【出版时间及名称】：2010年3月全球TMT行业研究报告
        【作者】：汇丰银行
        【文件格式】：pdf
        【页数】：107
        【目录或简介】：
Slicing up the telecoms sector
We tend to think of the telecoms sector as a 2 by 2 grid. On the x-axis are the two different platforms – fixedline
and mobile, on the y-axis the two different things that an operator can sell – first, raw connectivity (for
instance line rental and broadband), and second, the services that run over this connectivity (such as voice and
IPTV). In our previous DisContent report (September 2009), we explained our scepticism about operators’
ability in the long term to successfully monetise the fixed-line services layer: traditional voice services are
being eroded by VoIP and we suspect that the IPTV market will be captured by large internet and media brands
like Google, Amazon and Apple. Fortunately, though, we do think that the telecoms operators should be able to
monetise the fixed-line connectivity that their infrastructures provide, as the capital involved in upgrading to
fibre access systems is so great that in future there will likely be fewer rivals, as well as a shift from unbundledto
wholesale-based competition (see Age of Enlightenment, September 2008).
But what of the mobile side of the industry? Here, we need to address two key questions. The first of these is,
can telecoms operators monetise the mobile service layer? In the longer term, just as in the fixed-line subsector,
voice revenues are likely to be eroded by the shift to VoIP, so the challenge for operators is – one way
or another – to find replacement revenues for traditional voice services. One promising area would have been
selling mobile applications, but – unfortunately – it is companies from the internet and technology space that
have captured this space, leaving the operators to dream of what might have been. Some telecoms players still
have ambitions in the territory now occupied by Apple’s App Store and Google’s Android Market, but we do
not rate their chances.
The second fundamental question we need to address is, if the operators have missed this opportunity to sell
data services, can they at least monetise mobile data connectivity (ie selling raw MB of capacity)? The signs
here are mixed, and a good deal less clear than in the fixed-line market, where the capital involved in fibre
On the face of it, there would seem to be some grounds for encouragement. In particular, we firmly believe that
mobile capacity is – in total – scarce. The reasons for this view are summarised in our recent thematic report,
The Capacity Crunch (8 December 2009). And, all things being equal, providers of a commodity that is in
scarce supply (like mobile bandwidth) should find that they enjoy pricing power. Alas, all things are not equal.
In particular, we must be very careful about identifying what is in scarce supply. Total network capacity is, in
our view, inadequate to meet the demands of heavy data users, who will want to utilise bandwidth-intensive
applications like video streaming. But any attempt to satisfy the demands of customers like these involves
massive upgrades to mobile network bandwidth that will increase by orders of magnitude the capacity available
to another, arguably even more important service – voice.
Data users may be insatiable, but voice services translate into just a few MB per hour. Any effort to cater to
users looking to get through 1GB of data a month would literally enable voice users to redeploy their mobile
phones as baby monitors, if the desire should so take them. Hence data capacity might be scarce, but any
attempt to address this implies voice capacity becoming super-abundant – and it is voice that provides 80% of
today’s mobile revenues. The crucial question for the mobile sector, then, is simply whether or not customers
can be coaxed into paying sufficiently for their data connectivity in order to compensate for the pressure on
voice service revenues (from both VoIP substitution and more traditional sources like termination rate cuts).
Or, perhaps more precisely, can they rebalance with sufficient speed to offset the decline in voice?
Voice revenues will be eroded
Certain trends within voice services look set to continue. For instance, mobile interconnect cuts remain a
steady drag on the industry’s top line. Most recently, pronouncements by the Belgian regulator indicate
termination rates in the next phase of regulation could fall to EUR0.01/minute. Meanwhile, other regulators
(like Ofcom in the UK) are examining the possibility of bill and keep, albeit amongst a range of other
possibilities and on a potentially extended timeframe. In the long term, though, this destination is inevitable, as
all voice traffic will ultimately be carried by VoIP, to which interconnect rates do not apply.
One bear case argues that reductions in interconnect pricing also have dire consequences for retail tariffs. The
idea is that operators (especially challengers) price on cost, and hence when the latter fall (via termination cuts),
they then lower their retail tariffs. However, we believe that game theory considerations rather than the dictates
of a cost-plus methodology have most influence over pricing. Challengers will cut if they see an opportunity to
which incumbents will find it hard to respond. Otherwise, though, typically most work on the assumption that
large cuts will elicit a response from their rivals, making the whole affair a negative-sum game. Underlining
this point is the fact that the pace of market share gain achieved by challenger operators is often not much
different from what one would anticipate from a simple process of mean-reversion. Clearly a discount is
needed to lure users to a less familiar network, but markets are super-tankers, and it is far from clear that heavy
discounting reliably much accelerates the process. Furthermore, many challengers that today fall into what we
term the ‘teenage’ bracket (ie with market share in the teens) will, over the next few years, approach ‘adult’
status (meaning a market share of c20% or above). At this point the potential gains of taking further share begin
to be outweighed by the impact on the value of the existing customer base of the price cuts that would be
necessary.
But what about VoIP? One of the problems of the operators’ losing control in the applications market is that
VoIP software like Skype can readily proliferate, with the consequence that voice services could become free.