Metered Data Begins

Peter : On Rad's Radar?
Peter
| Peter Radizeski of RAD-INFO, Inc. talking telecom, Cloud, VoIP, CLEC, and The Channel.

Metered Data Begins

TWC and AT&T both trialed metered Internet access over wireline broadband. As far as I know, both trials were not that successful.

The big issue for ISP's is that the bandwidth consumption keeps increasing (as the Internet becomes the communication avenue as well as entertainment and news outlet). This doesn't bode well for Duopoly revenue long-term. Why? 

AT&T and VZ are spending a fortune to deliver TV via tripple-play to consumers. MSO's are spending another hundred billion on network upgrades to DOCSIS 3.0. (HDTV is certainly behind this and DirecTV has the lead here). All while competition for the pie has increased and ARPU has basically stagnated. Is the pie growing? Unlikely. Probably shrinking. And customer acquisition costs (along with marketing costs) have to be rising. No balance here at all.

So all we have left is the Internet bandwidth, since voice revenues are in decline.

For cellcos flat rate voice plans mean stalled ARPU as well. How do you pay for 3G, 4G, WiMax or LTE without continued revenue growth? As Gary Kim writes, Bandwidth and Revenue: Something has to give.

The only way to accomplish that is to raise rates. (Because as Business Insider diagrams, cellcos are hosed.) To start that AT&T has moved to metered data access charges. iPhone users will be angry!


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