Development of services is being held back by the self interest of the main vendors, says Monte Silver, who perceives a ‘Great Industry Conspiracy’.

Since GPRS, the hype surrounding non-SMS data applications has been constant.  In Cannes/Barcelona, one can easily identify the annual killer-application. Mobile internet (WAP), MMS, streaming and mobile TV have all enjoyed the spotlight, but none have delivered the mass-market. While there can be no single explanation for this failure, this article argues that these services have failed because they have primarily been generated to serve the interests of industry – network and handset vendors, and to a lesser degree the operators. 

Vendors promote services which favour perpetual network and handset upgrades.  Operators promote portals to strengthen their brand. Unfortunately, the user is low on the totem pole. Although we all hold devices and are constantly pressing their buttons, we have not adopted data services. This article argues that if services continue to favor vendors and operators, rather than focus on client-oriented user and usability issues, DVBH and HSDPA networks will be launched, but not used either.

Seeking to exploit the internet revolution, the leading handset and network vendors saw a huge opportunity in GPRS if they could persuade cellular operators to upgrade networks and market internet-enabled handsets. There was only one way to off-set declining voice ARPU, it was argued, and that was by tapping into the ‘pent-up’ demand for mobile data, anytime, anywhere. Mobile internet was positioned as a natural extension of the PC experience and flattering analyst reports all agreed.  Mobile internet hysteria was born. 

Late 2000 marked the deployment of the first major WAP services in Europe.  Ericsson and Nokia’s combined network sales that year was approximately $23.7 billion. In addition, Nokia sold 128,000,000 handsets, generating €21.8 billion. Operators searched for the killer GPRS application. Users found WAP, however, to be CRAP. Notwithstanding, with global networks emerging, operators needed to build strong global brand. The WAP portal was born. While teens continued to download ringtones, logos and games, and people SMSed themselves, the portals remained the domain of early-adopters only.

Despite the failure of WAP, vendors were now focused on the next really big thing – MMS which, of course, required new handsets. MMS was positioned as the natural evolution of SMS. But the user experience of the native client was horrible. Opening the MMS client required several clicks. Composing a combined visual and audio was close to impossible. Add operator interoperability issues and the need for a compatible handset on the receiving side. Operators could not commercialize MMS, so simply stuck poor quality photos on the portal to download. As an end result, MMS and picture messaging has disappointed everyone but the handset vendors. In 2000, about 400,000,000 handsets were sold. In 2004, 257 million camera phones were shipped worldwide, representing approximately 39 percent of total handset sales. In 2004, Nokia sold 207.7 million units, all with color screens. 

The 3G opportunity
PC-based internet was evolving towards broadband and rich-media. Mobile broadband (3G) presented the vendors with an opportunity to completely replace existing networks and sell more phones. GPRS, they argued, could not support rich-media, and mass-adoption would congest the networks. There was only one solution: UMTS. 

As only a few UMTS licenses were tendered per country, operators could not afford to be left behind, so they played along. In the UK, five operators paid 35.4B for UMTS licenses.  In Germany, six licenses cost the operators $46 billion. In 2002, the first year of large-scale UMTS network sales, operators paid vendors $45 billion. Ericsson and Nokia received about 43% of this amount. 

Vendors direct network and service evolution primarily for their benefit, not for that of operators or users. The focus on mobile TV is a perfect example.  Watching countless live TV demonstrations at Symbian developer events and at recent 3GSMs, it was clear that streaming/mobile TV applications have had the vendor spotlight for years.  The reason is simple. Of all the rich-media services, streaming generally, and mobile TV specifically, places the greatest demand on the radio network, the most precious network resource. So by promoting these services, vendors are forcing operators to upgrade networks and phones with each new radio technology. 

Streaming is more demanding than other types of services for several reasons.  Firstly, viewing content involves delivering and viewing content in real-time. Content is not stored so delivery and viewing occur simultaneously. Secondly, to meet this real-time requirement, the radio link between the user and network must be sufficiently broad and consistent to enable the user to watch the content smoothly, without delays. GPRS, the vendors argued, could not deliver the requisite bandwidth. Rather, UMTS was required. 

