Case study

Orange will be the first carrier to offer the upcoming Blackberry Bold.  The France Télécom UK outfit confirmed it will be the very first carrier with Bold. This beats T-Mobile by weeks, despite that firm being the first to announce. Initially, a source at the Carphone Warehouse informed us they’ll be trumping Deutsche Telekom September arrival of the phone, by stocking the Bold on Orange from the 21st of this month. A follow-up call to Orange surprised the bejesus out of them as no one was supposed to know any of this, A spokesperson at Orange said the firm will even be beating Carphone Warehouse to the shelves. Orange will be taking stock on the 14th and will have them in its shops by the Saturday 16th, along with online ordering.  The tariffs start at £45 a month, with the phone free. We understand the Warehouse folk will be offering deals on gratis handsets from just £40, with an unlimited data allowance. Normally the latter’s priced at £2.50 per month, but will be refunded every quarter. Not a peep still from O2 or Vodafone on arrival dates, despite attempts at cajoling information out of them. The relationship with O2 is usually quite strong, as they were the first out the starting gates with the likes of the Curve.

A spokesO2 said: “the Blackberry Bold is still undergoing product testing. We will only launch a device when we are confident it will deliver a great customer experience.” This is an odd response, seeing as they know full well we recently toyed with the O2 version of the phone for sometime at the Wireless Festival in London, with no problems whatsoever. What’s even odder than that is the press samples of the handset sent out by RIM for review carry a Vodafone SIM card.

Just in case you need a refresher as to what the Bold is all about, it’s the first Blackberry phone to support tri-band HSDPA networks, with integrated GPS, Wi-Fi and a new full-QWERTY keyboard. Here’s a picture of the phone on an Orange network, the very first image to be seen anywhere on the very first network to support it.

The boom in demand for big, fat data centres built to churn out web-based apps helped plump up worldwide server revenue to more than $13bn in the first quarter of 2008.
Companies have been throwing plenty of cash at x86-based server beasts to help flesh out their web data centres, according to a report yesterday from IT analyst firm Gartner.

Hewlett-Packard once again pulled in more global revenue and shipments in Q1 than its closest rival IBM. HP racked up ten per cent more server revenue than the same period a year ago, reeling in $4bn for the three months ended 31 March, narrowly ahead of IBM’s $3.9bn – an increase of just two per cent on the first quarter of 2007.

IBM had been sitting pretty at the top of the server revenue pile for many years, but in recent quarters a robust HP has retained the all-important number one spot.

HP shifted 683,433 servers for the quarter, while Dell pushed out 516,499 boxes and IBM shipped 302,057 systems, according to the Gartner report.

Dell was third place on server revenue and brought in $1.6bn, up six per cent on last year’s quarter. The only major server vendor to lose revenue in Q1 was Sun Microsystems with a drop of less than one per cent on revenue of $1.3bn.

Total server revenue increased 4.3 per cent to $13.6bn in the first quarter compared to the same period last year, with shipments up 7.6 per cent. However, Gartner noted that overall growth hasn’t been as feisty as in recent years.

Despite that, the analyst firm said that companies have been ditching old kit in favour of new x86 models that are capable of supporting web-based apps.

The report also pinpointed emerging markets, such as India and China, where it said growth had “forged ahead” for the first three months of 2008.

Meanwhile, shipments of RISC and Itanium-based Unix servers dropped, but still that sector scored a slight increase in revenue. IBM led the charge for the quarter on revenue in that market, while Sun Microsystems shipped more units

Picture this: a young woman goes to a party. She doesn’t know anyone but it’s fine because she has her mobile with her. A few clicks and she accesses the profiles of a dozen people at the party, including their pictures. She’s in luck: two of them turn out to be friends of friends. She messages them and they start to chat. Or this: an entrepreneur is at a conference. He is on the lookout for a new marketing director. Within minutes he has identified ten people in the hall with the right CV, two of whom are looking to change jobs. His mobile tells him one of them is standing 20ft away. That evening, a record of all the people he has met is automatically displayed with their profiles on his home computer.

This is not science fiction - it is the future of social networking and it is just around the corner. After the explosion in internet-based social networking (MySpace, Facebook) doing the same thing in real life instead of in front of a computer became an obvious next step. Much of it is already happening on a small scale as dozens of companies seek to exploit social networking on the go.

So how does it work? The key is the coming together of internet-connected mobile phones and location or proximity technology.

You can browse the internet quickly and easily on most new phones. Phones know where they are, thanks to in-built GPS satellite technology or triangulation from mobile phone masts. They can then tell if other phones are in the same area. Bluetooth short-range radio technology is also standard on most mobiles and with this phones can pick up the presence of other Bluetooth-enabled phones within about 20 metres.

