"One cannot judge the value of opinion simply by the amount of courage that is required in holding it," wrote George Orwell to Evelyn Waugh

The last few months public promotion of 5G by Ben Wood and his colleagues at CCS Insight have caused me to question my sanity. Have I lost my faculties or has Ben been bought as a "Social Media Influencer" by EE? Today's activity around the launch of 5G by EE has caused me to conclude that he has been bough lock, stock and barrel by BT and he should tag his posts as paid promotion. In Financial Services his approach would be called in for review and it should not be different in the telecoms world.

Clear advantages to #5G if you want to download an album on @Spotify in "very high" quality. Here's a 4G vs 5G comparison on @Qualcomm powered @OnePlus 6T (4G) vs @OnePlus 7 Pro 5G. Hard not to be impressed by the @EE 5G network. #5GEE (test conducted in #Cardiff) pic.twitter.com/iceFy5Zkqm

— Ben Wood (@benwood) May 30, 2019

I've been using the @EE #5G network in London and Cardiff over the last few days with the @OnePlus 7 Pro 5G. When in 5G coverage I'm consistently getting 200Mbps to 400Mbps with the fastest speed peaking at around 700Mbps. #5GEE pic.twitter.com/DXdfgtY3iQ

— Ben Wood (@benwood) May 30, 2019

Wow. #Stormzy live (and live steamed over 5G) on The Thames in the shadow of @TowerBridge for the launch of @EE #5G network in the UK. #5GEE @bt_uk pic.twitter.com/L1vZIIS9nx

— Ben Wood (@benwood) May 29, 2019

Here's @EE's 5G smartphone line-up: @SamsungMobile's #GalaxyS10 5G, @Oppo Reno 5G, @OnePlus 7 Pro 5G and @LG V50 ThinQ 5G with Dual Screen accessory. #5GEE pic.twitter.com/fNRxb5iSxt

— Ben Wood (@benwood) May 26, 2019

I would expect a first year GCSE Economics student to provide better coverage than Ben is currently doing as they would offer some balance and critical thinking about the recently launched 5G handsets and the launch services Mobile Networks are promoting in launching 5G. The issue is that Ben Wood has spent twenty years developing a brand and networking so that at the moment he is frequently quoted in the media. Some of this is that CEO's of Networks and Equipment Manufacturers are not as vocal as they were and so Journalists pressed for time to create a "package" seek out Ben for easy quotes.

EE are first to market with 5G in the UK, but not in Europe, they are less than a week ahead of Vodafone in launching and have chosen a network strategy that will require more base stations but not necessarily more capacity than Vodafone by the year end. The first subscribers for 5G are unlikely to have connected to the network for more than 15% of their usage by the end of the contract in TWO years. The "leadership" that EE claim to have established in the launch of 4G was such that if left it's then Parents seeking an exit from the UK and accepting a financial loss when sold to BT for equity alongside cash. BT was first to market with the launch of 1G, it had a property portfolio that meant that every base station needed up to 2000 could sit on it's estate rather than deal with third party landlords. Yet by 2000 it had been overtaken by Vodafone AND Orange in terms of leadership and had put Cellnet up for sale.

Thus the launch marketing for 5G by EE can be described as "brave" given the overwhelming demographic of BT's customer base and the very early stage we are in for 5G in terms of business case for consumers adopting the new service. For Ben Wood to take the optimistic view that EE are right to dash forward with a strategy he called "build it and they will come" requires a naivety greater than "the eternal sunshine of the spotless mind". 

Just how can one value Vodafone shares?

The business section of the Sunday Times once again gets me scratching my head about City valuations.

It is early days in the stewardship of Nick Read as CEO and it will be years before we discover if he was more like Arun Sarin than Vittorio Colao. Yet he is in control of an International Telecoms business that is far better placed than BT. Vodafone has stated that it's plan's for 5G mobile is focused on a slow and stead deployment rather than a race to be first. It does not have the issues that Three and Telefonica face in terms of access to capital to fund the building of infrastructure. It has the scale to be able to get not just better prices but also better service from its suppliers.