Inherent problems
There are several inherent problems with streaming. Firstly, streaming over any cellular network (even UMTS) has proven problematic. One only has to commute on a trial or enter a metro station to know that network access is not constant. Secondly, and more importantly, cellular networks can not guarantee constant bandwidth throughout a viewing experience. The radio resource is limited.  When few data subscribers are in the cell, bandwidth is available. When more enter, bandwidth is shared. Thus inconsistent streams and poor user experience are inherent. The situation is worse in crowded areas or peak times, which is usually when services are used. Thirdly, rich-media (even mobile TV) can be delivered in other ways which are more radio-efficient and user-friendly, as will be discussed below.

Clogged networks
Operators realized that even moderate adoption of streaming in peak hours would clog the networks. So they pixilated and shortened the content and, like MMS, stuck it on their portals. We, the users, continued to stand on the sidelines, while vendor and operator solutions served their needs, not ours.
Next came mobile TV. Mobile TV is like streaming, only it involves the real-time streaming of ‘always-on’ multiple-channel TV, delivered to many users simultaneously. It sounds complex. It is complex. However, as with Mobile Internet and MMS, the vendors took a popular experience – TV in this case – and just added ‘mobile’. A natural evolution. 

A simple analysis of the network data capabilities readily display the many current problems, as well as the futuristic network/handset features that would have to be in place before mobile TV is possible. Firstly, current UMTS networks can not deliver a decent stream to a few users in a cell. Delivering multiple always-on channels to multiple users on current UMTS networks is not technically feasible. Aware of this, the vendors have introduced solutions that this time, they claim, will solve the radio problems and enable the delivery our much-loved TV to the mobile user. HSDPA today and MBMS tomorrow are the solutions, each requiring their own network upgrades and handset replacements. Alternatively, Nokia is championing DVBH, which requires building entirely new non-cellular networks, not to mention the need for new Nokia handsets.

One would expect that the industry will eventually ask fundamental questions before investing billions on new network components, frequencies and user services. However, the tendency to believe the latest hype is strong. No one wants to ignore industry leaders, analysts or the media, or allow the competitor to move forward alone. However, at some point, should one not suspect the message from an interested messenger?

The key message is this: it’s user and usability issues, stupid. We, the users, are constantly holding and pressing our phones, looking for things to do with it.  However, an immediate user experience on the client is mandatory. Instant access to content and functionality is a must.  The service is the client.  It is what the users sees,  and can press and can use immediately.  Thus, to take user and usability factors into account means promoting a client experience that provides an immediate access to resident content and functionality.

Emerging alternatives
Despite the vendor and operator structural bias, numerous independent alternatives have emerged which address user and usability issues. For example, On-Device Portals (ODP) seek to overcome the WAP interface by providing client-based immediate access to locally-resident content that mirrors the operator portal. ODP deliver sample content to the handset in the background, usually ringtones, wallpapers and sample MMS clips.  This allows the user to effectively and immediately discover the content on the handset, without a WAP connection. Accessing and purchasing the full-version still requires a WAP session, but it is greatly abbreviated. The win for the user is an immediate on-device experience with an attractive GUI. In addition, the access and purchase processes are expedited.  The operator wins sees greater revenue from content consumption. Furthermore, the ODP generally mirrors, and thus leverages, the existing portal. ODPs currently operate on existing Symbian devices with Java support emerging. 

A second area is that of background download. Client-based background download delivers high-quality rich-media files to the handset without any user-activity required. Whether overnight or while in the pocket, the device receives rich-media content transparently. That content is resident on the handset for immediate viewing when and where the user wants. No WAP sessions are needed.

