Twitter Analytics Audience Demographics for @DeadZones

Here is a snapshot of our Twitter Analytics demographics Notice the carriers AT&T, Verizon, Sprint. T-Mobile, Vodafone. O2, Orange. 

Australia's Mobile Black Spot Program Has Located 6,000 Dead Zones

The Mobile Black Spot Programme is an Australian Government initiative to extend mobile phone coverage and competition in regional Australia. The programme will invest in telecommunications network infrastructure to improve coverage of high quality mobile voice and wireless broadband services and competition in the provision of these services. The Government has committed $100 million (GST exclusive) over four years to the delivery of the Mobile Black Spot Programme. The program will improve coverage along major transport routes, in small communities and in locations prone to experiencing natural disasters, as well as addressing unique mobile coverage problems.

Nominations of mobile black spot locations. From 16 December 2013 to 1 August 2014, the Department of Communications received reports of approximately 6,000 locations with poor or no mobile coverage. These locations have been included in a database which is now available as an interactive map. The database will be shared with mobile network operators and infrastructure providers to assist them in preparing funding proposals for the Mobile Black Spot Programme. The database of mobile black spot locations closed on 1 August 2014.

Some 6,000 mobile black spots (dead zones) exist across Australia, according to a recent database released by the government and compiled after submissions from the public. Victoria was the state reported to have the most nominations – 2,029 – for mobile black spots, followed by New South Wales, which had 1,780, while Queensland and Western Australia had 897 and 523, respectively. However, according to The Australian, the AUD100 million (USD92 million) set aside for its Mobile Black Spot Programme is only expected to be able to pay for the construction of between 250 and 300 new base stations. Despite this, Paul Fletcher, parliamentary secretary to the communications minister, was cited as saying that these new towers should help fill coverage gaps in multiple areas, saying: ‘It is important to understand that, although 6,000 locations have been nominated, this does not mean that there are 6,000 locations where a new base station is required.’

With mobile operators such as Telstra, Optus and Vodafone Australia expected to tap the AUD100 million government fund, the process is also reportedly expected to generate at least another AUD100 million investment from bidding parties, state governments and local councils. In terms of which locations will benefit from funding, this will be determined by a competitive selection process, with Mr Fletcher noting: ‘The final determination of the locations to receive funding will come through the competitive selection process, which is designed to allocate the funding to locations which will deliver the greatest benefit in terms of new coverage, for the public funding provided.’ This tender process will reportedly get underway this month, with a decision on successful bids expected by April 2015, ahead of new towers being rolled out in the second half of 2015.

Tell Us Where Vodafone, O2, Three, T-Mobile UK Black Spots Are

UK Black Spots Map Survey

Endemol TV producition is looking for mobile phone users in the UK who experience blackspots and deadzones.  They would like to interview people in the UK suffering from poor reception who use Vodafone, Three, O2 or T-Mobile.  Deadzones.co.uk only has about 100 poor reception areas in the map currently and could use a few more contributors.  Please add pins to the map or email us or comment below if you can help contribute to the story that Endemol is doing.  Are UK mobile phone consumers able to get out of their contracts if they experience poor reception or bad patches in areas where the mobile phone companny promises coverage?

Related Articles:
UK Black Spots
UK Black Spots Map

History of US Wireless Telecom Consolidation

US Mergers and Acquisitions of Wireless Telecom in the US

List of companies consolidated by Sprint (NYSE: S), Verizon (NYSE: VZ), T-Mobile (DTEGY.PK) & AT&T (NYSE: T).  Here is a chart explaining the acquisitions and the year it took place.  This slide was contributed on the Rural Wireless Telecom webcast to help the industry understand why the AT&T and T-Mobile merger is too big!

Sprint: Nextel (2005).
Verizon:  Nynex (1995), PrimeCo (1999), Airtouch (1999), Vodafone Airtouch (1999), GTE (2000), Unicel (2007), Alltel (2009), Western Wireless (2005).
AT&T:  Bell South Mobility (2000), SBC (2000), Cingular (2004), Dobson Cellular Systems (2008), Centennial Wireless (2009).
T-Mobile: Founded as Voice Stream (1994), Omnipoint (2000), Aerial Communications (2000), Powertel (2001),  Changed the name to T-Mobile USA (2002), SunCom (2007).  

