“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” – Buckminster Fuller.
Internet Telephony can only be provided by an internet service provider or Unified Access Licence holder,believes the cellular operators Association of India (COAI). “ Companies offering OTT(Over the Top) voice services,without holding a telecom licence in India,would essentially violate and circumvent Indian telecom licensing provisions and provide services that are otherwise only permitted under a telecom licence,” wrote Rajan Mathews,Director General COAI , in a letter to the telecom Regulatory Authority Of India (TRAI). OTT refers to video,television and other services provided over the internet.
Telecom operators are concerned that WhatsApp, which has close to 70 million users in India, would soon start offering voice-over-Internet-protocol(VoIP) calls. This would allow a Whatsapp user to make a call to another Whatsapp use for free using a Wifi or a cellular data service. Customers till now have used VoIP to talk to their relatives and friends living and travelling abroad.
The Telecom Operators have not bothered until now, because International calls are a very small portion of their overall revenue . Once the services is available to millions and starts getting used locally, the situation will be different. Voice revenue is the mainstay of Indian Operators. “VoIP will lead to decline in voice revenue. It has already adversely affected the SMS revenue in India” says Neha Gupta, senior analyst at research firm Gartner.
Global Digital Economy:
In Germany, the regulator tracks the usage pattern of the top few communication apps and regulates them. In France, the government banned Skype and only allowed it to resume operations after the service was brought under regulation. South Korea charges a small fee for the services. U.S. consumers might get a break from the high costs of a pay-TV subscriptions starting this year when several major providers plan to introduce streaming video on-demand services in what the broadband industry calls over-the-top (OTT) programming.
“Our revenue streams are moving towards data services. Telecom industry is all for innovations among OTT and it is most welcome. It will be wrong to project…that telecom operators are against OTT” Gupta said on sidelines of Convergence India 2015.Telecom operators have raised concern over internet messaging and call services from applications like WhatsApp, Viber, Line and Skype are denting their revenues. Recently, Skype withdrew its option of voice calls within India. At this point, consumers are looking for apps which provide them with free calls within India. This option can be availed in Viber, Line. However Line started to promote its App with many free stickers and discounts in shopping websites using Line discount coupons and Viber tried a new marketing strategy with Brand Ambassador Programme to college students.
Monetising OTT Services :
By Pavani Chennamasetti