Background download services are typically subscription oriented, with users subscribing to specific channels, such as video/music clips, TV mini-series or Podcasts. The win for users is that top quality content is immediately available for viewing when and where the user wants. Where once the consumption of media by train/underground commuters was difficult, with background download, captive commuters are the target audience. From a network perspective, congestion is eliminated. Background downloads can be scheduled off-peak. In addition, by avoiding real-time delivery, high quality lengthy content can be delivered. Background download services work on existing Symbian and Java MIDP2 handsets. 

The client approach has one major drawback: the client must be customized per handset type, and installed on the handset. Deployment of non-native client solutions adds significant levels of complication. However, many examples of successful deployments of advanced non-vendor client-server services exist.  Instant Messaging by Vodafone, Verizon Wireless’ BREW-based converged IM solution, and Push-to-Talk are but a few examples. The network and handset vendors will dislike the client view. Non-real-time services mean using the existing networks better. Furthermore, the clients are developed by others. Worse, the client works on existing, not futuristic handsets. 

To summarize, cellular data networks and devices have significantly evolved since voice and SMS. Being vendor driven, data network and service evolution has been, and will remain, technology dependant, with each specific technology requiring expensive network and device enablers. 

Will real-time services such as mobile TV remain industry favorites? Yes. Will the portal remain dominant? Yes. However, upcoming client solutions are placing emphasis on user and usability issues. At the end of the network is the user holding a phone. If the user is to use that phone for services, the on-device experience must be immediate and attractive. This requires a client approach. 

Implementing a client solution is not trivial. However, considering the investments to date in networks, frequency, marketing and device subsidies, a slight shift in focus toward user and usability might actually show some return.

With mobile operators adopting triple and quad play strategies, either through partnership or direct ownership, do they need to adopt their billing strategies to allow the mobile to become the prime engine of content billing?

Richard Owen, vp of sales and business development at mobile payment services provider Upaid, thinks there is still plenty of mileage in premium SMS for the lower ticket items, the digital downloads that we are now all familiar with.

“PSMS continues to be strong, and there is not a lot of evidence it is diminishing,” he says.

“It’s a good fit for the content that’s there. But for more feature rich content, and when services such as TV on mobile become mainstream, that demands different payment methods.”

One of the drivers for a different payment method is purely the risk involved in putting large ticket items on a  mobile bill.

“Operators are all OK with it (PSMS) up to the €5 level, and then beyond that they get a bit nervous from a risk point of view” Owen says.

Tanla Mobile’s Global Business Development Director Gautam Sabharwal, whose company has provided premium SMS platforms in the UK and India, also says that he doesn’t see PSMS volumes dropping off in the near future.

“Even though it’s not very elegant, some applications are unique to it, he points out”

Gautam says that the mobile content market has now created space for providers who are “not just a pipe into the networks but provide a value added service”.

He says that it is important to have a platform to allow content developers to set up services without needing deep technical knowledge of all the steps required for integration with a mobile operator.

“Quizzes, voting applications, WAP sites to manage content, these are the areas we can make it simpler to keep services integrated with the billing interface.

For Owen, the big change for mobile operators is that they are getting into a world where they compete head-on with other retailers and channels.

“If the mobile plan is that it is going to dominate your life and outstrip PC and internet consumption, then from the operators’ perspective they have to put themselves into that part of food chain.

“If you are a prepay customer, then feature rich content is going to gobble through your pre-pay allowance very quickly. You’ll see significant chunks taken out of it when you download content. So people will tend to use other methods, and perhaps even modes of delivery.”

Which of course would cut the operator out of the game. One example Owen gives is that of a MMC with a list of DVDs pre-loaded onto it. If you see a film you like then you are sent a code to unlock that film.

“In the MMC model — operators could be completely obviated by that process,” Owen warns..

Of course, for Owen, a payment services provider such as Upaid solves that problem, by tying the operator into the process, with “no change of requirement on the operator billing side”.

“From an operator perspective it means their business is running slightly differently in terms of bill presentment and payment. Even on OTA recharge it provides them with real time decisions on when customers can be topped up.”

Real time decision making on content services, how to bill for it and which deals to offer, is exactly what Qpass, now the digital content division of billing giant Amdocs, is all about.