Vodafone Was Trying to Buy T-Mobile

Its always interesting to see what other companies might have been in the bidding war for T-Mobile.  Apparently, Vodafone (Nasdaq: VOD) was a very serious player at the table making a bid for T-Mobile USA as well and was ousted at the last minute by AT&T's enormous bid.  Based out of the UK, Vodafone would have been by far a better option for the US entity of T-Mobile.  The company has a market capitalization of $150B similar to AT&T but larger than Verizon's $105B.  This would have finally brought at 3rd and formidable competitor to the US market. Vodafone could bring a European buying experience to phones that we don't get in the US.  European companies are also about 5 years ahead of the US in terms of technology innovation and adoption of techniques for improving coverage and speeds.  If you look around the World most Countries besides the US have 3 large players in the market competing for customers.  However, the US only has AT&T and Verizon and drastically smaller players T-Mobile and Sprint.  I suspect that AT&T executives positioned themselves to Deutsche Telecom as "tight" with the US government regulators and claimed they could get the deal done more quickly than Vodafone could have.  Its sad to see T-Mobile taking a step back and not getting purchased by a company that could significantly bring improvements to an industry that desperately needs new blood and change.  Below is a map of Vodafone operating countries in red and affiliates around the World.  Verizon is their affiliate in the US. 

Why a Vodafone & Verizon Merger Would Be Great for Customers

Reports indicated the two companies were holding informal talks about the future of their joint venture, Verizon Wireless, in which Verizon holds a 55 percent stake and Vodafone has the remaining 45 percent. A Bloomberg report, which cited unnamed sources familiar with the matter, said the companies were mulling multiple options including combining the two companies, having one company sell its stake in Verizon Wireless to the other, or paying out a dividend to investors.  Verizon Communications CEO Ivan Seidenberg seemed to scotch the idea of a merger with Vodafone, noting he sees little compelling reason for such a move.   Ivan's translation - "I would like to keep my job." 

My speculation is that Vodafone management doesn't agree with Verizon's perceived cozy position in the US market which I think is 5 years behind the technology curve from the rest of the world.  Also, the US business has reached the end of the customer acquisition growth cycle and the FCC is under a new regime.  I think Vodafone would clearly like to see a management shakeup and see a realignment of some priorities.  US Verizon customers want iPhones and femtocells embedded in their FIOS and management has failed to deliver in the last few years.  A combination of the two could certainly help provide some worldwide leverage that Verizon needs with Apple.

Vodafone also has a much more customer-centric focus in Europe where ironically coverage is actually much better than Verizon in the US.  See our post about Vodafone will start advertising Femtocells.  Verizon's management is drinking their own coverage map BS cool-aid and is resistant to femtocells in the US for fear of admission of guilt.  Change is good in telecom and would like to see a shakeup at AT&T next.

Verizon CEO down on Vodafone merger, but open to iPhone - FierceWireless

Femtocells & Wifi - Can't They Just Get Along?

Femtocells and WiFi: Why can't they just get on?

It's probably because the two represent radically different business models - rather than just being different technologies - which gives the rivalry added oomph. In the end, though, femto and Wi-Fi will probably both be options on the same hub. Ian Scales reports

Femtos have really arrived: especially in the US and in Japan. According to its supporters there is now an accelerating commitment path, with the number of operators committing to a femto strategy having risen by a full 50 per cent just since November 2009. Vodafone UK, Optimus in Portugal and SFR in France have all come forward with offerings. And there are over 60 operator trials in progress around the world today.

So femtos, just ever-so-slightly delayed by the recession (thought its boosters dispute even this, saying the last year saw the industry involved in a sort of last-minute sanity check, hence the slight pause) are now ready for prime-time.

Femocells are the small and (relatively) cheap micro mobile base stations users are supposed to attach to the end of their broadband connections to relieve the radio network from the worst of their 3G data traffic, and to provide indoor voice coverage where this is a bit shakey (with 3G, for instance). To rework a well-known beer ad, femtos are supposed to reach the parts (and carry the load) that the public network can't.

 

But despite all the cheering, the femto approach has its detractors. These observers usually point out that while femto is a great idea for providing voice coverage where it's weak, it's not a great solution for data offload... at all. They usually think Wi-Fi is the way forward for the following reasons:

Wi-Fi is cheap to deploy in both client and base stations. While femtos look like remaining in the £100 plus camp for the time being at least, Wi-Fi already costs just pennies to deploy in gadgets like smartphones, laptops, games machines and even television sets.

