Arun, thanks for the conference notes.
On this item: <Non-selling cash cost of service is $9/month/sub for a typical CDMA carrier. $5.56/month/sub for LWIN. Reason: Fewer cell sites. Cell sites only cover 70 percent of the POPs in each market. Less backhaul costs and less technicians.>
As competition mounts, that doesn't seem much of a price difference. I wonder if subscribers won't increasingly prefer to get coverage, even for $3.44 extra per month. Prices are getting so low that convenience, coverage, functionality, phone options, cyberspeed and other matters will predominate in subscribers' minds rather than feeling comfortable and predictable with a lower cost per month.
I believe the predictable nature of the Leap service is not so important as the lack of sticker shock when accidentally going over the bucket plan of minutes [which I believe is what they mean by 'predictable'. The competitors could offer predictability by showing the current price per minute and expenditure so far [and amount remaining in credit] on the phone rather than offering the annoying plans where you have to take a guess at how many pints of milk you want for a month, then use them or lose them. People prefer to just pay for what they use.
I believe people prefer to not have to guess [=predictability] and prefer either to eat all they like or pay for what they do eat. The buffet or the a la carte menu are the models which work in restaurants. The buffet saves the cost of measuring, individualizing and arguing over bills, but it means greedy pigs get a better deal.
Still trying to figure it out,
Mq
PS: Good suggestion Jack [for offspring to give oldies a $10/10minute phone for Xmas, Birthday, Mother's Day, Father's Day, Thanksgiving Day, Saturday... |
