TELECOM BUZZ “expanding telecom world horizon”

ISSUE 33

A MobileComm Professionals Inc. Publication www.mcpsinc.com

So you want to buy a

new phone this festive

season?

Forget that 0%

EMI scheme

India’s Telecom Commission approves

100% FDI

Achievements

Blues

& more news snippets

from the Telecom World

Telecom Bytes

MobileComm Professionals Inc.

The news that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has banned 0% interest rate schemes on consumer durables is being perceived as a dampener ahead of the festive season. But is that really the case? Actually, no. Far from taking away a benefit, RBI has acted in your interest.

In this issue we look deeper into these schemes and show you that they are not as attractive as they sound. 0% interest schemes In the advertisements, mobile manufacturers and banks advertise that there is no processing charge, but if you read the fine print of the scheme, you will find that banks have started charging a processing fee on select smartphone products and for select tenors. It varies from bank to bank and even store to store .The charges get hidden in the form of processing charges, convenience fee or a variation of loan schemes.

Our take RBI is extending a helping hand to you, the customer, who should reciprocate by being vigilant. Though RBI has put forth the points, it is the customer who has to be careful. You have to understand the different between cash down payment and 0% interest scheme. Always ask a lot of questions before you buy and compare the schemes. Always do the math before buying anything. So this festive season, don't get bought into attractive schemes, but buy what you really need and know how much you are paying for it.

Key Company Highlights

• MobileComm strengthens its Training Portfolio further by entering into a new venture with Samsung Training Academy, for providing LTE competency training.

• MobileComm, has become an official Corporate Training Partner for Vodafone and will be offering Customized Training Courses, specially designed for the middle and high level management. The courses will provide the organization programs such as Strategic Thinking and Problem Solving Abilities for innovative formatting and building new processes to enhance sales worldwide.

• Mobilecomm recently participated in CEO-Technical Peer Group of TechConnex, a technology community leader providing learning and networking for technology business, with other entrepreneurs, innovators, and service providers in making a sustained economic impact throughout the GTA.

• MobileComm has another major LTE project success in the APAC region, for providing turnkey optimization services for Celcom, Malaysia through NSN.

• Huawei, one of the biggest Telecom vendors, has partnered with MobileComm India for a new service domain including 4G In- Building solutions n the country.

Editorial

Contents

• Death of EMI Schemes : RBI puts an end on 0%

Interest EMI Schemes • 100% FDI : A Boon or Bane ?

Main Stories

Telebytes

Teledata • Worldwide Broadband Market - 2013: Report

Sneak Peak into MobileComm

• TRAI moots nationwide MNP • Vodafone, India introduces new International

Roaming plans • Bharti Airtel launches “Customized Bill Plans for

postpaid subscribers • Nine vendors selected by China Mobile for the

latest 4G push

Feature Story • Beyond Carrots and Stick

• MobileComm launches a new KT and Job portal :

www.ltejobs.in

• Blackberry abandons search for buyers, replaces CEO • “RADIO DOT”- small cell that will enhance the indoor

coverage

We hope you’ll find this issue interesting. Drop us your suggestions or feedback at newsletters@mcpsinc.com

GOOD NEWS FOR INDIAN HANDSET MAKERS After facing a stiff competition with the high end handset makers, like Apple and Samsung, this change has been welcomed by Indian counterparts like Micromax, Motorola, Karbon, Videocon and even Onida. These are the makers of middle to low-class tier devices which could end up passing price hikes on to consumers. All such cheaper handsets would definitely gain a direct advantage against the entrant’s prices which would be higher due to import duties and tariffs. Also, with the festive season coming up, these devices could be benefitted in terms of lifting up their sales by providing newer and cheaper schemes to consumers.

RBI BAN ON 0% EMI SCHEMES: A GOOD NEWS FOR CONSUMERS Buying products via credit cards was a convenient and user-friendly option for high end products like Apple and Samsung. Such buys are mostly “sentiment-driven purchases” by consumers without the financial capacity to buy, resulting in “unmanageable amount of debt” under such schemes. Rather than being upset, consumers may now try for another option called “SAVINGS”, which would help consumers to control themselves to make such purchases under high inflated scenario where cash too comes at a higher price. Also for example, a customer decides to buy a smartphone that costs around Rs 48,000 using the zero per cent finance scheme. Under the scheme, the customer will pay the entire cost in six EMIs of Rs 8,000 for six months. This works out to be Rs 48,000 spread over a period of six months. However, the customers unknowingly pays a processing fee of Rs1,000. Since he's buying the smartphone under the zero per cent finance scheme, he's not entitled to the cash discount of Rs 2,000. The total loss is Rs 3,000. The cost of phone would have come down to Rs 45,000 if he had directly purchased it.