Wi-fi is already pervasive: because it's cheap it's everywhere and because it's everywhere it's cheap. It's already on laptops, it's on half of all smartphones and that proportion is rising. And it's available in hotels, cafes, hotspots and homes. And it's increasing its grip.

And when it comes to data offload (not voice coverage) Wi-Fi wins because most (like about 99 per cent) of the data it offloads goes straight to the Internet, not into the network provider's core as the femto is engineered to support. Yes femtos can do data 'breakout' to the Internet, but as the whole conception is about supporting the core operator network it's a less than optimum arrangement if it just uses breakout nearly all the time.

We recently ran two panel sessions at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. One on femtos and one on WiFi and we were left with the abiding regret that it might have been more illuminating to have run a joint panel. That way we could have thrashed out some of the 'pro' and 'con' issues.

However, you can view both of them now and make up your own minds.

Video: Getting it Right for the End-User 

Video: Why WiFi? What's in it for Operators?

Video: Femtocells: are they critical for network offload?

In the panel on Wi-Fi it's pointed out that Wi-Fi is for the semi-stable world, when people are not actually on the move. They move and then they stop and do some data downloads from a sedentary postion. I called this nomadic rather than mobile. Our panelists had other definitions

Ubiquity in its Wifi sense is that it's every where you need it to be, rather than simply everywhere. So it is (or soon will be) in all coffee shops, airports, hotels, railway stations, in addition to it being both at home and at work.

We learned that BT has a million hotspots that can be accessed under its BT OpenZone brand and it intends to keep on growing that number towards almost total ubiquity.

In regards to mobile network offload engineered by the network operator in the interests of reducing the strain on the mobile data network, a BT representative said the company was already involved with three operators in the UK to provide a WiFi service for their iPhone customers.

On the femto side, the big conundrum is about how you shape an offer so that people are prepared to buy into the concept - what sort of incentives can be made available? What marketing messages might work?

One approach that appears to be working well, say some of our panelists, is the idea that the addition of a femto marks its user out as a serious mobilist. That way it's not so much a remedy for the inadequacies of the network, it's a personal cell for those who can appreciate it.

That might work. But it seems to me that the job of blending a Femto plus various incentives into a compelling offer needs some work yet.

There are many participants in the value chain, from software providers to the device manufacturers themselves, but what are each of them bringing to the table to enhance the user-experience? As they transform their strategies to accommodate ever-changing user demands, what future challenges are they preparing to face? How is the focus on the end-user changing the industry?

Mobile Blackspots Map for the UK

We are huge fans of the fact that Vodafone will start advertising femtocells.  It's impressive to see Vodafone stepping up and taking the industry lead educating consumers about the new products to consumers in the UK using the brand Sure Signal.  Vodafone's Sure Signal guarantees you a great 3G signal at home, no matter where you live, and promotes the fact it might be an emergency risk if you are living in a coverage hole.  This is something the U.S. carriers have tried their hardest to ignore.  See their promotions and website above and watch the stories of people from around the UK who have been rescued from their mobile signal problems.  I am quite proud of a carrier finally admitting that they have coverage holes and giving consumers the ability to do something about it.  Kudos to Vodafone UK!

It will remain to be seen if the U.S. carriers still want to "blow smoke" up our asses with their ridiculous commercials touting their great coverage.  AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint & T-Mobile have been dragging their feet for years "testing" femtocells in the U.S. and not educating their customers that they actually exist.  It also amazes me that Vodafone owns 45% of Verizon in the US yet it seems so against Verizon's arrogant culture to admit they actually have coverage problems with their network.  Do you think Verizon's marketing executives who came up with their moronic coverage map promotion commercials are going to be able to keep their jobs or are they going to have to do an "About-Face" (look in opposite direction) if they start selling femtocells in the U.S.?  Hmmm . . . we shall see.

As a result of Vodafone's leadership, Deadzones.co.uk has launched a new "Consumer Generated Mobile Blackspots Map" asking where mobile customers don't have problem areas indoors and outdoors.   Even if Sure Signal can solve the problem indoors at your home or office there are still many bad patch locations around the UK.  We ask for users to contribute pins in our map for 3, O2, Orange, T-Mobile, and Vodafone. Please also see this UK Blackspots Facebook discussion board we started under Vodafone's profile. 

