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Why Mobile Carriers should adopt Mobile VoIP or VoIP over 3G? [Opinion]

By Alok Saboo on October 27th, 2009

I am surprised (and upset) at the reluctance of telecom companies (telcos) to embrace and encourage VoIP over their cellular networks. Today, I will discus why it makes absolutely no sense for the mobile carriers to discourage the adoption of VoIP on their networks.

Mobile carriers may be motivated to to block VoIP over their networks for two reasons: consumption of bandwidth and loss of revenue. Let’s discus each one of them:

  • Bandwidth: Carriers may argue that sending voice signals may consume their bandwidth affecting the performance of the voice quality for the larger population. This simply does not make sense. Watching a Youtube video consumes much more bandwidth than a voice call of the same duration. With the explosion of smart phone usage, the bandwidth requirement will only increase exponentially. There are already several applications that consume more bandwidth than a VoIP call. Why penalize VoIP traffic? In fact, by moving some of the voice traffic to a different channel, the carriers may be able to save bandwidth on the voice channel, thereby providing better call quality to everyone.
  • Loss of revenue: Mobile carriers, all over the world, make lot of money on international calls. So, if they allow consumers to make cheap VoIP calls over their network, the telecom companies fear that they will kill this revenue stream themselves. The underlying assumption here is that by blocking consumers from accessing VoIP over their network, the consumers will make expensive calls from their mobiles. This cannot be far from the truth. Services such as Google Voice make low cost VoIP calling extremely easy even on a regular phone. Several VoIP service providers (VSP) offer convenient local access numbers in several countries. A consumer may conveniently call these numbers and make cheap international calls. Further, there are various ways (even now) through which determined consumers can make VoIP calls over the carriers networks. The point I want to make is that price sensitive consumers will almost never make expensive international calls from their mobile phones. The price insensitive (business) users will not take the trouble to go through the (minor) inconvenience of using VoIP.

Firms must learn that they cannot prevent the benefits of technology from reaching the consumers for too long. This is a great example of “marketing myopia”, wherein the telecom companies are overly concentrating on the short term gains. Mobile carriers must stop thinking of voice as separate from data. By adopting common standards for voice and data, mobile carriers can increase the adoption of their data services among consumers and increase the Average Revenue Per User (ARPU). The objective should be to make a mobile an indispensible device, enabling telcos to increase the size of the pie and keep other technologies (e.g., WiMax) at bay.

I have a feeling that telcos agree with this. AT&T’s recent approval of Skype & Rebtel to use the 3G network suggests that we are (slowly) moving closer to the ultimate objective and you may soon be able to make VoIP calls over the 3G networks :-)

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  • http://blog.radvision.com/voipsurvivor/ Tsahi Levent-Levi

    Alok,
    I think mobile carriers have a lot to lose from mobile VoIP at this point in time – the bandwidth issue is a hard one, and while there's other, larger content on their network – it doesn't compare in its sheer size with voice (which is used by anyone with a phone).
    You can get more on my feelings regarding mobile VoIP here: http://blog.radvision.com/voipsurvivor/2009/10/

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  • youcanthandlethetruth

    3G Mobile VOIP will never ever work.

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    And why do you think so???

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    Tsahi..thanks for stopping by!!

    Although I see your point, I have a slightly different take on it. When carriers are able to support all the bandwidth guzzling apps already available, I will be surprised if they are not able to handle voice calls on their data network. It does not have to be circuit switched network and that is where the real value will come from – lower cost. This may lead to some (although not noticeable) degradation in voice quality, but let the consumer decide whether they want to use it or not. A regular voice call does not take more than a few KBs of bandwidth.

    Finally, I think your post talks more about why mobile VoIP is not ready for “prime time”, which may be true. But when carriers are talking about LTE and 4G, I do not see why they cannot support a voice call….and I am not even talking HD voice.

    The problem, I feel, is not about “being able to” but about “wanting to”. Mobile companies have this mental block against VoIP and I wanted to argue that this block is misplaced.

  • http://www.novitell.com/ Mikkel

    With the rapid expansion in IP wireless networks (Wifi, 4G, LTE, Wimax, etc.) it won't be long until the question of voice quality will be turned upside down. It will be easy for mobile voip providers to upgrade to HD voice, while GSM really don't have the capacity. And then the carriers have to adapt to avoid being the ones with the inferior product (which I by the way believe that they are – they are just not pushing it yet).

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    Can't agree more with you…guess its not in the distant future that wireless networks will surpass the GSM network :)

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    Can't agree more with you…guess its not in the distant future that wireless networks will surpass the GSM network :)

  • Anonymous

    The 1legcall Mobile VoIP Dialer is making some big strides in GCC markets…

    Check out an article about 1legcall growth: http://www.pressreleasepoint.com/1legcall-racks-impressive-doubledigit-growth-first-year

  • talkfreejustin

    Have any of you heard of the 1legcall Mobile or Zonefone mobile dialers? Its one of the fastest growing mobile dialers in the GCC / Middle East voip markets.

    Good article about 1legcall dialer: http://www.pressreleasepoint.com/1legcall-racks

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    Thanks for stopping by and commenting. Will have a look and talk about it soon. Thanks!!

  • talkfreejustin

    Let me know if you have any questions.

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    I just sent you an email with some clarifications…

  • Eng Tash

    How can i use ban-free swiss-voiz in nokia n-900 at oman? can u send me steps at eng.tash@gmail.com. Thanks.

  • http://truvoipbuzz.com Alok Saboo

    I am guessing that VoIP is restricted in Oman and hence you are not able to use the same. However, you can try some options listed here.

    1. Use Proxy server to bypass VoIP restriction.
    2. Use Ringomax to bypass ISP restrictions. Ringomax even has a mobile dialer.

    If nothing works out, you may have to subscribe to some VPN service that may allow you to access VoIP. Search for “VPN VoIP” and you should be able to find something. Let me know if you have additional queries…

  • http://www.cheapgsmcellphones.com Prince Finkle

    I have a slight problem here. I would like to purchase a decent phone and can’t decide on which phone to select. To begin with, i thought of the Nokia 5610Nokia 6500, which my buddy has. It appears pretty tough, and it all seemed alright, but then i started researching other phones. Now my largest problem is to decide between the Nokia N97 and the Samsung B3310. All suggestions are welcome.

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