Amdoc’s Qpass 6.0 is a horizontal software system which packages in meaningful ways to subscribers, across a variety of channels.

Roger Parks, vp product at Qpass, says operators are taking the first steps in terms of user experience to drive sales, but are still not acting like retailers – in terms of concepts such as segmentation and promotion.

“Operators have a huge catalogue, so how can they optimise for the discovery of content? It’s about presentation coupled to a delivery mechanism.”

“Qpass 6 enables them to build complex rules in real time, plus an interface to the marketing user layer, so product managers can build propositions themselves. They can put together different rules to enable that promotion, passing the billing system a pre-rated event.”

For Parks, integrating partner management, payment, CRM processes as well as content management and delivery, operators can manage sales on, near and off portal in a holistic way, no matter the channel or device in use.

In the end, content billing seems to be not so much about the billing, as the management of the processes to present the even to the billing system. And that is where the real value lies.

In the past, service providers have dictated to their customers what types of services they can have, based largely on the capabilities of the network, but what if the network could repsond to customer needs. Can a new concept, knitting together the OSS, BSS and network layers provide the answer?

“Today’s models are going to fall apart when IPTV and other multi-service offerings are offered,  and there is going to be a major customer retention issue,” says Yair Sakov, VP Marketing & Business Development at FTS.

“Operators are facing the need to create new revenue sources, and the issue over the past 12 months is there has been no killer application. No new SMS2 — MMS is not there and 3G is not there in huge volume. So if there is none then they need new sources, and that means real time response to address the needs of our instant society.”

Sakov argues that going beyond mobile into multiplay and multiple services means operators will face intense competition, and for their product to be perceived as viable they need to deliver the value of that proposition beyond taking separate bills and stapling them together.

To address this multi-service, real time need, Sakov says that the industry needs to develop a new market segment, named the business control layer.

“The business control layer sits between the network and the OSS and BSS. It’s a technical concept to increase revenues and improve customer experience. It’s a concept for the real time capture and  analysis of customer interactions.

“It means you can look at a billing event and extract value from that, by offering loyalty points, or a promotional offer for example. It’s about getting a service provider to push you an offer in the context of what you’re doing. And for the operator it offers real time revenue opportunities.”

Sakov is proposing a repartitioning of the billing system to create a new market segment. He wants to offer the ability to capture alerts and dynamically adapt the network’s behaviour itself on a customer level.

Billing, he says, has been offline, with prepaid rating siloed in real time in the network. What if you put the business logic of the service plan into the network layer?

That means,depending on what events are happening, instructing the network layer to give a good experience to a user undergoing a more time critical application. For instance, giving a call priority over a download. This in effect means allowing service providers to enable ‘Bandwidth-on-Demand’ meaning that customers can adapt and re-provision their service package whenever they want in real-time

In a multi-network architecture, the business control layer needs simultaneously to operate in multiple network infrastructures, responding to  events in real time and recognising that they all relate to one person, and then taking appropriate action.

“Doing this would allow operators to create a true cross network service, for example rewarding a customer if he spends an extra $10 on his mobile with a VoD on his cable service. There’s value Value beyond simple bundling,” Sakov says.

Sakov also says that such an approach would give a pragmatic transition to the IMS environment, offering IMS value within today’s networks.

Paul Hughes, VP Billing & Payment Strategies, Yankee Group comments, “As communication services become commoditised, the service providers that can reduce churn by giving customers an improved experience, whilst maximising ARPU are the ones that will prosper.  Business Control Layer is an important new technology that can give service providers the means to achieve that, and therefore realise an important competitive advantage.”

“In the past, service providers have dictated to their customers what types of services they can have, based largely on the capabilities of the network,” Karl Whitelock, Senior Consulting Analyst for Stratecast, says.

 “The Business Control Layer is what the industry needs right now; it allows service providers to recognise business events – not just billable transactions – thus allowing them to offer services that customers truly want.”

