The Mirage of Mobile Number Portability

Just like a thirsty traveller in a desert follows the mirage thinking that its water, Indian mobile subscribers have been waiting for mobile number portability for long. Little do they know that when mobile portability actually arrives, it’ll only be a mirage of what they hope for!! Mobile Number Portability is the ability for a subscriber to carry their mobile phone numbers and switch operators. Thus, by just paying a small fees of Rs. 19/- you would be able to change your mobile operator and still keep your same phone number.

Mobile Number Portability (MNP) exists in a lot of countries. Basically in most of these places, mobile numbers are considered as assets or belongings of an individual, similar to your house address. In India, it is being advertised by operators as an opportunity for customers to move to a ‘better’ operator, when you are dissatisfied with your current operator… and this is exactly why I say it’s a mirage!

Every operator has some number of customers who don’t like their service. From most people I have talked to, every operator has this group of dissatisfied customers. But since anyone who was dissatisfied would previously just change their phone numbers, it wasn’t a big deal for these customers… They are so fed up with the operators that they have already moved to the next operator. On the other hand, people who cannot change their phone numbers because the phone number is really important for them, generally adjust with the operator and the ecosystem balances itself naturally like any mature market does. What Mobile Number Portability is not doing is changing the infrastructure or the technology deployed by the operators. It does not change the policies, tariffs or customer service of the mobile operator. For a sector which is somewhat saturated in a lot of circles, it really is not much of a change agent.

If the reports from the pilot in Haryana is anything to go about, there really hasn’t been a large change in the customer base and market shares of the mobile operators. Other than Idea, most operators have not advertised a lot about MNP. Most operators are following a wait and watch policy and not many want to be first-movers in grabbing customers from others. Its been over a month for MNP in Haryana and that should have been enough to see the change factors because of MNP. But the lack lustre effects of MNP have shown that it is something that the market and the customers are not enthusiastic about. May be in other circles the market might be more dynamic, but we’ll only know when the nation-wide launch happens on 20th Jan, 2011. It will be interesting days to see how the different telecom circles work their way in the post-MNP era.

I think of the mobile operators today like politicians. Everyone is dissatisfied with politicians. There is always something to complain about them. Still you expect everyone should be voting and democracy should run smoothly.

Google Should Sell Web Data In 2008

2007 was probably the year when Google announced a lot of new innovations and Google started improving search. Few changes to Google's ad system were also done which is Google's main money-maker. But one thing which is not good for any company is relying too much on one thing to make the bucks like Google does with Adsense & Adwords. Thus, Google really needs other sources of revenue.

Internet market research is a good business these days. A few companies are already making it big like Alexa, Comscore, Compete, Inc, Nielsen//NetRatings, Hitwise, and Quantcast.  And as online advertising increases, marketers would want to know more about the users. I think with the kind of data Google owns about web users, it could easily sell this as marketing data. Some people would argue that Google already gives some idea about the users through adwords, but that data is mostly from external sources. Data from gmail, orkut, analytics, adsense and other Google services would be more comprehensive and that would mean very accurate data. Accurate also in the sense that Adsense ads are shown everywhere on the net and users could be tracked easily across different sites. This would mean that no one will question the accuracy of the results shown through Google's vast data.

With Google acquiring DoubleClick and FTC clearing all the paperwork, it seems Google will know a lot about everyone. Thus in 2008, I think Google will find another revenue stream by providing data for Internet market research.

Asus Doesn't Think India As A Market

While I was reading this interview at the Inquirer, I couldn't stop thinking of Asus' state of affairs here in India. The interview is with Asustek President, Jerry Shen.

Asus has no doubt been an excellent company in terms to product innovation and business growth, but there are few questions about its service to customers. Jerry Shen being outspoken doesn't bother to mince his words about other companies like Nvidia or AMD. But when he talks about those points, I think he forgets that atleast in India (and the reactions on Inq tells more) the service for Asus products hasn't been anywhere close to even "Satisfactory".

The customer troubles can be read at different forums like techenclave.com, thinkdigit.com etc. But if anyone is expecting any improvements in the service then read the interview again!! Jerry Shen mentions only about US, Europe and to some extent Japan and China as his markets. Although the Indian PC market is growing enormously, Asus seems to have completely ignored India as well as other Asian markets. Maybe he mentions, high-end to be his interest and India is not a high-end market. But then it somehow reflects the ignored state of Asus products and service in India.

Even after all that, Asus has the largest market share of motherboards in India. The products that Asus has in the market are wonderful and top-notch, but I wish, they didn't completely alienate the Indian consumer...