New CHANNEL BUZZ

Last week Google announced that GrandCentral, acquired by Google in 2007, is now Google Voice, with new features including voicemail to text and archive and search of SMS text messages.

Analysts and bloggers are divided on how this will impact voice revenues from local and international calls, but the ability to offer free Internet calls will surely be seen as a threat. When Nokia announced last month that Skype came preloaded on the N97, it incurred the displeasure of mobile operators. According to Mobiletoday.co.uk, UK operators Orange and O2 may end up refusing to stock the N97 unless Nokia eliminated the application.

The incursion of Skype and Google into telecommunications adds to the mounting pressure mobile operators are facing from new players. Last year, when Apple announced it was opening up its platform to developers, they redefined the power balance in the industry; technology vendors and developers now have access to the mobile market without having to go through an operator. The result? Apple's AppStore is expected to become a $1 billion business by the end of 2009 and other major players have announced their own App Store including RIM, Nokia, Microsoft and Palm.

Vincent Paquet, a co-founder of GrandCentral who is now running Google Voice, stated that "Google is all about helping you manage your information and one of the big holes right now is in the management of voice communications".

Paquet's statement is relevant because he highlights yet another missed opportunity by mobile operators. A recent report from Frost & Sullivan placed the spotlight on Unified Messaging (UM), a technology that facilitates anywhere and anytime access to non-real-time messaging. According to Frost & Sullivan, UM contributed approximately 51 percent of the total enterprise voice and UM market revenues, a market that earned revenues of $708.1 million in 2008 (Cellular News, Feb 26 2009). Mobile operators, however, have not showed much enthusiasm in this service. Technology vendors including Comverse, Ericsson and Unisys introduced this service several years ago and it has evolved to reflect new developments such as voice mail transfer to e mail, web access and single access to voice, fax and e mail messages. Operators, however, have stayed with basic voice mail services, with functions that have not changed since they were first introduced almost twenty years.

The mobile market continues to evolve at a rapid pace and there are many new and exciting opportunities waiting to happen: converged messaging, mobile advertising and mobile/Internet convergence to name a few.

Mobile operators can still leverage their position in the market, but with new players moving in and filling the "big holes" in voice and data, they will have to redefine their business models and partner with the new players; at this stage of the game, this might be their only option to take advantage of new opportunities and more importantly, respond to threats in a new business environment where they no longer have the last word.