On The Margins

Tuesday November 09, 2004

[ Telecommunications ] Telecom News Bits

The WSJ reports that telecom operators plan to compete with cable operators in TV and video services . . .

Serivce bundling has not moved as fast as some U.S. telecom analysts had predicted. The WSJ cites a J.D. Power & Associates survey which shows a mere 1% of consumers use a single provider to get local telephone, long telephone, Internet access and cellphone service . . .

The FCC plans to give Vonage "interstate" status . . . Interstate status will subject the company to federal regulations and free it from local state-based regulatory control, reducing the number of regulatory regimes under which the company has to operate . . . That will also be good news for other national, incumbent operators who have plans to offer VoIP services.

The WSJ reports:

Motorola says it has already started selling the Wi-Fi and GSM phone to its partner Avaya Inc., which will sell it to corporate customers.

The calls are appealing to customers because calls within the Wi-Fi "hot spot" may not count against a customer's allotment of wireless minutes. Roughly one-third of all cellular calls are placed in either a home or office in easy range of a Wi-Fi hot spot, according to a survey by the Yankee Group, a technology consulting and research firm.

Such phones could reduce use of traditional paid cellular minutes, but telecom providers are betting that the reduction in paid minutes will be made up for by a reduction in customer turnover and lower customer acquisition costs. Wi-Fi technology also can improve calling quality inside of buildings for less money than traditional cellular-network upgrades.

The advance of VoIP (whether through wired or WiFi connection) is not limited to the U.S. As a recent sample, T-Online plans to roll out VoIP services in France.

Nokia is quitting CCIA due to leniency of its recent settlements with Msft . . . "Under the settlement, announced earlier today, the group agreed to withdraw from the European Union's antitrust case, now under appeal, and not appeal the U.S. antitrust settlement against Microsoft to the Supreme Court," reports the WSJ.

2004-11-09 05:45:46.0 -- ; Permalink ; Trackback.