One company that has been working with the concept is Belgian ISP Telenet, which allows customers to self provision their bandwidth access, perhaps moving to narrowband for a period if they have run out of quota. Patrick Vincent, Vice President Customer Care & Delivery for Telenet says, “The implications on our business have been quite visible.  Since implementing a Business Control system from FTS, calls relating to this service (Telemeter) have been reduced by 40%. In addition, 15% of customers who reach self-defined quotas have been electing to pay for additional bandwidth, thus increasing Telenet revenues.”

Perhaps the industry doesn’t need new acronyms, but the BCL may just answer a few needs.

Michael Lawton, Product Marketing Engineer, Electronic Measurement Group, Agilent Technologies UK, discusses the process of validating inter-RAT handover and cell transitions using two base station emulators.

The ability to perform handovers without interruption of service is a key requirement for all cellular networks. Historically the requirement has focused on supporting a voice call during handover for a given cellular technology. This situation has now changed with the need to support cell transitions for multiple services (voice, video and data) and to seamlessly encompass a variety of wireless technologies (GSM/EDGE, WCDMA/HSDPA). The increased scope of handovers has added significantly to the complexity of the conformance test requirements. The designers of User Equipment (UE) are now looking for more cost effective solutions, which provide both broad test coverage and support their needs for validation and regression testing.  This article describes the scope of this complexity and proposes a testing strategy that can be used to validate a User Equipment design.

I.  Cell Transitions
Cell transitions are a key requirement for all cellular networks. The range of transmission for a battery powered mobile device is limited. Hence, for good coverage it is necessary for the mobile to move from one cell to another as it roams around the network. The network also benefits from the reduced power by working with smaller cells and applying frequency re-use, which provides spectral efficiency benefits.

With the evolution of both networks and their corresponding services there has been a significant increase in the complexity of handovers. This complexity arises due to the following:

1. Network operators are offering a wider range of services – including voice, video and data – each of which will possess different handover needs.
2. Practical roll out of 3G networks dictates the need for handover between 3G and 2G in order to maintain service availability for 3G customers.

II. Testing Cell Transitions
Testing cell transitions is a critical part of the conformance testing process for a UE with both RF and signalling requirements specified for each of the different technologies. These tests are a mandatory part of the UE verification process. The need to support multiple cellular technologies (3G to 2G handover) and services means that the scope of this testing is significant. For signalling conformance alone the mobility management and packet switched mobility managements sections of the 3GPP 34.123 specifications have nearly 150 cell transition tests defined. In order to complete this testing a complex set up of six independent base station simulators is required. This testing is both time consuming and expensive, furthermore designers are increasingly finding that this testing is not sufficient. Whilst the conformance tests do test all the handover mechanisms, they do not perform the testing in conjunction with application servers running real applications. This can lead to performance issues when testing a UE with a real network.

To overcome this limitation designers are choosing to do additional validation testing based around the emulation of a real network.

Validation Testing
Here the testing is focused on functional performance using a “one-box tester” (OBT) as a base station emulator. The OBT needs to emulate the overall functionality of the base station, however, it is not required to offer a protocol scripting interface for running signalling conformance scripts. This simplification makes the testing easier to perform and reduces the costs significantly. A set-up with two OBTs can be used to test multiple different handover types for a variety of application servers. The approach can be used to run automated testing for a wide range of scenarios, for de-bug of known issues or problem areas, or for performing random testing within a limited time frame. Clearly this approach is not a replacement for the rigour of conformance testing. However, it can serve as a powerful tool for increasing the scope of the testing, as well as providing a more economic test strategy when performing validation and regression testing on new platforms.

III. 3G Handover
The term handover is used to describe cell transitions that happen during a voice or video call. These handovers are all network initiated and are categorised as intra-frequency, inter-frequency or inter-RAT (Radio Access Technology).  Within a WCDMA network, mobility between cells is managed by handover between different scrambling codes supported by the different cells all working on the same frequency (intra-freq). In this case it is possible for each base station to maintain it’s own link with the mobile, which allows the network to combine two signals and hence achieve a diversity gain at the edge of the cell. This mechanism is referred to as soft handoff diversity gain.