Effectively, by linking these two developments, your phone can tell if someone is near you and can access lots of information about them - the perfect ingredients for real social interaction.

The possibilities are endless. Can’t ever put names to faces? Want to check the background of that chief executive officer so you can remind him that he owes you a favour? Want to avoid all accountants/lawyers/journalists? Keep seeing that handsome man at the bar and need a common interest to get the ball rolling? All these scenarios are being solved by the new wave of mobile applications.

One company based in Berlin has just gone live with its mobile social network. More than 3,000 young Germans have signed up to the aka-aki service in just over a month.

Users of the service download an application on to their mobile phones free. The software uses Bluetooth, and when another member’s phone comes within range, it pings. The user can then check who it is and choose to access that person’s profile, message them and, if they want, go over and have a chat.

In just over an hour on a sunny day in the centre of Berlin I had more than a dozen “encounters” with aka-aki members. Everyone was buzzing with the possibilities of the network and eager to chat.

Stefanie Hoffman, 30, one of aka-aki’s founders, said that although she met her boyfriend through aka-aki it was not just about dating. “The business applications are real,” she said. “I went to a conference the other day - one girl and 80 guys - and normally I would feel very reluctant to go up to someone to talk. It can be very difficult if you are a woman in those circumstances. But my phone told me there were half a dozen aka-aki members there and so I could introduce myself.”

That privileged sense of belonging is both the key to the success of mobile social networking and the greatest barrier. People will want to join because they can be part of a connected community. But until enough people join, these mobile networks will not take off. It is probably going to take one of the big beasts of internet social networks such as Facebook, which already has many millions of members, to achieve this.

The other big question mark is privacy. Why would people want total strangers to have access to their details?

In the Mitte district of Berlin, Sehnaz Sensan, 27, a student and aka-aki member, was unconcerned. After I had messaged her to ask if we could talk, she said that she “encountered” mainly men (the ratio for men and women signing up for aka-aki is about 70/30 - early adopters of new technology tend to be young men). “I can control what is on my profile and what people can know about me,” she said. “They message me to say hello and I can message back and we can meet up or I can ignore it. It is a way of breaking the ice.”

What about being bothered by strangers? “Men can come up to you anyway without knowing anything about you,” Ms Sensan said. “That’s much more insulting. If I don’t want an encounter then I don’t switch it on.”

Michael Arrington, one of the most influential technology bloggers in the world, says that the days when people are not happy to broadcast their CV/personal life electronically are over. “People always trade off privacy for removal of friction,” he said.

As he notes on his TechCrunch blog there are more than a dozen mobile social network start-ups in Silicon Valley. “A few years from now we will use our mobile devices to help us to remember details of people we know. It will help us to meet new people for dating, business and friendship. Using your phone to create or enhance real world interactions is a killer application, but no one has cracked the nut yet. Once it happens, look out.”

Arrington has blogged that Apple’s hugely successful iPhone would be a great place to start. He has seen an “awesome” application being developed and says that iPhone users are the perfect group for a mobile social network - they are technological, elitist and identify with their brand.

Analysts and commentators are predicting huge growth in the sector. Aka-aki, which was developed from a university diploma project, now has serious funding from a leading German venture capitalist.

It is not difficult to see how networks like aka-aki might make money. Anyone who has watched the film Minority Report with Tom Cruise will have seen how shops could message those on the network with offers when they pass by.

In another scenario, businesses such as restaurants could pay to access the service and when a member walks in, the store’s profile appears. The member chooses to add the restaurant to a list of favoured brands and the next week receives a two-for-one meal offer. The restaurant gets targeted “permission” advertising and more diners on a slow night.

But in the end are mobile social networks not just a nerdy replacement for people simply talking to each other? As one blogger put it: “I am pretty sure that an actual conversation will do the same thing. Is this the evolution of geek dating?”

Roman Hansler, another aka-aki co-founder, says that seeing other people’s details on your mobile in real life is a conversation-starter not a replacement. “This is about opening doors for real communication, not sitting in a virtual chat room,” he said.

