Comments on: Telecom Outlook 2007

By: Chris Hughes

Chris Hughes — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 14:44:39 +0000

Cringely has something to say about all this - not Canada, though.

By: Hugh

Hugh — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 14:45:24 +0000

data and voice rates are very different things. if you are interested in canada’s dismal performance on the data side (who wouldn’t be?), see:
http://www.thomaspurves.com/2007/04/09/canada-worse-than-3rd-world-countries-when-it-comes-to-mobile-data-access/

By: Chris Hughes

Chris Hughes — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 13:42:50 +0000

Hmm. Don’t know. We could fall back on the ‘Canadian Telcos are baddies, as opposed to the rest of the world’ theory? :)

But first, I wonder if data rates are indicative of voice rates…

In fact, the more I think about it, the more I realise that I don’t know. So I will stop theorising.

By: Hugh

Hugh — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 13:07:09 +0000

oh, also for comparison on these issues, australia should be canada’s yardstick, with similar pop density and similar economy. see this graph to see how mobile *data* rates differ:
http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=452679328&size=o

(the red bars are canadian providers).

By: Hugh

Hugh — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 13:05:30 +0000

how to account for the huge success of mobile in lowish pop density/low income countries, eg south africa.

also, just a note on canadian pop density, though our data is among the lowest in the world, at 3.2 ppl/sq.km, that population is concentrated in a band of a few hundred kilometers along the southern border with the USA. so the effective density, as it applies to mobile towers, is much higher, tho certainly nothing like the UK.

By: Chris Hughes

Chris Hughes — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 11:58:20 +0000

Yes. A mobile phone mast used by many people would recoup its costs quickly, thus cost effective. The mobile phone population must be some sort of function of income and overall population.
In the UK we have high population density and high income, so high mobile phone use (also deregulated…) EVERYONE has a mobile – you get a free phone with a plan of £25 a month, and a blackberry free with a plan of £45 a month.
In the USA, high income, but lower population density, so mobile phone use seems to be lower than in the UK (certainly outside major conurbations) – also, it seems expensive to British eyes.
In Canada – very low population density overall, but high income(?)
In Japan – very high Pop Den – very high income – very pervasive mobile (3G) – cheapest and fastest broadband in the world.
QED(?)

By: Hugh

Hugh — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 11:31:40 +0000

interesting… underlying theory would be?:
-low density = high cost
-high income = high payment ability

By: Chris Hughes

Chris Hughes — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 08:22:53 +0000

Just a thought – and a small one – but I wonder if population density (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_density) combined with per capita income (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita) is a good predictor of mobile and broadband rates.