If the multiple links are formed from alternative sectors of the same base station (or node B) then it is referred to as softer handover. Strictly speaking this is a not an actual handover event but more a technique for improving signal quality. Using a One Box Tester such as the Agilent 8960 it is possible to simulate the effects of intra-frequency handover using a single instrument. This is achieved by using the OBT to manage multiple spreading codes.

It is sometimes necessary for a 3G handover to take place between frequencies. This may be done in order to maintain coverage or to balance the load between respective carriers. Inter-frequency handover is more complex than intra-frequency due to the fact that during a call, the receiver of a 3G phone is constantly listening to the serving base station. Therefore it either needs to make a handover without measuring the characteristics of the target cell or the phone needs to use what is termed compressed mode in order to make the necessary measurements. When a phone is instructed to make a handover without having gathered a measurement report for the target cell this is termed a ‘blind’ handover. In compressed mode the downlink transmission is briefly halted in order that the phone can make a measurement.

In order to support the period of no transmission on the downlink the signal just prior to and just after the break is sent with either a change to the spreading factor (and appropriate transmit power), or following a change to the higher layer scheduling. These changes are made so that the gap can be accommodated without significant loss of data.
 
One final handover type supported within 3G networks is the inter-RAT handover from a serving 3G to a target 2G cell. 3G networks use this to provide both 3G service hot spots and full 2G coverage for voice and low data services.  For single receiver mobiles the handover will either be blind or will use compressed mode in order to allow the mobile to measure a neighbouring 2G cell.

IV. 3G Packet Switched Data Cell Changes
3G cell changes arise either when the phone is idle, has a PDP (Packet Data Protocol) context, or is actively transferring packet switched data.

All mobiles that are either out of service or in an idle state need to be able to initiate a cell selection or idle mode cell re-selection procedure. This allows mobiles both to join the network and also to maintain network availability as they roam between cells in standby mode.  As a 3G mobile moves around the network it monitors each of the intra-frequency cells it can see within its ‘active set’. If the signal quality from the attached cell goes below a certain threshold, or an alternative cell becomes significantly better, then the mobile will initiate an idle mode cell reselection and attach to a new cell.

With 3G, once the phone has an active PDP context then all cell changes are network initiated by a packet cell change order command.
 
If there is an Inter-RAT packet cell change order during active data transfer then clearly there is a requirement for the physical radio bearers to be re-configured as the cell change takes place. If the capability of the two cells is significantly different then the re-configuration is likely to result in a change to the data rate. Using a base station emulator – in conjunction with real application servers – is very useful as it allows the user to test the actual experience of using this application in such challenging and dynamic conditions.

V.  HSDPA handovers
In addition to the handover and cell transitions described in section III and IV there are also some special cases relating to new physical layer technologies such as HSDPA (High Speed Downlink Packet Access).

HSDPA is a new technology for 3G which seeks to maximize downlink data throughput by using complex modulation schemes to exploit periods of favourable RF conditions. Mobility for HSDPA is different from W-CDMA packet switched data because HSDPA does not use soft handover. Instead the mobile monitors all base stations within its active set and informs the network when there is a change in the ‘best’ cell. The network then performs a cell transition and re-configures the HS-DSCH (High Speed Downlink Shared Channel).
 
 VI. Two Cell Test System Configuration
A LAN connection is used to facilitate message exchange between the two boxes. Prior to initiating cell transition commands the following set-up steps are required:
1. If remote control is required then establish GPIB connectivity to both units
2. Connect the OBT’s using either a single cross-over cable or a small Ethernet network (the network allows the use of both logging and application servers).
3. Configure each OBT to represent the two cells, ensure neighbour cells are configured correctly

This set-up is now ready for two-cell testing. Network initiated cell transitions are implemented either through the manual user interface or by sending the instrument a SCPI (Standard Commands for Programmable Instrumentation) command. The OBT receives measurement reports but does not use the information to perform any automatic handover choices, although the data is there to support this approach if required. The characteristics of a given cell change are determined by both the state of the serving cell (technology and active call type) and the settings for the target cell. For example, if on a WCDMA voice call with the second cell configured as a GERAN cell then an inter-RAT handover will be executed. In addition if the OBT has compressed mode enabled, then it will be instructing the mobile to take measurement reports. The instrument will receive and display the measurement report data but only perform cell changes as instructed by the user.