Companies have been queuing for space at the annual Commercial Vehicle Show, which opens at the National Exhibition Centre today. The show, the biggest road transport event in Europe, was filled some time ago, with more than 500 exhibitors signed up to take space in 11 halls at the NEC. More than 100 companies will debut at the show. “We’re amazed, we sold out over four weeks ago,” said David Crawford of Crystal Communications. “We’ve nearly 50 firms keen to get into the show who have asked us to put them onto a waiting list. If they want a piece of the action at what is clearly going to be a very successful show, it’s their best bet.” The biggest exhibitor will be Birmingham vanmaker LDV, unveiling a number of additions to its Maxus range of vehicles. This year’s show will be the first to be attended by the Russian-owned company’s recently appointed chief executive Evgeniy Vereshchagin. VIP visitors will include the Princess Royal who is expected at the Iveco stand tomorrow. Iveco has donated three vans to international development charity Transaid, of which she is patron. Another highlight will be the world premier of the all-new Berlingo range of vans from Citroen. Carl Snape, of asset finance firm Lombard, which is exhibiting at the show, said the event was “great news” for Birmingham. “The city and the region has a long history with the transport sector and the fact that the main players of the industry, not just from the UK but beyond, will be in Birmingham is a great opportunity for the profile of the city and region,” Mr Snape said. “Motor manufacturing is still important in the local economy and the opportunity for local suppliers and manufacturers to demonstrate their services to large national and multi-national players is a key opportunity. “As Europe’s largest asset finance provier, this is an absolute ‘must’ for us to attend and we have invested more than ever before in our presence at the show. “A show the size of this one is really where the NEC comes into its own as a venue. “It will bring additional revenue to the region - and not just from the short term increase in people visiting the city. Contracts will be signed over the three days which in some cases will be major investments and defining contracts for West Midland operators. “Once again it proves that Birmingham can be a catalyst for business.” Last year’s CV show attracted more than 27,000 visitors and that number is expected to be exceeded this time. The three-day event is run by the CV Show Partnership, comprising the Road Haulage Association, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders and the Institute of Road Transport Engineers.

The wife of a city executive cost her husband £11,000 after she downloaded four episodes of the sitcom Friends through his mobile phone while abroad. The woman used the broadband package on his Vodafone mobile phone to order the programmes, which would have been free had the download taken place in Britain. However, her husband flew to Germany on business while the download was still in progress and it resumed after he touched down, incurring the massive fees. The pair, who have not been named, discovered the unwelcome bill after the executive arrived back in the UK and Vodafone called his firm to alert him. Ed Richards, the chief executive of industry regulator Ofcom, said it would investigate the huge fee. He said: “We will be looking to take action.” The news came as European Commission officials prepare to take action against mobile phone providers who make “unjustified” charges. Viviane Reding, the European Union commissioner for information, society and media, has given phone companies until July 1 to cut their fees for downloading data and texting while abroad. She said: “Sending a text message or downloading data in another country should not be substantially more expensive than at home. “Higher retail charges abroad must be justified or they will have to disappear.” This is not the first time Vodafone downloads abroad have cost the unsuspecting user thousands of pounds. Company director Ray Elmitt, 63, got a bill for £1,150 after using his phone’s broadband internet connection in Spain to connect to his company’s website for an hour.  Mr Elmitt, of Hampton Wick, in Surrey, said: “It really annoyed me because I think most people would treat mobile broadband as they would their home or work-based broadband and not worry about download limits.” The debate on the cost of data transfer on mobile phones abroad has become more heated as new technology makes internet access faster and more reliable. A spokesman for Vodafone said the firm informed customers of the charges and alerted people who exceeded their quota in Britain. However, he acknowledged it took longer to alert customers overseas.

The government is apparently so concerned about being left in the slow lane of the information superhighway that it has appointed a fresh inspection of the path to next-generation broadband, even while the current one is still on the track . Ofcom, the broadcasting regulator, is already conducting a consultation on issues such as how the cable and telecoms industries can invest more than £1bn in upgrading the ageing copper-wire infrastructure. Only this will enable the UK to compete with countries such as France and Germany, which are well ahead in the provision of high-speed internet access. Virgin Media is already discussing ways of rolling out 50-megabit-per-second broadband on its cable network, while British Telecom believes that with a new-town development, such as Ebbsfleet in Kent, speeds of 100 mbps are achievable. The fastest speed currently available in the UK is 20 mbps. But without nationwide access, some analysts are warning that UK media industries will be unable to exploit the commercial potential of downloading in the music, film and television industries. The review announced in yesterday’s strategy document will be led by Francesco Caio, former chief executive of Cable & Wireless, and is said to be “complementary” to Ofcom’s study.

A third of mobile phones bought last year were purchased online, it has been claimed. Consumer trends research company Global Reviews asked over 1,000 mobile phone buyers what they look for when buying a mobile and found 31% bought their phone online last year.  The survey also found that customers are increasingly going online to manage their mobile account. Some 83% have visited their provider’s website, 44% have viewed their balance online, 23% have viewed their call history online and 14% have paid their bill online. The research also tried to assess which of the leading provider websites is the most consumer friendly. T-Mobile topped the league with 67% of its users who were surveyed rating it favourably, followed by Vodafone with 60%, Orange, 56%, and O2 with 54%. Global Reviews director, Adam Goodvach said: ‘It is crucial that providers take advantage of the increasingly important role of the website to maximise their potential sales. ‘Unfortunately, consumers’ online experience varies dramatically depending on the site they are visiting.’

