Editor’s Note: RCR Wireless News goes all in for “Throwback Thursdays,” tapping into our archives to resuscitate the top headlines from the past. Fire up the time machine, put on those sepia-tinted shades, set the date for #TBT and enjoy the memories!
Unlimited battles heat up
AT&T Mobility and Verizon Wireless have both announced new unlimited nationwide calling plans for $100 a month. The plans give customers unlimited calls to wireless and landline phones with no roaming or long-distance charges. Verizon Wireless’ new offering is available now while AT&T’s will be available Feb. 22. Carriers and mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) are slowly gathering around the idea of unlimited plans. Boost Mobile and Helio L.L.C. each separately tweaked their unlimited plans earlier this month. However, Sprint Nextel Corp. came out of the unlimited gate a year ago, offering one of the industry’s first unlimited plans from a national carrier as a trial offering in San Francisco. The No. 3 carrier expanded the offering to Minneapolis, Philadelphia and Tampa, Fla., in May 2007. The plan includes unlimited voice calling, text messaging, data, e-mail and picture messaging for $120 per month. … Read more
Consumer wireless policies take shape
The wireless industry’s campaign for a national policy framework picked up more traction, with a group of state regulators and a key member of Congress taking steps bring uniformity to wireless regulation and consumer protection. But the fight over cellular regulatory jurisdiction is far from over. At its winter meeting, the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners’ telecom committee approved a resolution to set up a national set of wireless consumer standards that would be enforceable by states. A 1993 law pre-empts states from regulating mobile-phone rates and market entry, but leaves to states oversight of terms and conditions of wireless service. The reserve clause has prompted some states to pursue regulation of the wireless industry, and has made mobile-phone operators vulnerable to consumer lawsuits suits. Meantime, House telecom subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey (D-Mass.) released a draft of a bill that would create new consumer safeguards for wireless subscribers’ and modify the existing jurisdictional regime without eviscerating state oversight of mobile-phone operators. The legislative draft would direct the Federal Communications Commission to initiate rulemakings on carrier disclosure of contract terms and charges, early termination fees, wireless service coverage maps, billing and service-quality monitoring. … Read more
Sprint Nextel shifts its headquarters to Overland Park
Sprint Nextel Corp. continued to chip off its Nextel Communications Inc. legacy, announcing today that it was consolidating its operational headquarters and corporate headquarters at its Overland Park, Kan., campus. The company’s corporate headquarters were previously housed at Nextel’s campus in Reston, Va. “After a thorough review, we determined that this change is necessary now so that our leadership team can concentrate on improving our company’s operations and create a single, performance-based culture,” said Sprint Nextel CEO Dan Hesse. The move was not a surprise as Hesse said the company was looking at such a move during a management shake up last month. Sprint Nextel said the move will require the relocation of “only a small number of executives,” and that it would improve operational performance by “immersing senior leaders in the company’s operations.” (No word on what the Reston-based executives were “immersed” in when away from Overland Park.) … Read more
Palm Centro goes GSM
One popular handset does not a successful vendor make. But in Palm Inc.’s case, the launch of its popular, $100 Centro smartphone at AT&T Mobility in a GSM, quad-band world format, may help the company recapture mindshare and produce cash flow. The Centro first surfaced at Sprint Nextel Corp. in late 2007 with limited exclusivity, now ended. At Sprint Nextel the Centro sold well, according to Palm. But component shortage issues constrained the device maker’s ability to deliver adequate supplies, a situation presumably overcome with the launch of a GSM version at market-leading AT&T Mobility. The quad-band GSM format also allows Palm to take its inexpensive smartphone to carriers outside the United States, an effort undoubtedly already underway. Having a popular handset on the market is especially critical to Palm as it retools its essential device platform to stop its descent in market share — mostly snapped up by Research In Motion Ltd. over the past few years — and reposition the company for the future. In financial terms, Palm last year raised $350 million in new financing with private equity, increased debt and attacked its cost structure to lower its breakeven point. The Centro’s brisk sales have contributed to a drop in Palm’s margins, from about 36% to 30%, according to Dow Jones, but CEO Ed Colligan said last week at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona that the Centro is bringing in new customers upgrading from feature phones and that was worth the margin decrease. … Read more
Mobile content market expected to grow
The worldwide mobile entertainment market will grow from about $20 billion last year to more than $64 billion by 2012, driven by music, games and mobile TV, according to a new report from Juniper Research. The report predicts mobile music will remain the largest sector within the mobile entertainment industry, growing from $9 billion last year to $17.5 billion in 2012, said Juniper. Availability of full-track download and streamed services will drive growth of mobile music, said the report. Mobile gaming is expected to follow mobile music in terms of end-user generated revenues, with revenues expected to increase to $16 billion in 2012 from $5 billion last year. Mobile TV revenues should rise from $1.4 billion in 2007 to $11.9 billion in 2012. “With revenues from voice services declining and messaging revenues flatlining, last year finally saw a number of more sophisticated entertainment services begin to fulfill their potential and redress the balance,” said Windsor Holden, author of the report. … Read more
Trip Hawkins of Electronic Arts, Digital Chocolate on mobile content
In the small world of mobile gaming, Trip Hawkins looms large. Hawkins designed his own major in applied game theory at Harvard University, and in 1982 founded Electronic Arts Inc., which continues to dominate console- and computer-gaming spaces. He launched Digital Chocolate Inc., a pure-play mobile publisher, in 2003, and quickly became a highly visible evangelist for wireless gaming. And while Digital Chocolate has yet to break into the top tier of publishers in terms of revenue, the company continues to receive rave reviews for its library of casual, connected games. We spoke with the member of the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame in advance of GDC Mobile this week in San Francisco. Q:Last year’s GDC Mobile was a sobering affair, with speaker after speaker bemoaning the industry’s failure to move beyond a niche market. What has changed in mobile gaming in the last year? A. One thing that has been going on is the migration of carriers in the Western world in terms of their ability to handle client-server applications, to (bring to market) handsets that know how to correctly route data traffic. We don’t want that to be confusing for the customer, or for them to go to the wrong place. Another thing that is moving forward is advanced billing systems. Verizon, with BREW, and Sprint Nextel built it themselves a long time ago, but it’s only recently that AT&T and T-Mobile added subscription capabilities. … Read more
Check out the RCR Wireless News Archives for more stories from the past.