VII. Summary
This article has shown how two one box testers can be used to perform validation testing for the handover performance of a given UE. This kind of testing is not a replacement to the rigours of conformance testing. It is however a useful addition and offers the following benefits:
1. Cost advantages for OBT vs. scripting based testers
2. Ease of use through the programming of a command based base station simulator rather than writing C++ or TTCN scripts to drive a protocol signalling tester
3. Perform real world testing that incorporates application servers to test handover performance during a ‘live’ application, for example ftp or video streaming
4. Use of regression testing to ‘stress’ mobile and search for fault conditions.

While operators continue to sell to their end customers based on network coverage, behind the scenes monitoring of performance has got a lot more complex. Mobile Europe looks at how customer experience monitoring can benefit an operator’s total business case.

Recently, T-Mobile invited journalists to its Oxford Street store to witness a new service it was offering its customers. The operator was lanching a service which would let potential customers get a view of the level of network coverage within any given postal code.

Obviously T-Mobile’s aim was to provide proof to customers of the way in which it now monitors and improves network coverage, and use that as a sales tool at the actual point of sale.

This emphasis on network coverage is no doubt welcome news for those interested to make sure that they don’t buy a phone that turns out to be in a poor area of coverage at their home or work. But as a tool, it seems quite remote from the current rhetoric of the companies supplying the mobile industy with monitoring and measurement tools, which is that network benchmarking has gone far beyond jsut benchmarking the, er, network, and into the realm of measuring how individual services, applications and even devices are performing.

In short, some providers are now saying that just saying a cell has good coverage is not enough —  wouldn’t it be useful to provide real statistics on which services work well on which devices, even if it may not be the kind of information operators are yet willing to share with potential customers on the high street?

One of the players which is taking a different look at how to monitor and measure end user customer experience,is Keynote Systems. Keynote’s  Mobile Device Perspective 2.0 provides a hosted solution for mobile operators, content and service providers and infrastructure hosts that allow them to analyse their mobile content and services from the perspective of their subscribers.

What Keynote does is use real life devices in a test environment on an actual network. It can remotely command the mobile to carry out certain functions, and then record the results.

Haran Sold, vp and managing director of Keynote Systems, says the benefits affect everyone trying to develop services.

“If you take the example of a small game developer in the UK and India with an Italian operator client. The developer can put a real device on TIM’s network and access that device through a web interface. That opens the door to see how its content performs. Not only that but they can instruct the device to go through the process of buying and downloading the game, and can measure every step of that transaction.”

In the USA, Sold says, one operator wants to work with Keynote to benchmark how competitors are doing in MMS delivery, and to see how it is performing in different markets.

And as the mobile industry opens up to a host of content providers and players from the fixed internet world, Sold says such tools will give those players the ability to see how their content is experienced on any channel they put the content through.

Another company that is making a play to monitor customer experience, rather than mere network performance, is Argogroup.

James Pearce, chief operating officer of Argogroup, says there has been a change of thinking in the practice and purpose of monitoring.

“Traditionally, passive monitoring alone has allowed operators to observe bulk traffic through their networks and deduce what is working well, and what is not, in their network. But this never shows the whole picture, particularly what the users’ experiences actually were.
 
“So carriers are increasingly turning to active test. This alone is not a panacea, but provides an ‘outside in’ view of the network and how the users see it. It can ensure that synthetic, injected transactions succeed, and then extrapolate overall quality from that.”
 
This information can then be used to analyse whether the prioritisation of traffic is well-tuned.

