15/09/2010 By Calvin Azuri ( Source: http://voice-quality.tmcnet.com )

European Operators Can Generate Revenue from Personalized Services

European telecom operators have the potential to tap into new revenue streams. To achieve this, operators need to deliver number choice to prepaid customers. Other personalized service offerings also need to be delivered by the operators. This was revealed by Evolving Systems, Inc. after conducting a survey in spring 2010.

The survey was carried across the U.K., France, Germany, Italy and Spain. The views and opinions of 500 prepaid mobile subscribers were taken into account for the survey.

If a choice was provided to select their own number depending on cost, more than 30 percent of the respondents in each country were ready to pay a premium for the same. However 25 percent of the respondents ready to pay the premium were only ready to shell out a premium ranging between €6-50 and £6-50 for U.K. users.

In a release, Stuart Cochran, CTO, Evolving Systems said, "These figures will give wireless operators food for thought. If operators could convert these percentages of their prepaid mobile subscriber base to number personalization, they would gain a significant incremental revenue source. There clearly is a potential market in these key European countries for personalized number selection and it is equally clear that this market remains largely unexploited so far."

According to the survey, very small percentage of prepaid users is able to select their own mobile number. While this option is given to only 13 percent of prepaid users in France when buying a prepaid SIM card, only 21 percent of users in Italy are provided this option.

Typically a retail store provides number choice for prepaid users. In every country surveyed excluding Germany, this option has been the most popular route. A choice of numbers via their mobile screen has been only offered to a very small percentage of prepaid users.

While U.K. users prefer to visit retail stores to choose a number, in other countries it is the least preferred option. Most respondents wanted an ability to select numbers via the phone’s screen.

According to Cochran, personalization like number choices is offered to customers with Evolving Systems’ Dynamic SIM Allocation solution. This is provided when they use a mobile device for the first time.