BT Broadband plans, to little to late?

Woke up this morning to CEO of BT Openreach talking on Radio 4 about the plan to accelerate his Fibre to the Premises build programme so that he has a chance of hitting 3m homes and buildings by 2020. In order to work 50% faster than it is at the moment BT will be hiring 3,000 engineers.  It would seem that HR Director Kevin Brady has massive task on his hands given that candidate require very little in entry skills if this is anything to go on. 

When you look at the investment made to deliver Fibre to Milton Keynes by rival CityFibre it looks like the plans of BT are not aggressive enough and by the time they have hit the 10m target the technology they are deploying is unlikely to be capable of serving needs of 5G mobile.

Valuing Vodafone

Yesterday Vodafone reported that it was no longer talking to Liberty Global about an asset swap and many analysts called it a mistake.  I have always seen it as a foregone conclusion, Liberty Global wants to exit Europe it has very little of interest to Vodafone and the pricing was always out of sync.

Earlier Malone had said that no deal was likely to happen with Vodafone as despite an investor roadshow pitching the "benefits" of such a deal to stockholders he had been unable to convince Executive inside Vodafone that a deal made sense and the price was right.

What has been a surprise to me is the rent a quote brigade who are all happy to say that it was an error on Vodafone's behalf.  Telecoms in Europe is a marginal one when it comes to profitability and more customers does not necessarily mean that the odds are better for success.  Investments are high and prices are falling, this could explain why Liberty wishes to exit before it can no longer pay debts, and competition is intense. Vodafone under Colao has not been about market share at any price rather it is about effective management of assets and seeking to maintain margins. Thus taking on Liberty's properties in Holland and Germany was not going to survive an introductory discussion.  

Will the real BT stand up?

Over the weekend I read three stories about BT which paint a confused view of just what it's future might be. On Saturday the Guardian reported that thanks to BT TV complaints have shoot up. The Yesterday's Sunday Times had two stories in the Business Section about the return of BT Mobile and a feature on NEW CEO Gavin Patterson's £2bn bet on sports TV.

If you read on paper you get the view that BT's retail strategy is in need of a major review. The customers are unhappy with the failings of not just it's TV product but also it's Broadband product. The only provider that gets more complaints for it's Broadband is EE.

Read the Sunday Times and all is good for BT it's about to get back in the Mobile Phone business after leaving in 2001 and BT TV has seen 3M on Virgin and Sky take the service. Then a full page feature on new CEO Gavin Paterson and his £2bn bet on sports TV is a bold gamble that aims to grow the business after a period of cost cutting. He will use a Quad Play offer to drive up incomes having bought some 4G spectrum and struct an MVNO deal with EE.

The problem is that Simon Duke in the Sunday Times does not seem to understand that BT has had MVNO agreements with O2 and Vodafone ever since it sold of it's mobile arm after over paying for 3G spectrum in 2000. He also does not seem to understand that since 2008 BT has failed to invest the money need to provide the long term upgrade in super-fast fibre to the curb rather than cabinet just as it failed to match European spending in ADSL deployment ten years previously.

When you start to understand that last week OFCOM reported that the UK has the lowest consumer prices for Mobile services in Europe you start to ask it's not just Duke that fails to understand the realities of a very competitive telecoms market but BT also.  For too long the Company thinks that one of its prime roles is to defend itself against the regulator rather than invest in it's Network so that it survives long term.  

An act of stupidity by a desperate Prime Minister

I picked up my morning paper and almost tore it in two reading the latest stupid PR stunt from David Cameron. When Ed Miliband made his Conference Speech this September we were told that price controls could not work and were wrong. Yet with his back to the wall Dave has decided that all utility companies need to be told that his government will not accept price rises in the run up to the 2015 election.

