krug3r
29-07-2003, 15:21
[SOURCE YAHOO]
BT Group Plc, the country's largest fixed-line phone operator, has launched a renewed effort to sell a consumer mobile service with a family-targeted product called BT Mobile Home Plan.
BT will buy the wireless access from Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile network, less than two years after it spun off its own mobile subsidiary, mmO2, to cut debts.
BT has an existing consumer-focused mobile product running on mmO2's network, but new customers will operate on T-Mobile. Corporate reselling agreements with mmO2 will remain in place.
The success of Virgin Mobile in Britain, which also operates on the T-Mobile network, has attracted many companies to the "virtual" operator model, including retailers such as Carphone Warehouse Plc and leading grocery store chain Tesco.
"Competition is fierce, and it's not going to let up," said Brian McBride, the recently appointed managing director of T-Mobile UK. "It's going to get even fiercer."
Like Virgin, which pitches its service at lower-spending users, BT wants to pin down neglected segments of the market.
The Home Plan is aimed at families who want multiple phones from one operator. Monthly subscription is 15 pounds for the first phone and 10 pounds each for up to five more handsets.
"Family, you know, is a big market and has been a little bit forgotten by a lot of the mobile operators," BT Retail Chief Executive Pierre Danon told reporters on a conference call.
Calls to the family home phone number will be free for the first two minutes as part of the Home Plan, following BT research that found the average person calls home five times a week, with most of the calls lasting two minutes or less.
The new mobile service would generate a significant part, though not a majority, of the 300 million pounds in annual mobile revenues Danon hopes to generate by March 2005.
ONE MILLION CUSTOMERS
The service starts next week, gaining momentum at the end of October when major retailers -- Carphone Warehouse, The Link and Phones 4U -- start selling the phones alongside a 10 million pound advertising campaign.
BT hoped to have 100,000 subscribers to the Home Plan within a year and one million at some point in 2005, Danon said.
Danon, who told an industry conference last month that in theory he would prefer to run his own mobile network, said the virtual model made sense, despite talk of BT buying mmO2 back.
"I have less gross margin - I am conscious of that. But I have no investments except IT and service and stuff like that. And the trade-off is the right trade-off for BT in a world where, as you can imagine, there is a lot of capacity," he said.
"Therefore I can buy a lot of capacity on the market and therefore I can get good prices."
Danon also announced a trial of a bluetooth-enabled mobile phone which will access the landline network at short ranges at home or at work, in just the latest fixed-line counter-attack on the mobile phone operators that siphon off their voice revenues.
MmO2, however, is developing a similar bluetooth product.
Asked about a trend towards owning only a mobile phone instead of a landline, Danon said there was no "significant" move from fixed to mobile in the British market at the moment.
"But you never know, things could move, and we would like to be well-positioned in case they move," he said.
BT Group Plc, the country's largest fixed-line phone operator, has launched a renewed effort to sell a consumer mobile service with a family-targeted product called BT Mobile Home Plan.
BT will buy the wireless access from Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile network, less than two years after it spun off its own mobile subsidiary, mmO2, to cut debts.
BT has an existing consumer-focused mobile product running on mmO2's network, but new customers will operate on T-Mobile. Corporate reselling agreements with mmO2 will remain in place.
The success of Virgin Mobile in Britain, which also operates on the T-Mobile network, has attracted many companies to the "virtual" operator model, including retailers such as Carphone Warehouse Plc and leading grocery store chain Tesco.
"Competition is fierce, and it's not going to let up," said Brian McBride, the recently appointed managing director of T-Mobile UK. "It's going to get even fiercer."
Like Virgin, which pitches its service at lower-spending users, BT wants to pin down neglected segments of the market.
The Home Plan is aimed at families who want multiple phones from one operator. Monthly subscription is 15 pounds for the first phone and 10 pounds each for up to five more handsets.
"Family, you know, is a big market and has been a little bit forgotten by a lot of the mobile operators," BT Retail Chief Executive Pierre Danon told reporters on a conference call.
Calls to the family home phone number will be free for the first two minutes as part of the Home Plan, following BT research that found the average person calls home five times a week, with most of the calls lasting two minutes or less.
The new mobile service would generate a significant part, though not a majority, of the 300 million pounds in annual mobile revenues Danon hopes to generate by March 2005.
ONE MILLION CUSTOMERS
The service starts next week, gaining momentum at the end of October when major retailers -- Carphone Warehouse, The Link and Phones 4U -- start selling the phones alongside a 10 million pound advertising campaign.
BT hoped to have 100,000 subscribers to the Home Plan within a year and one million at some point in 2005, Danon said.
Danon, who told an industry conference last month that in theory he would prefer to run his own mobile network, said the virtual model made sense, despite talk of BT buying mmO2 back.
"I have less gross margin - I am conscious of that. But I have no investments except IT and service and stuff like that. And the trade-off is the right trade-off for BT in a world where, as you can imagine, there is a lot of capacity," he said.
"Therefore I can buy a lot of capacity on the market and therefore I can get good prices."
Danon also announced a trial of a bluetooth-enabled mobile phone which will access the landline network at short ranges at home or at work, in just the latest fixed-line counter-attack on the mobile phone operators that siphon off their voice revenues.
MmO2, however, is developing a similar bluetooth product.
Asked about a trend towards owning only a mobile phone instead of a landline, Danon said there was no "significant" move from fixed to mobile in the British market at the moment.
"But you never know, things could move, and we would like to be well-positioned in case they move," he said.