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Monday, July 17, 2006

Air Wars: Episode III - Revenue of the MNO

Rumours abound that some MNOs have asked Carphone Warehouse at a high level (ie Charles Dunstone) to sell their broadband product alongside their TalkTalk Forever package.

From Mobile Today:

One director level source told Mobile: 'It's a very interesting question. Carphone still relies on networks for most of its revenue, but how far do operators want to fund its development into a competing service provider?'

'We have a broadband packages that they [operators] are all trying to copy. Everyone wants to talk to us about it,' confirmed UK CEO Andrew Harrison.

'In the world today we are all competitors and collaborators. We have made no decision yet. But we are committed to the networks and to selling their products. They are the greater part of our business,' Harrison added.

So let’s recount:

  • CPW is battling with the King of Copper, BT (amongst many);
  • Tomorrow, the King of Satellite, BSkyB, enters the ring; and
  • His main paymasters, the MNOs, are starting to get more than a little upset.
In my opinion, Charles has a short window of opportunity to sell TalkTalk to either T-Mobile or Vodafone before the walls of his empire start to come crumbling down.