Next Generation Communications Blog

Wireless

10 Ways to drive mobile data growth through the youth market

By Daisy Su, Senior Strategic Marketing Manager, Corporate Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent (@daisysu)

Last week, I talked about mobile operators are building an overall brand experience that engages young consumers because the youth segment is valuable — and do influence adult segments. In addition to creating a youth brand or a youthful brand, mobile operators must also consider how to craft specific offers that promote the “mobile data first” experience to drive mobile data growth through the youth market.

Here are the 10 ideas that can help craft the “mobile data first” offers using an online charging solution (OCS)

Build a Brand Experience that Engages Young Consumers

By Daisy Su, Senior Strategic Marketing Manager, Corporate Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent (@daisysu)

I’ve received a lot of questions from mobile operators, who are asking about mobile data growth and how it’s related to the youth market — meaning consumers from the age of 18 to 25 or sometimes 18 to 22. The mobile operators’ own research shows that the youth segment is valuable — and influences adult segments. The Business Case for Youth section of the Mobile Youth Report also says: “The youth market is worth $1 trillion dollars. Youth drive high-end smartphone markets. Youth have the highest lifetime value of all customers.” As a result, mobile operators around the world are taking notice of young consumers, and some are investing in a new youth brand to attract that segment. 

Shared Data Plans: A Tool for Attracting and Retaining Subscribers

Alcatel-Lucent’s Rich Crowe opens a new chapter of the Six Degrees of Mobile Data Plan Innovation blog series by examining consumer interest in shared data plans.

Shared data plans have become popular with mobile operators. Today, 19 of the world’s 25 largest mobile operators by subscriber base size[1] offer data-sharing options. Many others are following suit and offering subscribers the ability to connect several users or devices to the same pool of mobile data.

For operators, the addition of shared data plans is about clearing new paths to market expansion, subscriber stickiness and bottom-line growth. But what do mobile consumers think of shared data? What factors make them more or less likely to embrace it? And what impact does it have on whether they stick with a mobile operator?

We Ask the Experts: How Can VoLTE Outperform Circuit-switched Services?

By Jean Jones, Director, Wireless Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent

This second blog in our series begins a discussion of the most basic, yet crucial voice over LTE (VoLTE) question: How can you make sure your 4G voice service works as well — if not better — than familiar 3G wireless services. Your subscribers’ expectations are high now, as VoLTE services are launched on a larger scale. And they’re looking for carrier-grade quality.

To satisfy these expectations (and reap all the benefits of VoLTE), you need to start with a new way of thinking about service deployment. According to the VoLTE experts I’ve talked to, that means developing an end-to-end strategy. Then, ideally, carrying out your plan with the help of a cross-functional team.

We Ask The Experts: A Blog Series on Real-World VoLTE Deployments

By: Jean Jones, Director, Wireless Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent

The reasons for deploying voice over LTE (VoLTE) are simple and straightforward. The service delivers better voice quality, boosts efficiency and opens up a wider world of revenue opportunities. But the process of deploying VoLTE is more intricate. And it involves unique considerations that are still unfamiliar to many wireless network providers.

That’s why we’re launching a new blog series, based on my interviews with our VoLTE experts. Each blog will offer key lessons and tips to help your VoLTE deployment proceed smoothly and successfully. These insights come straight from our team’s experience with leading VoLTE deployments in North America.

The Secret Value of VoLTE -- Helping Enterprises Cut the Cord

By Ed Elkin, Director, IP Platforms Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent 

Businesses are always looking for new and better ways to reduce costs and boost productivity.  For decades, they’ve relied on customer premise systems that are increasingly inflexible and costly for today’s needs.  Now, voice over LTE (VoLTE) and cloud changes that old scenario, enabling the enterprise CIO to implement a mobile-first strategy that includes an ever-changing application mixture.  It gives enterprises a way to cut costs dramatically for employees who are on the move — while setting the stage to enhance all employees’ productivity.

This opportunity is a generational shift for Enterprises and Service Providers.  I’ll discuss the mobile aspect in this blog — the second in my three-part series on the value of VoLTE.  You should also check out Bryan Davies’ blog series to hear his ideas on how you can meet the changing needs of the enterprise.

The Secret Value of VoLTE

By Ed Elkin, Director, IP Platforms Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent 

At Mobile World Congress, I discovered that many network providers still aren’t aware of the broader business values of voice over LTE (VoLTE).  Most knew it readily includes HD voice for clearer calls and reduced background noise, which lets you feel like you’re standing right next to the other person. Most didn’t realize that, in unexpected ways, VoLTE helps them earn more money and increase efficiency.

An Open Access LTE Approach Offers Advantages

An Open Access LTE Approach Offers Advantages

Mae Kowalke, TMCnet Contributor

I must admit that currently I don’t use LTE as much as I write about it. However, this is not for lack of wanting LTE, but rather because I live in the woods where there is not enough coverage. It is more a failure of policy than a failure of technology.

I’m not alone, and the question of how to bring LTE and the societal benefits of comprehensive mobile broadband coverage to the US and other countries is an important discussion.

Recently Bell Labs Advisory Services, the research arm of Alcatel-Lucent, looked at the various models for rolling out LTE in hard to reach places in an interesting paper, Open Access LTE: Reducing LTE Deployment Costs for Rural Broadband Coverage.  What it found was that open access LTE, where a single entity owns the spectrum and deploys a nationwide LTE network that then is rented out to mobile network operators, offers significant advantages.

The research showed that adopting an open access LTE strategy could deliver up to a 50 percent increase in adoption over the traditional approach of having each mobile network operator build out their own system.

Metro Transport Networks Need to Get More Efficient or Choke on Tomorrow's Data

Mae Kowalke, TMCnet Contributor

Metro transport networks are in for a rough ride in the next few years if steps are not taken to ameliorate the impending bandwidth challenge they will face.

Metro networks are expected to grow in traffic by 560 percent by 2017, according to a recent Alcatel-Lucent TechZine post, Retool Metro Transport Networks with Packet-Optimized WDM. That’s because, thanks to the cloud and increasing video usage, the percentage of overall network data is increasingly happening in metro networks. In 2012, 57 percent of data traffic terminated in the metro network. By 2017, according to Alcatel-Lucent estimates, 75 percent will terminate in metro networks.

The short-term solution is to add bandwidth through the addition of higher capacity 100G-capable transport systems. But this is only a quick fix.

Alcatel-Lucent CEO Michel Combes says Europe Must Stop its Cellular Race to the Bottom

Mae Kowalke, TMCnet Contributor

As leaders in Europe debate whether the EU is “back” during the World Economic Forum, the region is increasingly falling behind when it comes to telecommunications, according to Alcatel-Lucent CEO Michel Combes.

“There is a real danger,” noted Combes in a recent blog post on Europe’s digital divide (published in the Wall Street Journal, “that Europe is losing ground in the information era.”

That’s because there is an increasing gap between what the latest smartphones can deliver and what Europe’s telecommunications companies can support due to a price war that inhibits infrastructure upgrades.

“Europe is locked in a vicious circle of competition focused exclusively on price, one that forces operators to reduce their investments and destroys their innovation capacity,” noted Combes. “This type of competition is bad news for a digital Europe and its consumers.”

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