“But only some carriers seem to actually make strategic, informed decisions about the complex relationship between traffic types, revenue, and subscriber value – in order to pro-actively get that prioritisation right,” says Pearce.
 
One of the issues Pearce identifies is that  operators can be excellent at moving bytes around, but poor at understanding the demands of wide varieties of content and media. For example, Argogroup used the World Cup to monitor how operators’ content services were performing, looking at video streaming, SMS alerts and other channels.

Pearce says that performance was “very patchy, with problems originating and integrating content (despite being able to move 160 characters out to a phone in a matter of seconds, alerts frequently arrived many minutes after the goals were scored). But it also demonstrated a degree of media un-savviness. At the time of kick off for the first match, one operator’s mobile portal was displaying a Mr Men promotion in place of anything football related.”
 
Pearce says that the Web, and especially Web 2.0 continues to show how it should be done.

“Alerts from web-based providers, such as from FIFA via Yahoo, arrived in a far more timely manner across all networks – and happened to be free,” he points out.
 
The idea of such an approach is clearly to help operators reduce lost revenue, by being able to see exactly what a customer mught be experiencing and doing something about it. But as operators face having to open up their networks to other providers, becoming channel partners as much as pure network operators, such information will give competitive advantage in being able to work with the best partners, and make it as easy as possible for applications developers to get a real view into how their product will work on the network.

“The capability for a developer in Seattle to download, test, and measure an application’s performance in real-time over a live network in London, Seoul, or Tokyo is enormously beneficial and cost-effective,” says Chetan Sharma, a communications consultant, identfying the real opportunity for what we might call benchmarking 2.0.

Does the failed Disney/ESPN MVNO mean the model is wrong?

With Disney Mobile saying its failed MVNO with ESPN will cost it $30 million, some have been quick to say that lower priced voice tariffs across the board now mean that MVNOs will not be able to make a business case based purely on low cost calls and texts.

And that seems fair enough, but in fact the reaction to the failure has been that Disney/ ESPN forgot that most people are after low prices and relied too much on brand power without developing a good enough value proposition.

We have been pulled up before for saying that to us, relying on brand to pull people to MVNOs was always an idea that was unlikely to fly. Well now it seems that Americans have not been brand loyal enough in this instance to switch service provider simply because the new guy was its favourite sports broadcaster. Yet Virgin Mobile is having some success in Europe and the USA. So is their success just due to a more compatible brand, or is there some other reason for their success?

The answer, according to Hugh Roberts, senior strategist at Logan Orviss International, is that Virgin has been able to do it marry its brand power with a primary goal to “innovate in the arena of customer value propositions.”

“Virgin knew its brand power wouldn’t be enough to cover a poor business model in mobile telephony, with the harsh landscape of this market,” he says.

But Logan Orviss also point out that to do this, Virgin invested in its own billing system and back office functionality. As it combines offerings from its merger with ntl:Telewest, it will give the MVNO a measure of control.

This is all in contrast to ESPN, which saw mobile as merely another channel for its content. Yet at the same time it was providing this content to other US mobile operators. So why would consumers want to switch?

The implications stretch not just to the business models of MVNOs, who in fact may have to actually operate more like operators than they may like, to the operators themselves, when they think about what value they are adding as they rush to set themselves as cross- platform media and content providers.

Orange has obviously invested a great deal in the power of its brand, pulling down Wanadoo and France Telecom, and also Equant in the corporate world, in favour of its integrated Orange name. Vodafone is hoping that wholesale access deals to enable it to become a DSL provider will not confuse its customers. Far from it, the bet is that customers will welcome getting their DSL, IPTV, fixed line telephony (or FMC equivalent) from the provider responsible for their mobile.

This much we all know, of course, but the Disney/ ESPN experience gives pause for thought. Consumers are more inert than we sometimes like to think in terms of switching service provider. Most go for price reasons, of course, but that’s not really a game that the big operators, with their flat growth rates, can really afford to get into right now. Brand extension, it seems, may not be enough on its own.