All bets are off

As exhibitors put the finishing touches on the show floor today and attendees are advancing slowly through the long, sun-baked cab lines at McCarron Airport, the CTIA’s Wireless 2001 convention may not seem any different than other of the CTIA’s annual parties over the last 10 years or so. Everything will be bigger, brighter and better than the year before, and people will discuss the amazing and happy fact that wireless subscriber numbers continue to grow.

As an industry, we have come to expect this routine, and even the lean times that appear to have beset most of the telecom industry will not change that. Wireless folks will take solace in the fact that wireless companies remain the least touched of all by both the slowing economy and especially the more recent tightening of telecom spending.

Wireless companies can be thankful of the fact that analysts, Wall Streeters and users are not questioning the viability of their solutions the way they are with, say, DSL companies. And, though average revenue per mobile subscriber is waning, the world has not even made so much out of that. It is not yet a crisis.

So, as you walk the show floor at Wireless 2001 this week, there continues to be much to be thankful for, and there continues to be reason to be confident about the industry’s health.

But, do not head to the blackjack table just yet. Wireless companies, especially, U.S. firms may also be standing on a precipice of uncertainty they will confront head-on within the next year. There is uncertainty over 3G—how quickly it can be built out, how much of an imposition it will be on carriers still paying their 2G bills, how heartily users will consume 3G applications. There is uncertainty over the mobile Internet in general—what’s the rush? Is WAP failing and should this be a sign that users aren’t ready for the mobile Internet? Where does imode fit in outside of Japan?

There is uncertainty over just what to do about the average revenue per subscriber (sorry, I have trouble saying ARPU)—users don’t seem eager to pay for short messaging service (SMS) or wireless Web services. Are location-based services being over-hyped? There is uncertainty over the future shape of the industry—it looks to be an industry that will be dominated by foreign global players tip-toeing their way around stubborn nature of North American technology adoption.

As the mobile industry seeks to become a mobile Internet industry, these chasms of uncertainty must be confronted and crossed. It won’t be an industry in which we’ll be able to expect the same old happy story every year. It is time now to figure out what works because the wireless industry can no longer count on the pace of new phone buying as an answer to every question about the its future.

Now that we’re all mobile, what happens next?
Dan O'Shea is Content Director for TelecomClick. He can be reached at doshea@industryclick.com.