Following the news leak of a new deal between UK operators, Vodafone and Orange, the pair have finally admitted that their proposed joint venture is dead. It’s believed that France Telecom, Orange’s parent, got cold feet about shoving the assets involved in operating its network into a shared venture. So instead, the two operators have struck a much simpler deal – they’ll just share the same physical cell sites. Even this is expected to result in the need for 15 per cent fewer sites, which over two years will mean 3,000 less sites. Given the public’s attitude towards cellular masts, that’s something of a PR coup. The new deal is rumoured to have been pushed through by the new head of Orange UK, Tom Alexander, who was previously head of Virgin Mobile. Come to think of it, he was once head of Virgin Games, too. Although the announcement was very watered down from the original objectives, there was still some hint that the running of physical network might still be outsourced. A memo sent round to Vodafone’s engineers – after the news had already been leaked – by Vodafone UK CEO, Nick Read, still says, “We remain committed to exploring the outsourcing of our field operations and maintenance teams.” The INQ isn’t sure whether this would let Ericsson – which already runs the network for 3 UK – to pitch for the business. What it does mean is that O2 is looking increasingly isolated, given that T-Mobile and 3 have come to a more far-reaching agreement on the network sharing front. Ironically, it is O2 which has been slowest in rolling out its 3G network and would have most benefitted from coming to a deal with the likes of 3 or Vodafone.

Phones 4U have bought online retailer Dial-a-Phone for the knockdown price of £9m, a snip on the £60m valuation a couple of years ago. Phones 4U have taken advantage of the situation at the ailing Dial-a-Phone in order to increase their share in websales, having been watching the business for some time. Carphone Warehouse were also said to be looking at purchasing the internet dealer, but were repeatedly put off by unrealistic valuations. Carphone eventually moved to buying smaller web-retailers e2Save and OneStopPhoneShop. Dial-a-Phone have been suffering the past couple of years following the pull out of T-Mobile, 3, and Vodafone, who all had issues with the quality of customers. This lead to a sharp decrease in contract volumes, from 40,000 to 10,000. Nick Fisher, Dial-a-Phone sales boss will take over the day to day operations as joint owners Richard Frank and Jonathan Beck have left the business. Fisher will now report to Brendan Sweeney, 4U’s distribution head. Phones 4U will continue to run the site as a separate operation under the Dial-a-Phone brand. “Dial-a- Phone’s strong brand and high level of expertise in the direct market are a perfect complement to Phones 4u’s brand and strength on the High Street.” Said 4u Group CEO Tim Whiting. “Combining the Dial-a-Phone business with the Phones 4u direct operation will significantly increase our share of the direct mobile phone market.  We are looking forward to welcoming Dial-a-Phone to the 4u Group and believe it will play a significant part in the continued expansion of our mobile phone distribution business.”

Vodafone is launching advanced customer services directly on the handset to give its customers customer care and billing information in real-time. The service will not only provide a self care facility but also gives an added opportunity to provide interactive promos and tutorials. Simple tutorials would include such as step by step guides on how to use the mobile internet to download music or how to send an MMS. Following a successful trial with more than 3000 customers in the UK and Spain using SNAPin SelfService, Vodafone will begin a phased roll out of the on device self care service from this year. The service will be available on open OS handsets, including S60, UIQ and Microsoft Windows Mobile, to begin with, with the aim to extend to the majority of handsets on offer from Vodafone over time. The  self-service lets customers navigate an on-screen visual menu of options to answer questions or solve their problems right on the handset. Customers also have the option to connect through to the call centre, bypassing traditional IVR menus, or to get an automatic response directly on their phone. The trial showed that customers want to have self help facilities on the phone. In more mature markets in Europe quickly solving problems in this way is highly desirable and often considered more convenient for solving routine queries such as current billing information. In emerging markets such as India, self help on the device empowers customers who are using mobiles for the first time and helps them to quickly and easily get the most out of a new phone and the services on offer. “We have conducted thorough trials over the last three months with customers. The trials have confirmed that on device self help, when simple and quick to use, is very desirable for customers as it gives them control of how and when they deal with us and makes the most of their time. It also greatly adds to their experience of dealing with Vodafone and improves overall satisfaction.” said Paul de Laat, Global Director of Customer Value Management at Vodafone.  “Many customers particularly liked the ability to answer set up questions themselves when trying out new services, like MMS, or the mobile internet. Customers were also more willing to try new services after receiving targeted interactive promotions. We believe that rolling out self care services could help us to grow loyalty and stimulate revenue, especially as customers become more confident to try new services.” Rolling out user-friendly self care services will not replace current customer care channels, but merely provide the customer with more choice over when, where and how they obtain information on Vodafone’s products and services as well as their own personal account information.