TECHNO BUZZ

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Retail EMI : RBI puts an End to EMI Schemes

RBI has banned zero per cent interest EMIs and has put ‘ifs and buts’ in credit cards transactions for Retail purchases

In order to ensure customer protection and accounting

integrity, Reserve Bank of India, has recently banned zero per cent interests Equated Monthly Schemes (EMI) on retail products along with ‘ifs and buts’ in credit cards transactions, describing the scheme as ‘pernicious practice’. The decision has been received with mixed response from the industry mavens with few standing for it, while few worrying for the sales of their high end smartphones. However, let’s not talk about the bad; let’s concentrate on what good it has brought for consumers and the local handset manufacturers.

This festive season play your cards right if gifting a Smart Phone

EMI MYTHS BUSTED Currently almost all the multinational companies offer 0% EMI schemes on their smartphones as it makes them affordable and in turn drive sales in the market. Apple is a major player in the Indian market to give users options, to own an iPhone or iPad, through easy monthly installments, giving Apple a huge amount of success in India for its iPhone series. However there are certain myths surrounding 0% EMI that is usually left out, giving retail companies a free run with gullible customers. When a consumer buys a phone on EMIs without any down payment, the interest fee (12%) is indirectly charged from the customer in the form of processing fee with the claims that he is being charged zero per cent interest. Also, the customer foregoes any discount that is otherwise offered against a full cash payment. RBI is of the belief that since the concept of zero percent interest is non-existent; such schemes only serve the purpose of alluring and exploiting the vulnerable customers.

Singapore Telecom and Qatar Foundation Endowment own about 32 percent and 5 percent, respectively, in Bharti, while Malaysia’s Axiata Berhard owns about 20% of Idea Cellular The Indian telecom services industry, which generates about USD35bn-37bn in annual gross revenue, is facing a huge debt burden of over USD40bn. At least 40% of Indian telcos’ debt is denominated in US dollars; and they are suffering from a weak rupee, which has depreciated by over 20% in the last two years. Some players, however, also feel hiking FDI limit from 74 per cent to 100 per cent in the telecom sector will not make much of a difference as foreign investors would continue to exercise control in more or less the same fashion as they did when the cap was 74% and hence they are looking forward to M&A policy and norms. 100 per cent FDI is expected to provide a much-needed boost to the Telecommunications sector and is likely to attract approximately $10 billion worth of investments in the near to long-term," said Prashant Singhal, partner in member firm of Ernst & Young Global.

TECHNO BUZZ

3 MobileComm Professionals Inc.

100% FDI in Telecom:

……….A Boon or Bane ?

Towers represent an annual Rs.1.36 trillion revenue industry, estimated Analysys Mason

Someone has rightly said ~ All days are not the same;

some end on a 'Bad Note' and some end on a 'Good Note'. What is important is who stands strong, irrespective of what happened. The above quote can be used in the context of Indian Telecom Industry, that witnessed a period of lull and uncertainty, and is now coming out strong through it. After being faced with serious functional and regulatory challenges, there is still much that is positive to be found in India’s telecom industry. One such development that is expected to create the difference in the otherwise debt-ridden sector is the approval for 100% Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the telecom sector. With the industry is facing tremendous amount of stress, the decision of allowing 100% FDI will allow new funding opportunities to the industry in the next upcoming years, to remain up-to-date with the emerging technologies. It is a “pro-industry and pro-consumer” move which will further catalyze the process of proliferation of telecom services across the country. Allowed 100% FDI in telecom verses 74% will help to bring in more FDI to fund high capital expenditure, which will further enhance coverage and launch of 3G and BWA (Broadband wireless access). After facing failure with two spectrum auctions in last 12 months, this move offers a hope of renewed interest from the major foreign players in the upcoming auction. As the last auction got tepid response from the operators and fetched fewer amounts, 100% FDI will allow large number of players to participate in the upcoming auction. The move would increase offerings and improve penetration along with stronger balance sheets for the Telco's. This will allow foreign investors who have earlier put off from investing in Indian market and also encourage the existing investors to increase the stake in their subsidiaries. Companies like Vodafone, Telenor, maxis and Siestema are expected to benefit from this move.

TELECOM BYTES

Recommendations given by TRAI to moot nationwide mobile number portability(MNP):

Within next six months subscribers will be benefited with nationwide mobile number portability (MNP) which will allow them to retain their numbers while shifting from one base to another within the country. Laying a concern on the use of one-number across the country was first raised in the National Telecom Policy 2012. Department of telecommunications (DoT) in December 2012, has asked TRAI to firm up policy recommendations. DoT will now take up TRAI recommendations and will provide a final roadmap to MNP, with some necessary changes to be done in the existing MNP license.

