotiations with America Movil were not going to be easy and that Apple's conditions, which include revenue share on data revenues, were very likely going to be unacceptable to America Movil. America Movil's leadership in Latin America is precisely what makes negotiations with them extremely difficult and for sure Telefonica will jump at the chance of winning this deal. Even though they have a similar number of subscribers in the region (both topped 100M in the last couple of years), America Mov

We had heard that both America Movil and Telefonica were in talks with Apple to launch the iPhone in Latin America (see here ), with operations in Brazil and Mexico as the prime candidates. It was expected that negotiations were not going to be easy, both companies and particularly America Movil are well known to be tough negotiators. Apple, however, has given no indication that it will change its business strategy, which consists of no exclusive agreements with global operators, which means it can launch with America Movil in Mexico and with Telefonica in Brazil). Apple's strategy is to have separate negotiations country/operator and exclusivity for one single operator per country. In addition, Apple is not backing down from the revenue share deal it has with its current partners, despite tough negotiations in Japan, China and other countries (see here ). It is now reported by Folha Online that Telefonica and Apple are in the final stages of negotiation to launch the iPhone in Bra

Rich Miner, group manager for mobile platforms at Google was at the Emerging Communications Conference last week where he mentioned, after his presentation, that he expects Android-based devices to outpace sales of the popular iPhone (read note by By Richard Martin, InformationWeek here ). Miner, however, stated that the iPhone and Android target different markets. The iPhone is "a single manufacturer, it's targeted at a particular demograph", while "Android is a "complete open-source [software] stack" for mobile devices, not just an operating system". It will be interesting to see if Google will dampen any future iPhone deals; we are still waiting to hear any confirmation about the iPhone launch in Latin America.

Last week Apple released the much expected SDK for the iPhone, allowing thrid party applications to run on the handset. This move (from John O'Brien's Technology Blog MacChat ) will reposition the iPhone in the corporate segment, which up until now has been dominated by RIM's BlackBerry. The iPhone is already the second most popular smartphone after the BlackBerry but up until now it was not a serious contender in the corporate segment. It should be interesting to see how things evolve in Latin America, where just a couple of years ago the BlackBerry was introduced with much hype. Despite being a small niche (in some countries in LA, subscribers are only in the thousands), it has proven to be one of the highest revenue generating handsets for operators worldwide. In Latin America, however, the segment for smartphones is much smaller than in North America or Europe, and targeting this segment with special handsets can be tricky. Such is the case of the BlackBerry. This means

We have talked a lot about Apple's iPhone, who has revolutionized the industry since its introduction in the USA last year. Now comes the "People's Phone", introduced at Barcelona this year, which sits at the opposite end of the spectrum in price and features (see story by the International Herald Tribune ). Spice, an Indian based company, has introduced the greatest innovation since the iPhone: a handset priced at less than $20. The so called digital divide seems to disappear with this innovation. This type of handset should appeal to operators that are reaching to lower income segments as mobile penetration continues to grow and the markets become saturated, or in countries where regulations require operators to provide service to these segments.

While everyone else impatiently waits for Apple to make up their mind about the iPhone, as reported here before (see here and here ), CTI quietly launched their CORREO MULTIMEDIA CTI (CTI Multimedia Mail), which is a great option for deploying Visual Voice Mail to mass market. Even though the service currently is only available to the postpaid segment, this service is part of the Visual Voice Mail offering that seems to be the buzzword not only in Latin America but worldwide thanks to Apple's iPhone. We expect to hear more from operators regarding this service, as we have mentioned here before , the time for an upgraded version of VOICEMAIL is long due and it took an outsider to reinvent the service.

Comverse at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona was selected as a finalist for the 2008 GSMA Global Mobile Award in the Best Mobile Messaging Service category. They showed us not only their iPhone Visual VoiceMail but also other demos for different types of handsets for non iPhone operators and segments. This is probably the single most important breaktrhough innovation in VoiceMail since it was launched. Interestingly, the breakthrough came form an outsider, breaking all the rules to which both operators and handset vendors had played for years. As we have reported here before, there are strong rumors that Telcel Mexico and Claro Brazil are next in line to launch the iPhone. Given the size of the market and the dominance of both operators, it's a non brainer Apple might want to partner with them. The question is, will Venezuela and Argentina also be considered, given the size and importance of both markets. Venezuela, for example, is expected to be similar in size as Brazil for mes