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I wrote many blog posts about mobile VoIP and I tried most of the mobile VoIP services available for my handsets (Nokia N-series). That being said, I have to say that all of them are definitely bringing innovation to the mobile market, while mobile operators start watching them carefully as a potential threat.

One of the trends I’m observing is how those services are leveraging their existing infrastructure, investments and developments by offering a white label solution to big companies which want to up-sell new innovative services to their huge potential user base. It’s nothing more than what some mobile carriers are already doing worldwide with the so called MVNOs, but with “VoIP” and “new services” in the middle.

Look at Rebtel with EasyMobile (but I know for sure there is more coming out soon) or FreshTel with Tesco. FreshTel, for example, is a new player operating in the Australian market that I knew during the VoIP World 2008 in Dubai since I was sitting at the same rountable with Rhonda O’Donnell, their CEO. They signed a big deal with Tesco, a Wal-Mart competitor, to provide their customers with a mobile VoIP solution. How long will it take for WalMart or similar groups to look for similar solutions to be sold to their huge audience?

I’m pretty sure there is more coming out from players like, for example, the no-boundaries mobile operator Cubic Telecom and I expect to see something similar coming from other players like Truphone or Fring. The point here is to bring user experience at its best. Customers of big shopping groups like Wal-Mart are mostly “normal” people who look for something cheap and easy to use, without having to struggle with software installation or handset’s configuration.

In this perspective a solution by MaxRoam, Rebtel or Sim4Travel (by Truphone) would fit better with that audience and are more likely to succeed than other services which are more complex for an average user. Most people are not early adopters of new technologies so all the mobile VoIP companies that want to jump into that business through those channels must keep this aspect well in mind.

Besides, I stated many times and I firmly believe that the #1 concern for any mobile VoIP player must be the usability and the overall user experience delivered by their services. They can offer the cheapest rate ever, but It becomes useless if a “normal” person needs to attend a software engineering class to install their software or needs to buy a $500 phone to use it (mmm… how many “normal” people have a Wifi access at home?).

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Technorati Tags: Cubic Telecom, freshtel, fring, luca filigheddu, maxroam, mobile voip, rebtel, Tesco, truphone

Truphone is no longer offering their FREE calls, after having had this options for many months. Mobivox, announced that calls between Mobivox users are no longer FREE, too.

All that said, is a new trend starting? Are we finally in front of the end of the FREElosophy?

On the contrary, companies like Rebtel caught this opportunity immediately and issued a press release where they state that, unlike TruEphone and Mobivox, their service can still be used for FREE, with the “smart call” option.

Unfortunately there are two weak points here. First, this is not free. That option can be used if both users are calling a local number from their phone, calls that they are paying (not to Rebtel, but to their local telecom provider). From Rebtel’s website:

Please note: You and your friend will pay your phone companies for the local part of the call. The international connection is free!

Secondly, that method is not certainly the most usable, they surely have other methods much more suitable for a wide general usage. However, we have to say that Rebtel’s CEO honestly admits this in the press release:

“It true that most of our customers choose our paid service,” said Hjalmar Winbladh, Rebtel co-founder and CEO.  “And we don’t deny that our free calling service requires people to jump through a hoop or two.  But if free is what matters to you, then give us a try. It’s really not hard to do – in fact, we think it’s kind of fun.”

Anyway, customers will tell their opinion by using this or that service. In the meantime, I praise any VoIP company that start making users pay for their services. It’s a clear equation: someone offers you a service, you have to pay.

Technorati Tags: free, luca filigheddu, mobivox, rebtel, truphone, VoIP

When you invested a lot of money in building a strong infrastructure, advanced VoIP services and all of this is being used by millions users everyday, why not sharing it with other service providers and new VoIP operators who want to offer innovative customized services to their users?

That’s the natural step that both Jajah and Rebtel are undertaking. Jajah, in particular, thanks to their strong partnership with Deutsche Telecom, is making it a real business division and their latest deals include Yahoo, MailVision, Pageonce, Gumiyo and many others.

Besides Jajah, Rebtel is signing important agreements as well and the first one seems to be a big one, easyMobile, the mobile virtual operator by easy Group, the UK group headed by the greek entrepreneur Stelios Haji Ioannau and much popular in Europe because of the low cost airline easyJet. The official announcement has not been made yet, but Om Malik seems to know the story very well.

The white label approach has a downside, however, that is the need of a dedicated team to take care of your partners, since your business is strictly related to the their performances. In a nutshell, you have to work closely with the marketing division of your partners to help them to grow their business, that means a bigger specialized marketing team.

What’s next? I praise both Jajah and Rebtel for the great job they are doing, definitely two companies to watch for the 2nd half of 2008. At the same time, I look forward to seeing new services that can add value to their offering, limited, right now, to telephony. However, with the recent agreement with Dial2Do, it seems Jajah is working on them and, moreover, filling the gap they had with voice-activated value added services like those already offered by companies like Mobivox.

Technorati Tags: easymobile, jajah, luca filigheddu, rebtel, VoIP, white label