A report commissioned by Allot Communications claims that 33% of operators are leveraging revenue sharing models and partnerships with cloud-based content providers such as Spotify to deliver mobile cloud services.
Allot said its second bi-annual Allot MobileTrends Charging Report is based on publicly available data, collected during Q2, 2012 from over 100 mobile operators worldwide.
The report's findings included:
- 46% of operators offer Value-based plans, with services such as parental control or music streaming
- LTE operators have embraced Value-based pricing in a similar manner as the 3G Operators
- Operators’ cloud is on the rise with 33% offering cloud-based services through partners such as Rhapsody, Spotify and Deezer
- 32% of operators charge for WiFi access (offload). The challenge for operators is to incorporate offloaded traffic into their policy control architecture
- The number or operators charging for tethering almost doubled over the past nine months from 15% to 29%, marking a rise in operator efforts to closely monitor and monetize the interminable surge in data consumption
Allot said that since its previous Report, released in Q3 2011, application-based plans, multi-device plans, time-shifting and parental control plans also becoming more common. And operators are also starting to recoup their losses on previously unbillable usage patterns. 32% of operators now offer paid WiFi access. The challenge for operators is to incorporate offloaded traffic into their existing policy control and charging architecture.
Comparing 3G and LTE pricing, the percentage of operators offering Value-based plans is identical. Despite the increased capacity available on LTE networks, it appears that operators are careful not to run into the congestion and declining ARPU issues now faced in 3G environments. Instead, they are building Value-based policy enforcement into their LTE networks from the get go.
"LTE is expanding the scope for value-based pricing innovation over 3G,” said Monica Paolini, PhD, Founder and President of Senza Fili Consulting, “We will see even more pricing choice offered to LTE subscribers over time, as subscribers increasingly expect their broadband plan to reflect their preferences with regards to content, usage and services that are valuable to them, and give them the flexibility to make the choices that work best for them.”
"Working with some of the world’s largest operators, we found the need for pricing innovation to be a cross-regional requirement," said Andrei Elefant, Allot’s Vice President of Marketing. "We are currently helping our customers to evolve their data charging, focusing on providing consumers with more choice and operators with unique service differentiation.”