This is an act akin to King Canute except the Prime Minister does not understand that he cannot turn back the tide of price increases.

An analysis of the players in the market will show that many are subsidiaries of  overseas businesses rather than British and thus have little loyalty to local politicians. They are in the majority investing in significant infrastructure programs that mean that rather than pay taxes they have losses to cover.

What the Prime Minister should be doing via the offices of the Department of Culture Media and Sport and Ofcom is making sure that telecoms networks are able to deploy high speed broadband to the majority of the population in the majority of places. It is with such a network that the economy will grow and income rise at such a level that people do not feel price rises.

A bad day for Britain's Mobile Ecosystem

Today at the Science Museum Everything Everywhere entertained the dumb and witless of the British Press to its "plans" for the launch of LTE services in the UK.  Next month they will give the opportunity to a few to have a service that is so far away from 4G standards that it's laughable. EE are offering the consumer the chance to experience a Mobile Broadband experience of up to 8Mbps which is slower than some with HSDP+ devices on Vodafone are capable of getting.

This launch has every opportunity of being an even bigger disappointment that 3G was in 2003 when coverage was very poor and devices were not best suited for the improvements offered by the new technology.  The real benefit of 4G is not in services to "smartphones" rather it will be improved connectivity for laptops and tablets or it will be delivering highspeed broadband to rural areas. Everything Everywhere has no intention of offering such services any time soon.  Perhaps that is because at present it has problems giving 3G services to these markets.

The UK Government has so far managed to fudge and fiddle the sale of 4G spectrum and hopes that in allowing Everything Everywhere rights to run a second rate service they can force Stakeholders to participate in a flawed sales rather than seek judicial review and see yet more delays.  I would rather have a delayed launch of 4G that gives Britain a significant uplift that enables it to compete with rivals that a glitzy marketing launch of an inferior service that history will see as willy waving - all be it with a shinny new iPhone.

Sorry I have been quite

It has been some time since I have posted anything.

The reason is that I have become more and more frustrated with the fixation that the answer is the iPhone for all things that are wrong with the mobile phone market. Just as Motorola got it wrong with placing all its eggs in one basket trusting everything to Apple is flawed.

Those that ask, what about Android? Have to understand that Google is just another walled garden and it to is flawed for other reasons.

The fact that both of these handset developers see the future as about the power of the App store highlights the failure to understand the ecosystem that is the Mobile Phone Industry. Observe the clamour of Vodafone Shareholders looking for the fire sale of minority equity assets to see the bonfire of the vanities.

Google does not seem to understand the timeframes the Industry operates under.

Apple sees life in a binary format of winners and loser which risks seeing the foundations crumble under them. As a futurologist I read the tea leaves for Apple as potentially pulling out of the phone market. Recent developments with the iPad, iPod and Apple TV could all point to no iPhone6. If the App store was the answer look for the BBC News app on the OVI and ANDROID stores it will not be the same one developed by Fjord for the iPad.

Nokia have replaced the CEO as he was unable to develop a handset that would kill the iPhone. As Apple is a very small rival and the real fight is with Blackberry his focus was on the right place. Yes fire him because he did not stop the rise of RIM but not for the lack of a high end handset that fails to complement the ecosystem.

If you fail to understand the need to support the ecosystem what you face is failure of the infrastructure. If Vodafone cannot see a return on the investment for new base stations why are they going to build them?

Once Mobile Networks employed anthropologists and sociologists to understand customer needs and develop products. Now they live on Internet Time which works on open development with Darwinian evolution. Evolution is difficult when the search methodology is a top ten list rather than accurate indexation with a standard taxonomy.

This post is me letting off steam. I might come back and develop some of the observations above or I might lie in a dark room and listen to whale music.

A New Dawn or the beginning of The End for Nokia?

This week we have seen the presentation of results for Nokia and Apple which in headline terms present a change in the fortunes of the leader and a significant challenge at the high end of the market.

