|
NewsGlobe: Today's News
Cable’s wireless adventure
MSOs target integrated wireless service play
by Sean Buckley
Cable operators, despite their outward conservative nature, never seem
to be afraid to try something new, and their drive to provide wireless
services reflects that mentality.
Following their initial foray into the wireless market in late 2005, the big
four U.S.-based cable MSOs—Comcast, Cox, Time Warner Cable and
Advance/Newhouse Communications—earlier this Spring jointly launched
their “Pivot” wireless service via a joint arrangement with Sprint Nextel.
Set to go live in eight metro markets this year, “Pivot,” while not exactly
a true FMC (fixed mobile convergence) service, offers cable subscribers
the ability to effectively link their wireless service with their digital home
phone service, Internet and even digital video services.
(see CTIA: Sprint/Cable JV Ready To Pivot)
Alan Breznick, senior analyst for Heavy Reading says that while 2007 is
the ramp up year to prove out the cable operator’s ability to deliver
wireless service, 2008 will be the year when the rubber will likely meet the road.
“The cable guys have been talking about getting into wireless for years,”
he said. “This year they are finally starting to make it happen and launch
services; three of the big guys have already started offering pilot
services this year as part of their consortium with Sprint.”
Not Just Voice
As suspected, each MSO is in a different stage of their wireless
deployment.
Thus far, Time Warner Cable has launched wireless service in 6 markets
with plans to be in all of its 31 markets by the end of 2007, Cox is in 4
markets, Comcast is in 2, while Advance/Newhouse has not indicated
any specific plans to launch wireless service.
Feeling continued pressure from the RBOCs entering into their video turf,
Breznick believes the real driver for cable MSOs in wireless won’t just be
voice resale in a quad play bundle, but video.
“Cable always responds to competition, so (A) they’re doing it because
the telcos are getting into video and because the RBOCs already have
their own wireless play, so the cable guys know they have to get into
it,” he said. “But (B), they see it as a differentiator. While they are
getting into the wireless voice business, the big thing they seem
interested in even with Sprint is doing wireless video and wireless data.
Their big push is not so much mobile voice, but mobile video.”
At this point, the big three operators are offering mobile TV service
through a partnership with MobiTV.
Out of the four participants in Sprint’s joint venture, Time Warner appears to be the most aggressive. Time
Warner has been touting its “Enhanced TV” package that includes 11
video channels for $15 a month. What’s more, TWC offers three dozen
mobile TV channels on an a la carte basis that cost between $3.95 to
$6.95 a month.
Along with video and voice, Sprint’s cable MSO partners are offering
other features such as access to home e-mail accounts, Internet
access, unified voice mail for VoIP and mobile phones and access to
home TV program listings. In addition, the cable MSOs are offering
unlimited free calling between subscribers’ VoIP and mobile phones.
Question of Spectrum
But the “Pivot” service offering is only one part of the cable MSO’s
overall wireless equation. Inquiring minds want to know what the cable
operators will do with the 137 spectrum licenses they jointly purchased
with Sprint last fall via their SpectrumCo venture.
Currently, none of the members of SpectrumCo, which collectively paid
US$2.37 billion for nationwide wireless spectrum, have indicated any
specific plans.
“The big question is what they will do with that spectrum,” said
Breznick. “Will they sit on it and trade it for something or whether they
can build something on their own. I think they are studying a lot and
they may make decision this fall. Then, there’s this whole load of analog
broadcast 700 MHz spectrum.”
|
