LATAM Telecom

A recent article published by the New York Times (Jill Colvin, "You’ve Got Voice Mail, but Do You Care?" , April 1st, 2009) announced the demise of Voice Mail and the rise of new technology and services such as Google Voice's Voice to Text and the iPhone's Visual Voice Mail. According to the article, most people don't bother to listen to their voice mail messages and that the technology is obsolete. Interesting article but Colvin's article misses the point: most of the new services she presents as examples of technology that is replacing voice mail are actually an evolution of voice mail technology. Voice to Text, for example, which is included in Google Voice, is a voice mail message delivery mechanism that allows text transcription of voice mail messages. This means that you have to have a voice mail message to begin with. It is new technology that provides a better user interface to recover voice mail messages, precisely what Colvin points out is missing fr...

"Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some." - Robert Fulghum The market for mobile applications has changed significantly in the last four years, when I first started working with these applications. Four years does not sound like a long time but in this industry it means I have lived through several generations of devices and have seen some applications take off and many others fail. This year, analysts expect mobile applications to really take off; it is very exciting to see the industry reach this point, so I thought I'd share my experience and what I've learned in the process. Back then, Comverse was working on developing client applications that used new device capabilities to enhance network based services. These services included Call Completion, Mobile Instant Messaging, Address Book Backup, Mobile Email and Visual Voice Mail; each of them had different technical and commercial issu...

"Nothing is more expensive than a missed opportunity." -H. Jackson Brown Jr. This is a follow up to my two previous posts where I discussed opportunities and my top five predictions for the Latin America mobile market in 2009. The global economic downturn has forced operators to take a second look at new investments for 2009; however, this can be a good opportunity to look at things differently. Operators can rethink their VAS strategy and Repackage, Reposition, and Reinvent services and adapt to succed in the new economic environment. What follows is a list of services that, based on my experience, have a higher probability for success in 2009-2010: Reinvent voice .... Operators will be watching CAPEX spending closely and looking for ways to reduce OPEX. In addition, voice will continue to be the greatest cash generator in the region through 2013; it therefore makes sense to think about services that will help them offer voice services as cost-effectively as possible. ... ...

With mobile penetration around the world reaching saturation, and the growth rate for traditional services flattening, operators are looking for new options to increase revenue. However, traditional services (voice, SMS) continue to be the main revenue generators for operators and there are still many interesting options to continue milking the cash cow. Services such as Ring Back Tones, MMS and Push e mail, when they were first introduced, created huge expectations that have not been delivered. In addition, operators get distracted by these new services and tend to overlook the basics. Voice mail, for example, is still the main call completion service and SMS continues to be the main messaging service worldwide; it is expected this trend will continue for the next few years. Operators can benefit from looking at options that sit on top of both services, to revitalize them and target missed opportunities. One of the key advantages to leveraging voice and SMS is that they can be used to...

Voice Mail and SMS have been in a mature stage for several years now; growth in most markets has slowed down and until recently, they kept the same form and functionality they had since they were first introduced years ago. Both services, however, remain the bread and butter of VAS services. In most markets (the USA being a notable exception) Voice Mail is the largest VAS contributor to revenue for mobile operators; SMS in some cases accounts for up to 90% of data revenue. This alone justifies paying attention to recent developments that are breathing new life into these two services by dramatically improving the user experience with visual interfaces. The best example of this is the iPhone, which introduced to the market visual applications for both services. Visual Voice Mail had been around for several years, but it was not until the iPhone was introduced that it got the attention of mobile operators. While it can be argued that the iPhone reflects a shift in users’ expectations as ...

This is a follow up to my last post about the relevance of Voice to Text for Voice Mail vendors. One of the main challenges operators face when introducing new value added services to their offering is defining the target segment and making sure these services will attract a large enough group of subscribers. A compelling business case is not the only factor that operators will use to determine whether or not to launch a new service. However, VAS managers are under increased pressure to raise ARPU and the effort required to launch new services will hardly be worth their time if they cannot show a significant contribution to the bottom line. At first glance, the business case for voice to text delivery of voice mail messages may seem difficult, in particular for Tier 2 and Tier X operators. The cost of transfering messages -mainly because of costs associated to ensuring the quality of transcription- makes it seem that this is a service that can only be offered to specific segments, such...

We have discussed previously (see here and here ) the huge potential and appeal Voice to Text has and the fast penetration it has seen worldwide, including the recent launch in Latin America by Movistar Chile (see Spinvox press release here ). Ther key element that seems to be missing, however, is the lack of enthusiasm Voice Mail vendors have shown for this service. Voice to text delivers voice mail messages via SMS in text format, so integration to the Voice Mail platform is a key component. We have seen strong marketing efforts by Spinvox and Nuance, and operators worldwide are responding. Voice mail vendors, on the other hand, seem to be in a responsive mode, collaborating with integration efforts but not really pushing the service. Perhaps the single notable exception to this might be the agreement Nuance signed with Comverse, who is the leading Voice Mail vendor wolrdwide with >50% market share, but even that was an initiative led by Nuance, not Comverse. Given the fact that v...