Mobile operators are concerned with ARPU

As mobile operators race to add new capacity and services to meet accelerating demands, they are concerned about optimizing their networks cost-effectively and generating new revenue….. increased ARPU (Average Revenue Per User).

In a new study called “4G + Cloud”, Maravedis reported that “The predominant business driver in offering branded mobile services is to improve ARPU, followed by other main drivers of improving margins and reducing churn.”

Mobile operators worldwide are seeing huge growth in mobile data and bandwidth use so they need to offset this with new and innovative services to increase revenues.

At the same time, they are having to maintain and upgrade their 2G, 3G, and now, 4G networks. Unfortunately, most of the CAPEX (radio) doesn’t contribute much new revenue.

To ‘ride the wave’ of new apps and services, to get a percentage of revenue from OTT players, and avoid becoming just a “dumb pipe,” mobile operators must transform their networks to all-IP architectures, and raise ARPU by streamlining CAPEX and OPEX.

Findings from the recent OpenMobileSummit say “Carriers are struggling with the conundrum of delivering a marketable offering to consumers which delivers a proportional return on the network investment.”

Perhaps the key to increasing ARPU lies with innovation around subscriber identity. Mobile operators have the unique opportunity to integrate subscriber information with services and applications to offer streamlined and personalized experiences in real time.

Smaller vendors who are typically more innovative, offer convergence solutions that solve deployment challenges faced when migrating services and subscribers.  They can cut time-to-market by bringing ideas such as overlay solutions that obviate the need for CAPEX investment in the legacy network and optimize the OPEX spend to maintain complex functions.   

Companies such as Mavenir provide a flexible converged services platform (Mavenir’s mOne Platform) to cost- effectively deliver innovative services between next generation and legacy networks while offering proven time to market advantages.  Real time voice, video and messaging services such as RCS and VoLTE, tied to the subscriber’s identity and delivered quickly may be the answer to creating loyalty and increasing ARPU.

Who knows?  The chase for ARPU and loyalty is likely linked to the power of subscriber identity.