Telepocalypse by Martin Geddes: Skype segments Martin is talking Balkanization of mobile phone traffic.
I see the MVNO called Skype Wireless coming. It doesn’t need to be run by SKYPE. All it needs to do is carry their branding. Heck, Earthlink already does it so why can’t SKYPE, YAHOO, MSN, AOL…cable companies, etc….and you wonder why the companies are merging out of consumer telephone biz. It’s not about the end user to companies like SBC/ATT, SPRINT/NEXTEL any more. It’s about supplying the network and the services.
Banks have been doing this for years. Get your customers to sign up for credit cards, then sell off the portfolio to banks that have the technology and resources/out sources to really manage them, while keeping the essentials. Loans, banking, checking.
Brands are what people buy. It seems that though to the telecom carriers they want to be suppliers, eliminate the big headache of customer service and still make the money on their networks.