Vodafone introduces new International Roaming plans Vodafone has always been committed in providing seamless and affordable services to customers and recently released new affordable international roaming plans. The plans are available for Rs.599 and Rs.1499 along with a validity of 10 days and 30 days respectively. The plans cover roaming in 53 countries including UK, USA, Thailand and Singapore and will be beneficiary to customers, both in terms of savings and connectivity.

In-App Advertising gaining a prominence growth The Mobile Advertising market is currently over $13 billion, and is believed to further witness a tremendous amount of growth in next upcoming years reaching almost up to $40 billion by 2018. The potential for such growth is due to innovative formats and new payment mechanisms. Further to that, it provides a larger scope for rich media advertising to engage the users.

AT&T looking forward to hitch upon Vodafone in 2014 AT&T is all set to target Vodafone to acquire its potential network, further expanding their reach in European markets where mobile broadband can be an extensive opportunity. On the contrary the deal has to hold-up, till the Verizon lays down any further conclusive statement to acquire 45% stake in Verizon Wireless.

Bharti Airtel launched “Customized Bill Plans for postpaid subscribers: Bharti Airtel recently launched an innovative customized plan for postpaid subscribers known as “Airtel My Plan”. The plan is uniquely based upon the needs and preferences of the customers allowing them to pay only for the services they need. Rather than a standardized plan, customers can now choose their personalized services, they wish to have on their number.

Nine vendors selected by China Mobile for the latest 4G push Giant mobile vendors which include Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, NSN along with six domestic vendors including Huawei, Datang mobile, Wuhan-based Fiber Home technologies, Potevio and New Postcom Equipment Company Ltd are selected for the 4G buildout by China Mobile. The project is reported to be worth 20 billion yuan($3.27 billion) and will help to build 207,000 TD-LTE base stations in 31 provinces across the country. Financial details and percentage of the contract of each vendor are not yet disclosed.

Blackberry abandons search for buyers, replaces CEO BlackBerry has been in the news lately for being a deeply troubled company with sinking sales, mounting losses and a user base that is increasingly defecting to rival smartphone makers. With the company recently abandoning its plans to sell, Blackberry has succeeded in making the market eagerly await its next strategy. Many tech analysts believe that while the future does not look good for BlackBerry's smartphone business, the company's software business is still viable and could be valuable to other tech firms, along with its mobile technology patents. In recent news, the company announced plans to emphasize services and not the devices. The strategy is to provide secure infrastructure across devices and secure iOS and Android devices. With CEO Thorsten Heins stepping away from the position and John Chen, the former CEO of Sybase, appointed to be the next chairman of the Blackberry, it is now up to Chen to take the helm and build in better strategic decisions and functions for the survival of the organization.

“RADIO DOT”- small cell will enhance the indoor coverage Ericsson has recently unveiled a new disk shaped small cell known as Radio Dot System to compete with Alcatel-Lucent light Radio network gear product. It is portable, can easily fit in palm of persons hand and can also be placed on walls, ceilings to boost indoor voice and coverage. It will use standard internet LAN cables to indoor radio units that link to base stations for connectivity. The product so far will not be made available until late 2014.

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MobileComm Professionals Inc. 6

TELEDATA

Worldwide Broadband Usage : A Report

REALIZING THE IMPORTANCE OF NATIONAL POLICY LEADERSHIP,2013 ICT has now realized the importance of NATIONAL POLICY LEADERSHIP, which provides a clear vision on the opportunities, constrains and actions pertaining to the supply and demand of broadband. With regards to the available data, progress on policy leadership is relatively recent. Digital agendas incorporating cross-sector perspective are growing immensely. 69% of the countries by 2013 will have a national plan and strategy, in order to promote broadband and remaining 6% are planning to introduce further measures in the upcoming future. THE GENDER GAP: Men and Women online- Totals and Penetration rate,2013 So far there is no gender-disaggregated data available but considering the internet usage as proxy indicator, estimation by ITU shows 1.3 billion internet users will be women as compared to 1.5 billion men online. The gender gap is to be more pronounced as, 16% fewer women use internet in developing countries as compared to 2% fewer women in developed countries. In the next three year time, the total gender gap will grow to 350 million. The data has shown that women are making lesser use of internet as compared to men, leading to serious implication for women to develop vital IT skills, which is highly needed in today’s digital economy.

