Telecoms Supermarket India revealed a few months back that the next move in Mobile market will be a Mobile+Sim contract, which is very common and a strong selling point for mobile operators in UK. Although the consumers in UK have to pay for mobile phone and their contract is translated in Airtime and hardware charges.
Offering a 4G handset for nothing has to mean something for mobile operator, which in other terms means a user is signing into 3 years contract, and operator in other way will have a paying user and incoming revenue for stipulated term. Although none of the news have confirmed this yet but it’s a valid point that none of operators will give hardware for FREE.
Now coming to free phone; the cost of customer acquisition and customer retention are 2 major factors for mobile operators. So in essence the mobile operators will take a hit but in return will have a paying user for contracted term. As per JIO’s new offer, it seems the ARPU (Average revenue per user) will further dip down.
Soon all other mobile operators will follow this and cost of 4G mobiles will come down due to demand. The main point to ponder will be quality of the handset and what specifications mobile will be offered.
Needless to say this will be a hardcore acquisition call mainly in Rural areas.
28 days Pre-paid…..Whattttt?
Another catch in Indian Pre-paid market is 28 days funda. Nowhere in World is a month made of 28 days.
365 days / 28 days = 13.03 months
Now understanding this fundamental means we divide 365 days by 28 days. This shows that mobile operators for Pre-paid users get a month more revenue. Funny thing is postpaid users still are billed on 30 days or a normal monthly cycle.
Future of Mobile market in India
1. The Mobile market will change furiously over coming months and years where Postpaid users will have option to have a Free phone of their choice (Subject to hardware cost and contract term cost).
2. Content will be the next big thing. Users will get more of regional based content without using their free data allowance.
3. Mobile will be soon taken as a payment device as well where users can pay from their mobile phones exactly like debit/credit cards at POS (Point of Sale).