In his presentation  Ollli-Pekka Kallasvuo Chief Executive of Nokia said  “In recent weeks the macroeconomic environment has deteriorated rapidly, with even weaker consumer confidence, unprecedented currency volatility and credit tightness continuing to impact the mobile communications industry. ” 

Apples results show that it sold 13.7m devices in 2008 which is about 1-1.5% of the total worldwide market by volume.  The last quarter saw only 4.4m sold rather than the 5m the market estimated. The key comment made in the Earning Call was that the iPhone performs poorly in non-subsidised markets, indicates that at some point when demand evens out carriers will have more power over the price they pay Apple for the handset. 

With 40% of the handset market and the Integrated model rather than contract manufacturing Nokia has better Economies of scale than its rivals.  Apple is a design house that gets its handset made by Hon Hi as a contract manufacturer.  When you are making Phones in small volumes doing so in someone-else's factory makes sense however is it something that works when you have more than one design and 10% of the market?

Whilst some see the entry of Apple and Google into the handset market as the opening of the ecosystem thanks to the application platforms that they present I have to ask if the economics work?  The Network Operators have made investments in infrastructure, distribution and support over the last 20 years.  Why would they not expect some return on that investment and security over the future customer revenues?

Looking at the history of Mobile I recall that Nokia assumed that with the arrival of Data services in the late 1990's it presented a chance to take control of the consumer with the launch of Club Nokia as the primary Wap bookmark.  The result was a boycott by the networks until they localised devices for each Operator.

Talking to those who work in FMCG I am told that advertising is not about getting someone to switch from Coke to Pepsi but rather to get them to increase the volumes they consume.  The same is true with Handsets most people say that they are a Nokia user, Sony Ericsson person, Blackberry Addict rather than Orange customer, Vodafone Fan, O2 Punter.  This Brand loyalty makes it difficult for new entrants to capture market share the rise of Blackberry and HTC has taken 10 years to achieve.

The presentations at Barcelona next month will be interesting in that we in Europe will get to see the new Palm Pre and perhaps the first Android based handsets from Motorola as well as new handsets from all those in the mainstream.  I hope that we will get to see the first devices that use the Snap Dragon chip which could offer features better than the current smartphones with hopefully better battery life. 

Nokia will innovate devices in the economic downturn.  The conditions hopefully will mean that they cut a number of handsets from the product range in an effort to improve the user experience and quality of the offering.  In light of the downturn will Motorola, Samsung and Sony Ericsson be able to do the same? If they fail to then they will be the ones who lose out to the New Entrants.  Before I see Apple as anything other than an opportunist they will need to offer a range of handsets similar to their iPod or Laptops.

A look back at 2008

This year in terms of mobile technology I have decided to take a multiple device strategy rather than try and do all things with a single machine. Whilst it has not been cheap it has been productive.

I have downgraded my Sony Ericsson P1i smartphone to the Sony Ericsson C905i and the first plus side is that I can now operate for a whole working day rather than discover that my battery has died just as clients from America come a calling.

I also managed to upgrade my Skypephone from 3 with the second generation of the handset. The device looks better than the original, the battery lasts longer and the new price plan means that I only have to top up every 90 days. However 3 seem to have missed a trick or two because whilst they give me access to Planet 3 I cannot buy anything for my handset. I hope that they have learnt from this with the Facebook phone.

When I am heading into London to meet people rather than give presentations I have taken to carrying either my iPod Touch or Eee PC which allows me to keep on top of my email and also surf the web whilst I await my coffee to cool enough for me to drink it.

When I do need to take my Laptop or Macbook then I also pack my Mobile Broadband dongle so that I can do some work whilst the tube makes its slow trundle back to Hertfordshire. I have tested the service provided by Orange, 3 and Vodafone and the later is best suited to my needs as they at least seem to be able to provide at least 50% coverage on my journey home. I just wish that the power drain was less.

