Next big last-mile hurdle

COMMUNICATION

Technology breakthroughs will free us from the grip of telcos.

For decades, postmen and linesmen were treated with awe and rewarded with generous bakshish. Getting a phone or data line into your home, fortunately, is less of a feat today. There are multiple telephone operators and modes. Television cable will transmit data if the phone line does not. The wireless option exists for both voice and data. And telecom operators are even stretching standard ethernet cables for direct computer access, like in offices, into homes.

It's not so simple when it comes to mobile phones. There's one instrument in your hands. You can't have multiple operators feeding into it, at least now and surely not commercially. There is no way competing wireless standards can access your mobile simultaneously. And while the mobile itself is a technological boon, access to this device is still tightly controlled.

What this means it that telecom service providers (telcos) can charge exorbitant rates for delivering services, in what is a 'shifting oligopoly'. Sure, telephone calls themselves cost much less. To flash back a little, the time I was befriending linesmen and the reason I was doing so, mobile calls clocked Rs 16 a minute. Handsets started at Rs 35,000.

While the telcos have cut down voice charges, they have tightened their collective grip elsewhere. Like value added services or VAS, perhaps the most overworked division in most telcos today. Think ringtones, wallpapers, games and SMSs. While content companies (including this one) benefit from the telco's delivery and, importantly, revenue conversion capability, their bargaining position is severely limited.

The question is larger though. What will be the next technology breakthrough that will allow me, the content provider, to serve you information on your mobile phone without being held hostage by the telco? At a price you can afford and that encourages you to come back. And ensure I get paid for it. The answer is not clear to me, at least at this point.

There are solutions, of sorts. And variations to that. For instance, if your phone is data-enabled all the time, then the content download cost is much lower. Incidentally, studies show close to 30 per cent of all mobile users have browsed the internet on the mobile phone. Some people already use Skype over the mobile internet. Blackberry formally integrated with Google Talk (a voice application) a few months ago.

Thus, you might use a mobile telephone instrument but your activity is being powered by the internet, obviously at cheaper rates. Moreover, distance becomes irrelevant. But the internet does not 'alert' you in the manner a telco generated message does. Or have the same 'ease' of commerce. And GPRS or mobile internet connectivity charges are usually steep, for the same reasons of connectivity control outlined earlier.

WiFi is one solution, since many mobile phones can and will access it. To that extent, you are out of the telco's grip. And you can perform internet-related functions, including talk at much lower costs. In some places, you may not pay at all. But once again, standard WiFi is equivalent of being logged in your desktop/laptop. And you will be alerted to something only if you were logged in to that service in the first place. While WiFi is big in the west, it is not so ubiquitous in countries like India.

Lots of folks are breaking their heads on this issue, broadly defined as heterogeneous wireless networks. Firms like Motorola,for instance, refer to radios in mobile devices that "seamlessly pass sessions between multiple frequencies and networks". A bit like you not knowing that the call coming on the phone on your desk is being routed through a propreitory IP network.

Managing these next generation mobile networks will require sophisticated infrastructure, both on ground and on your phone. It's a fascinating subject to delve into but best left to experts like radio technologists. Incidentally, T-Mobile in March announced a seamless mobile-broadband offering for Europe which 'preserves' the benefits of SIM-based access and authentication.

So, the forces of technological advancement are gathering around. Earlier it was your home, now its your mobile phone.