Find this map at Deadzones.co.uk & Deadcellzones.com/uk.html

Vodafone Will Start Advertising Femtocells

Vodafone and others soon start advertising these devices

We really thought there would be a lot more femtocells on the market here in the US by 2010 considering all of the dead zones in the US and black spots or bad patches in the UK.. There are some femtocells on the market today, but for the most part, carriers are still in "trials" and have not educated the consumer about the product.  We are pleased to see the Vodafone UK has started marketing femtocells and educating consumers and maybe even acknowledging a UK blackspots map for UK. 

It’s pretty common for mobile phone customers in Europe to get better deals than we get here in the U.S. Such is the case with a new femtocell from Vodafone called the Sure Signal pictured above. The device does what you expect a femtocell to do by routing wireless calls over your broadband connection for better signal strength.  The big difference is that Vodafone made the femtocell an attractive device by offering it to customers for a one-time fee. Vodafone users who spend £25 monthly or more on their rate plan can get the device for £120. Those who spend more can get the Sure Signal for as low as £50. No ongoing monthly fees are required and it supports up to four users at once.

Femtocells are expected to rise substantially over the coming years as a growing number of operators start deploying the devices to increase capacity and coverage in their networks, industry organization Femto Forum said Tuesday. At a briefing at the ongoing World Mobile Congress in Barcelona, the non-profit organization's chairman Simon Saunders said increased mobile spectrum and new efficient network standards like Long Term Evolution will not in themselves be enough to meet the explosion in mobile data generated by smartphones and laptops. Femtocells, essentially minimal base stations about the size of a small shoebox that cover an area of some 10,000 square feet, will increasingly be deployed in homes, offices and busy city environments to help offload the networks, Saunders said.

According to projections from analysis firm Informa, some 49 million femtocells will be deployed by 2014, he added. A few big operators including Vodafone Group Plc (VOD) and AT&T Inc (T) have recently started deploying femtocells, according to Sanjeev Verma, founder of U.S.-based femtocell maker Airvana Inc. (AIRV). There are a few hundred thousand femtocells in use worldwide, he said in an interview Tuesday but added that the number should rise sharply as Vodafone and others soon start advertising the devices.

Operators are interested in femtocells because they improve coverage in indoor environments and boost network capacity, said Verma. He said they also allow some applications for home environments, like synchronizing electronic devices over the network. A typical femtocell costs around $100-$200, Verma said, but added that operators will probably offer them to consumers at a subsidized price, much like they currently do with mobile phones.

In a separate keynote speech Tuesday, Guo Ping, Chief Science Officer at Chinese network equipment vendor Huawei Technologies Co, said limited bandwidth is an important challenge for the telecom industry. Telecom firms can meet capacity demands by rolling out faster technology standards like Long Term Evolution, gaining access to more spectrum, and building solutions for increased coverage in hot spots, he said.

Can Femtocells Fix U.S. Residential Cell Phone Coverage Problems?

A femtocell—originally known as an Access Point Base Station—is a small cellular base station, typically designed for use in residential or small business environments. It connects to the service provider’s network via broadband (such as DSL or cable); current designs typically support 2 to 5 mobile phones in a residential setting. A femtocell allows service providers to extend service coverage indoors, especially where access would otherwise be limited or unavailable. A number of non-U.S. operators have announced intention to have field trials in 2008, including O2, Softbank, TeliaSonera and Vodafone. Most analysts agree that 2008 will primarily be field trials and soft launch, while commercial launch will be commence in 2009. When will the U.S. carriers get their act together and catch up to the rest of the world?

UK Bad Mobile Patch Map

Vodafone’s decision to back-peddle on its promotion of 3G is timely acceptance by the world’s biggest mobile operator that the technology and its services are not compelling enough for subscribers to pay the premium prices that mobile carriers are charging. The re-evaluation might have a domino effect throughout the industry and it is expected that other operators will follow suit and change their marketing tack. Vodafone is now to concentrate on pushing the excellence of 3G voice similar to Verizon in the U.S. This is a signal that operators are now focusing on their customer's real needs and will be competing more directly on the quality of the basic services they offer. The difficulty with this approach though is that individual subscribers have no independent way of assessing which mobile carrier actually offers the best quality. The parameters that determine “quality” vary so much between carriers and in subscriber perceptions that www.deadzones.co.uk was started as an open forum where mobile phone users can share service coverage complaints with fellow subscribers and with the operators themselves.