In terms of services I use on my handset, the good news about no longer having a UIQ handset is that I can at last use Yahoo Go 3. The interface is good, I would like to have access to a few better widgets but it works well as a simple app store. It allows me to have access to my email, RSS feeds and upload photos to flickr. I have also been Twittering away on my phone which is interesting. Other Social Networking on my handset has not been as successful, for facebook to work for me I need a bigger screen and LinkedIn is best done with a 13inch plus screen.

I am starting to work more with the GPS in my handset. I don’t use it everyday but I do use it at the weekend when I am visiting places new to me.
In deciding to carry a number of devices I have had to invest in a couple of bigger bags to carry everything. I have also been talking with a friend who runs a bag design company about the need to develop a better man bag. As well as phone I carry a Camera, iPod, Sony Reader, Note Book when I am working. At the weekend the Sony Reader and Camera are not needed but I then have a bigger camera and lenses and my Macbook.

I was thinking that I had a strange case on OCD with my collecting of gadgets but watching others on my commute I am seeing more and more people are carry a range of devices. A recent news report said that UK kids were the best to mug as they were carrying over £800 of gadgets, so I cannot be alone. My disposable income just means that I am to buy more gadgets than the normal consumer.

The impact for the Mobile Networks, I am the guy that you should sell SIM only to for the main device and then as some form of loyalty programme you should offer mobile broadband. Talking of loyalty, when are you going to start doing with just some of the data that you have about me? Why don’t you use the opportunity presented every month to start a conversation with me? Why don’t you look at the HLR data and understand that I have become somewhat of a fan of Sony Ericsson and so stop trying to push another maker’s device at me? When are you going to reward me with lower call costs to my most called numbers?

2009 will be an interesting period in the history of mobile. I am sure that over the period I will get 4-6 new handsets, I hope to get a femtocell so that my home is better served with 3G services. I don’t think that I will be looking for convergence anytime soon, rather as with my knife draw in the kitchen I will seek out the best tool for the job. When it comes to embedded mobile broadband I hope that Sony don’t do a deal with T-Mobile for connectivity because if they do I will format the machine before I transfer data and then demand that my Network support my Vaio.

Time for a change?

If we are to see Mobile to continue to grow, then some structural changes are needed. With change at the top of Vodafone could we have a catalyst for change?

The new CEO of Vodafone offers something different from the status quo. In Viterio Colao you have someone with the skills of a Strategy Consultant supplemented with Operational Experience of a Country Manager. Having worked in the Italian Media industry he also has developed diplomatic skills that sees him able to form federations.

The price of a mobile minute is afalling thanks to competition and regulation. Whilst I expect to pay some premium for my use of mobile over fixed it is not as great as it once was. The reason for the deflation in the value that I place on the value has to do with my perception that mobile coverage is not as good as it once was; along with the lack of innovation in the basic product, Voice. Those that offer Mobile Data Services have failed to grasp the fact that for me it is connectivity for my Laptop whilst I enjoy a coffee between meetings rather than ebay and facebook coverage on my handset.

With a new CEO vodafone can take advantage of their scale and influence to alter the way the whole ecosystem functions. They could acknowledge the fact that at this moment the revenue streams are out of kilter and recent adjustments have not achieved a better balance.

At the moment Equipment Manufacturers have little incentive to innovate with margins falling over the last two years to less than 5%. If Ericsson, Nokia Siemens Networks or Nortel cannot find a reason to invest in developing new data solutions then what chance the Mobile Internet? The current Mobile Broadband has placed a massive load on the OSS and BSS systems in Mobile Networks as 5% of users are consuming two thirds of all data on the network. Whilst Huawei have excelled in the development of HSDPA/HSUPA/HSDP+ as they have taken marketshare to the point that today sees them leading the field; what will motivate them to create the flat architecture needed to open the mobile web?