Worldwide NBP adopted countries : 2013

Source: broadbandcommission.org

Internet Usage: Gender Gap

Source: broadbandcommission.org

SNEAK PEEK INTO MOBILECOMM

7 MobileComm Professionals Inc.

MobileComm Professionals Inc: LTE, Small Cell Success in USA and Canada

SPRINT NETWORK VISION MobileComm chosen for building Broadband coverage LTE FDD service on ESMR 800MHz band MobileComm Professional Inc. has been chosen by Ericsson, as the approved vendor to test, optimize and deploy Sprint Muilti-Modal LTE network on ESMR, 2.5GHz and PCS band as a "tri-band" LTE Data services. Involved in the first-in-market testing of this " tri-band" services, MobileComm has been instrumental in optimization and deployments of Sprint's multi-modal LTE thus allowing Sprint to boost its LTE performance up to the levels that subscribers at other operators experience.

SITE CONSTRUCTION and INTEGRATIONS MobileComm now present as an I&C vendor across seven states in USA MobileComm wins additional opportunities in Installation & Commissioning of LTE networks sites build out endeavor for Sprint NV, Verizon and AT&T along with LTE installation & integration of T-Mobile's continued efforts to expand its LTE coverage.

DAS and HET-NET portfolio MobileComm launches its DAS and HET-NET portfolio offering design, optimization, installation and commissioning of DAS and HET-NET networks. With the growing demand for higher data capacity and reduction of traffic load on cellular networks across all carriers creates a need for DAS deployments and Heterogenous network combining Small Cells and Cellular off-loading on Wi-Fi networks. MobileComm has developed competency across the board and has partnered with Ruckus & TE connectivity. MobileComm is now engaged with Top OEMs in USA and Canada to deploy DAS & HET-Net services.

SNEAK PEEK INTO MOBILECOMM

7 MobileComm Professionals Inc.

MobileComm Professionals, Inc. launches a new Knowledge Transfer portal

Continuing with our endeavors towards keeping up with market competence, MobileComm Professionals, Inc. takes a huge pride in announcing the launch of a new conducive knowledge sharing portal for all the employees. On this portal, employee’s will be able to enhance their learning skills by discussing and sharing their own ideas, thoughts, and queries with colleagues, superiors and subordinates regarding in-and-outs of the organization and the industry they are working for. Employees will be benefited with rewards points on each log in, and on sharing and downloading any kind of document related to the telecom industry or regarding MobileComm Professionals, Inc. Current job openings within the MobileComm Professionals, Inc. can also be viewed and referred to others as well. The portal is accessible 24*7 from anywhere by simply using the official Email ID and password.

KEY HIGHLIGHTS OF THE PORTAL: Build for online Knowledge sharing between employees 24*7 accessibility from anywhere by using the employee mail ID and

password. Any employee making effective use of portal will be rewarded with

credit points. Current job openings within MobileComm Professionals, Inc. can be

viewed.

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FEATURE

MobileComm Professionals Inc. 8

Beyond Carrots and Sticks “MONEY IS NOT THE ‘ONLY’ MOTIVATOR” – New Ideas for Motivating Your Team So everyone loves a little extra money…….. But there lies the question for all Employers, on the means to motivate their employees and appreciate their employees’ effort. Many entrepreneurs use bonuses or raises to motivate, believing that digging into their pocketbooks will help to motivate the employees. Although we all love that extra money coming in, sometimes motivating a team on monetary basis may not prove to be as effective as we think. Monetary rewards when used poorly, becomes more like coercion, thus deviating away from the classic carrot-and-stick approach to motivation. Here are a few tips to help companies to put both holiday bonuses and compensation packages in perspective:

"Unless you're extremely careful while using money rewards, you may end up getting people who are just working for the money," as said by Edward Deci, a human motivation psychologist at University of Rochester. "Money is highly motivational for people,” but saying that money is the only thing we should use is also silly. Companies think too much about using money as a motivator and too little about other motivators. When used rightly, Money can be used to motivate employees without compromising self-motivation.

Stay tuned for the next issue !

• Facilitate a sense of autonomy: Employees to a large extent need autonomy and respect in order to feel motivated. When money is used as bait, it can undermine empowerment. Under such circumstances employees lose their self-motivation. Offering reasonable freedoms, listening to employees and providing them opportunities to pursue their goal will help them to boost their confidence and will create a positive and pleasant environment within the organization.

• Use a variety of individualized rewards: As organization tailor their management style for each employee, the same way multiple motivational styles can be tailored as well. Organizations must consider values, tasks and goals of their employees. "Monetary rewards are not a one size fits all kind of thing." Rewards are only the “add-ons” and not “the whole package”.

• Focus on the means, as well as the end: If getting a bonus is the only primary goal, then employees will definitely start taking short-cuts. "If the activity is an instrument to the reward, then they'll try to do it as easily as they can," Deci said. As a leader, emphasize on the broader goals by focusing upon company's mission, and pay attention to how each of your employees reach his/her goal. Reward the people who embody your organization’s values in a wholesome way, and provide clear indications that you want to reinforce such behavior.

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