Dialogic is exhibiting at Connecting West Africa,
taking place at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Dakar, Senegal on Tuesday the 11th of
June.
Jim Machi is the Vice President of Product Management at Dialogic. Today he
shares his views on the Promise of the African VAS Market.
I was asked a question
a few weeks ago about “the future” of value-added services in Africa. This
question was deeper than it first appeared because the person asking me the
question was really wondering whether VAS will be “required” once 3G services,
and thus over the top services (OTT),
become bigger over time in Africa. Before we really get down to answering the
question, it’s important to remember that a value-added service is a service beyond voice
that the consumer is willing to pay for. This does not necessarily mean that it
has something to do with mobile broadband and smartphones. In fact, the advent
of value-added services (and innovative value-added services at that) occurred
with basic feature phones long before mobile broadband was even feasible. SMS,
and derivatives of SMS such as voice SMS, televoting using SMS, gaming using
SMS, and color ring-back tones are examples of value-added services that have
generated revenue for service providers because they provide value to the
subscribers.
So yes, VAS has a very
bright future in Africa. According to the June 2012 Wireless Intelligence
report, “Global Cellular Market Trends and Insight,” Africa has an almost 17% annual mobile connection
growth rate, which is the world’s fastest growing, and 3G accounts for more
than 10% of all connections in Africa. This shows the great potential for all
kinds of value-added services.
And right now,
Dialogic customers offer a wide range of VAS that are applicable to and being
sold in Africa today, ranging from text messaging (including voice SMS), mobile
payments (including exchanging pre-paid from one phone to another phone), IVRs
and roaming solutions. Please see the Dialogic Solution
Showcase on our website for
examples of deployed services. We will see more VAS going forward, and we
should get a glimpse of some of these new services at Connecting West
Africa in June.
So, back to the reason behind the original
question I was asked. What a value-added service is will change as
networks change and as subscriber demand changes. However, the key
principles of value-added services will remain, which is why VAS will always be
a key ingredient to a service provider offering even as the networks change:
- Use VAS as alternative to voice communication mechanisms, such as texting. As smartphones and mobile broadband enter the market, this will likely morph to include other communication mechanisms, such as those provided by instant messaging or Facebook.
- Use VAS as a personalization vehicle, such as with color ring back tones or social networking interaction.
- Use VAS as entertainment, such as with televoting for TV shows or playing games. Again as mobile broadband enters the market, we will see people using their phones to watch TV or videos on YouTube as an example.
- Use VAS as a way to improve your productivity, such as with location-based services or IVRs.
- Use VAS for mobile commerce, such as with payments or mobile banking. As mobile broadband becomes more prevalent, and people start using their smartphones as an on-ramp to the internet, you will likely also see more mobile advertising (think about going to the internet today and how common it is to see advertisements).
Find out more; meet Dialogic at Connecting West Africa, visit Stand 15. Visit the website: www.comworldseries.com/westafrica