The content space is no better with those that provide free content doing better than those who have a subscription service. The quality of the network means that very few attempts to watch streaming media by myself have been a success. Efforts by Networks to impose additional standards have resulted in displacing successful content with bland services that nobody wants. The iTunes platform is not something loved by Artists because the economics are wrong however the portal approach of Mobile Networks seeks to replicate this.

The battle between Handset Manufacturers and Mobile Networks seems to have swung to much in favour of the Networks. Sony Ericsson joined others in reporting a slowing of sales this year and a lowering of its average selling price. This means that they will expect to get a better return on the investment it makes in handset design which means that we can expect handsets to stick around longer. The only people I know who upgrade the firmware on a phone are iPhone users who are prompted to do so when they connect the device to a computer rather than over the air. To many early adopters have attempted to do so on other devices and turned them into bricks because of Operator profiles. If we slow the rate of release of new handsets then we will slow the rate of innovation as this is the only way that we can seed new services. We are now looking a handset makers moving towards three platforms in a way similar to the computer market with Windows Mobile, Symbian and Linux. This lowers the cost of deployment for Mobile Networks and makes the developers lives easier because the APIs needed will be smaller.

Recent projects have seen me look at the launch of Mobile Banking in the US. Over the last year they have managed to get over 8M Consumers to move from the Internet to the Phone. Some are just doing simple queries whilst just under half are making payments. This market is serviced by a wide range of service enablers who have acted as trusted providers sitting between Banks and Mobile Networks. All in the process share the rewards in a federated approach no one is talking about "my customers" rather it is about users. Dependent on the handset and my financial needs I can Bank using SMS, Browser or Java Aplet. All those working in Mobile Banking have a common evolutionary path that sees them working towards Mobile Payments and then Mobile Wallet over the next 2-3 years. They will include Store Cards, Coupons, NFC, Access and Keys in the evolutionary steps. They are all able to work on the development of functionality because they have a framework that is stable thanks to the Federated approach.

The work of the European Commission seems to be to reduce the mobile premium to zero via regulation.

Taking all of the points above I would hope that Stratergy in Vodafone would apply some degree of logic that says its time to make a massive change otherwise we face the risk of becoming a dumb pipe. If European Networks do not change the way that they deal with partners then they will find themselves by passed. The difference between fixed and mobile is that mobile has the payments mechanism built in thus connected consumers with retailers the mobile network could take a commission on the sale. If Vodafone were to look outside of Telecoms and say we will become a facilitator in the same way as Tecso's Clubcard provider the ARPU will not come just from handset user but from those that want to communicate with them; this is after all the plan of Blyk. Better software installed at the level of the base station could improve the information that the Mobile Networks gather and thus aid knowledge about the users. At this moment my Network providers know very little about me or my useage of mobile as I us more than one network and so simple bill anaysis fails.

In Europe rather than buying new subscribers the focus needs to be getting more of the current subscribers wallet. As a mobile user we all have a budget, some of the most informed users are those with a limited budget. My daughters and their classmates have an excellent knowledge of prices for mobile and are innovating how they share content off network. What they present for Vodafone is a communication chanel which used correctly will provide revenues far greater than the amount they spend on connectivity. The FMCG community has an excellent knowledge of Brands and are will to pay for a conversation with small groups who they can get to spend money on increasing the money they already spend on a product.

If you look at the failure of WiMAX, IMS, MMS ..... to find a market you will see that one common feature is the lack of a common ecosystem. Perhaps if these technologies had first attempted to form a Federation then they would have been a success? Vodafone has the power thanks to size and footprint. Does it have a CEO prepared to change the game?

Some quick thoughts

Have been busy causing trouble and disrupting poor thinking in some of the big clients that I consult for.

On one level I am ashamed by some of the thinking that I have seen from the Blue Chip Strategy Houses and have to hope that clients will reject the invoices when they are presented. However I fear that the fact that people were not fired if IBM were hired rings true when it comes to Bain and McKinsey.

Over the last week I have been forced to look at the published analysis of Mobile Broadband in Europe more than I would have chosen to. Clients have asked will we see the Mobile Networks follow the fixed in becoming just a dumb pipe? The one thing that I think will stop this is the payment relationship that the mobile networks have, if you already have one payment mechanism why would you need to invent a new one as you did with pay pal on the fixed internet. I also think that Voice could play an important part in the new data services that we will use. Vox shows some of the possibility with turning you voicemail into text. My Opera browser on the desktop shows some of what might happen with its voice controls. Before you buy into mobile broadband, the situation in Sweden, Finland or Austria is not something that can be used for the Globe or even the five biggest European markets on the basis of population. PC ownership in Spain and Italy is far lower than in Northern Europe for a start.

What are Nokia doing with Symbian?

Since the departure of Psion from the party it started Nokia have controlled the shape and direction of Symbian. We are told that Symbian leads the Smartphone market in terms of sales globally. However do Symbian phone's demonstrate that they are smart? When I was a Psion user you had a community of geeks who developed and exchanged software which they hoped they could replicated on Phones. They failed because the Networks were closed to personalisation that was more than just wallpapers and ringtones. I have explained that I see handsets as looking somewhat like the computer market of the mid-1980's in that we have too many Operating Systems. Only history will prove if Symbian was the DOS3.1 of mobile OS rather than VAX. The power of Nokia has put Symbian at risk because of its close association. At the moment all I see is Nokia saving money paying licence fees and the demise of S40 because the only reason it is used at present is because it has a lower charge. If they both have a zero cost Nokia will Supersize the OS with S60.

Was Motorola's new handset the last roll of the dice? This weeks new handset with its Kodac 5Meg Camera was behind the curve once again. Is this something to show that they still are around in the hope that they can find a buyer? Will be interested in seeing how public Huawei are about the PE House offers for a stake in their Handset Business. Should give an idea as to just what my old Motorola shares are worth not that I expect to be able to more than buy the family a round of ice creams with the "profits"!

Today's FT shows that what some Vodafone shareholders wanted may be about to come to pass with the Head of Verizon talking about taking control and buying assets overseas. The new CEO faces a challenging time when he takes the top job at Vodafone. I expect that those in Newbury are on for exciting times for the next 12 months.

So just how do the mobile data evangelists square this then?

I am trying to finish two blog posts at present but things keep getting in the way.

Just had to post about Ewan's problems with Vodafone and data charges.

His solution following a chat with another member of the Customer Service team is no long term solution but rather a way to exit a contract that he feels is unfair.

I had a similar issue with the rates that Orange wanted to charge me for unlimited data useage last year. The good news was that I had the name and number of the head of the executive office and after a short call managed to get the to fix the problem and refund the over charge. It took them two months to resolve the issue. It also highlighted holes in the billing systems used by the operator.

So with a disconnect between Marketing and Operations just how will the networks enter the market? Ewan is now unhappy with both T-Mobile and Vodafone. He intends to try 3 on the basis of cost. In a market that sees everyone who wants a mobile having two the networks need to retain customers. With termination rates falling they seek to replace declining revenues from Voice by selling people something new, Data. This sale is not informed as they have little understanding of what a normal user consumes and so cannot price accordingly. With the investments made in 3G the Network needs to find some form of ROI or it will not build the networks, see O2.

If all those who spoke at Mobile Portal Strategy last week are to deliver the vision of Mobile they hold then they have to remove the bill shock. Why did Vodafone not have a Credit Control process in place that gave Ewan a warning that he had used his allowance and then it was his dicision to stop or pay through the nose? Ewan is not the only one to be surprised by the cost of Data. The Bloke in the Pub effect will mean that Mobile Data falls into the WAP is C**P sector if the networks do not quickly resolve pricing.