Alcatel-Lucent, ng Connect, Ruckus Wireless, and Vidiator to discuss mobile apps and revenue opportunities at CONNECTIONS™ Europe

Executives from Alcatel-Lucent, ng Connect, Ruckus Wireless, and Vidiator will discuss new mobile broadband strategies, including ways to contend with declining voice revenues, at a special CONNECTIONS Europe session on November 15. Applications such as messaging, social networking, and multimedia are initial revenue opportunities, and once the smartphone reaches into the home network, operators can extend services to include remote access, place-shifting content, and remote home monitoring.

Parks Associates details the challenges for mobile operators, including market oversaturation and diverse user populations, in the new white paper “European Mobile Market: Beyond Price-based Strategies.” The firm illustrates the necessity of data services for mobile operators in order to compensate for the drop in voice revenues. By 2014, data will account for over 46% of mobile service revenues in Western European countries.

Parks Associates President, Stuart Sikes will moderate the session “Mobile Broadband: Devices, Strategies, and Consumer Demand,” November 15 at 2:30 p.m. This interactive session includes the following participants:

-- Andrew Bielinksi, Technical Sales Manager, Vidiator
-- Laureen Cook, Vice President, 4G/LTE Strategy - Emerging Technology and Media Group, ng Connect
-- Steven Glapa, Director, Business Development, Carrier Networks, Ruckus Wireless
-- Yves Tjoens, VP Head of Product - Motive, Alcatel-Lucent

New White Paper, "European Mobile Market: Beyond Price-based Strategies"

Parks Associates has released a new white paper, "European Mobile Market: Beyond Price-based Strategies."

This new white paper examines challenges for mobile carriers in Europe and strategies to sustain ARPU and expand their base of postpaid users.

• Regulations, Competition, and Churn

• Evolving Beyond Price-based Strategies

• Examples of New Strategies: Vodafone, Telefonica, T-Mobile, & Orange

• The Road Ahead - Evolution of Carrier Strategies

To download this white paper, complete this online form.

Other recent white papers include Google TV- Searching for Success and Consumer Attitudes and the Benefits of Smart Grid Technologies.

New White Paper, Google TV - Searching for Success

Google is entering the market for smart TV at a time where there is much indecision about the ideal technology solution. The market is searching for a solution that will benefit the TV manufacturer, content owners, and advertisers.

This new white paper from Parks Associates looks at Google's strategy and the current market conditions for connected CE.

Click here to download.

Service providers boost subscriber satisfaction with bundled services and connected home strategies

A new white paper from Parks Associates finds households with bundles and home network solutions supplied by their service provider are more satisfied with their broadband service and more receptive to value-added services.

Broadband providers can achieve 15% higher customer satisfaction through connected home strategies that include service bundles and value-added services such as premium technical support.

Broadband Services: The Turning Point, the new white paper from Parks Associates, reports subscribers with a triple-play bundle exceed the national average for satisfaction with broadband services. Premium entertainment services, premium technical support, and provider-deployed home networks also have an immediate and positive impact on customer satisfaction and create a foundation for future service enhancements and higher ARPU.

Broadband Services: The Turning Point examines the evolution of broadband services and provides primary consumer data of U.S. broadband households, including current penetration of bundled services, consumer interest in a variety of broadband value-added services, and the impact of VAS on customer satisfaction.

Parks Associates’ upcoming project Broadband, Communications, and Entertainment Bundles examines the consumer selection process for communications and entertainment services.

Digital Lifestyles and the Service Provider

Service providers face issues brought on by the economic and housing crisis, slowing subscriber growth, and increased competition – where the right combination of services or the wrong pricing dynamics can woo subscribers from one carrier to the next. Although service providers’ priorities have been consistent over time, the steps necessary to fulfill them have changed.

CONNECTIONS™ addresses the major priorities, opportunities, and challenges for service providers in a new white paper, written by research firm Parks Associates, Digital Lifestyles and the Service Provider.

New white paper expose security risks within next-generation set-top boxes

Consumer demand for media-rich home entertainment services is driving innovation and new revenue opportunities in the set-top box (STB) industry. Next-generation STBs will integrate video content from multiple signal sources such as broadcast television, premium video-on-demand and Internet-based services, provide value-added capabilities like time-shifting, and allow content to be distributed to a variety of viewing devices including multi-room TV networks, personal computers, portable media players and other mobile devices.

Cloakware's latest whitepaper, Security Impacts of Next-Generation Set-Top Boxes, describes the market and technology trends that are influencing set-top box designs and explains how advanced features are creating new content security challenges for set-top box manufacturers. This paper is intended for product and business managers, security architects, development managers and other technical staff who are directly involved in the specification, design and development of advanced set-top boxes.

This white paper is available for download at: http://security.cloakware.com/whitepapers/set-top-box-security/intro.php

New White Paper, CONNECTIONS™ Conferences focus on digital content, networked devices, home systems, and consumer electronics

International research firm Parks Associates released a new white paper today, The Future of Networked Devices and Digital Content, which tracks developments and areas of growth for the digital living industries in anticipation of upcoming CONNECTIONS™ events.

The paper addresses the core topics Communications & Entertainment Services, New Media and Digital Content, Home Systems, and Consumer Electronics. These topics will be under discussion at the next two CONNECTIONS™ events:

CONNECTIONS™ Europe Summit
Nice, France
March 31

CONNECTIONS™: The Digital Living Conference and Showcase
Santa Clara, California
June 2-4

The CONNECTIONS™ white paper notes that increased competition and the commoditization of voice and bandwidth are pushing providers toward advanced services including fixed-mobile convergence (FMC). They will rely on femtocells to realize their FMC strategies, which will boost the number of these devices shipped worldwide to 100 million in 2013.

In addition, carriers and manufacturers have the opportunity to craft new customer support services as part of bundling and product design. U.S. remote tech support service for consumers was a $650 million market in 2008, and this service area will only expand.

For over a decade, CONNECTIONS™ has been the site for discussions on networking standards, including multiple sessions devoted to wireless and powerline control technologies. Parks Associates forecasts five million smart meters installed in the U.S. by 2012, ensuring home controls will again be an important area of discussion and display in 2009.

The Future of Networked Devices and Digital Content is available as a free download on the CONNECTIONS™ websites www.connectionsconference.com and www.connectionseurope.com.

The deadline to submit to be considered a speaker for either event is Friday, January 23, 2009.

CONNECTIONS™ Europe to address mobile TV and other entertainment platforms and applications

While Europe has adopted a standard for mobile TV, this move actually makes it more difficult for operators to reap the benefits of this service sector, according to a new white paper from Parks Associates.

The research firm released No Way to Regulate: Mobile TV in Europe for its upcoming CONNECTIONS™ Europe Summit. This event will take place on August 28-29 at the Kempinski Hotel Bristol Berlin and features panels and interactive discussions on advanced entertainment platforms and emerging applications for entertainment, home networking, and communications.

This new white paper highlights the challenges European operators face as they develop and deploy mobile TV services. European regulators have adopted the DVB-H as a mobile TV standard for Europe, but the paper asserts that this approach means operators are limited in their spectrum options and often cannot leverage established network infrastructure.

This market situation threatens what is a significant service sector. Mobile TV users, while small in number, are an important consumer segment, according to Parks Associates. They are more likely to own and purchase a variety of consumer electronics, more likely to subscribe to pay TV services, and generally have a more favorable attitude toward technology. Service providers will be able to command a premium in advertising to this consumer segment.

GDL: Entertainment 2.0 in Europe, a new study by Parks Associates, will further explore consumer purchase habits and service preferences for a variety of entertainment products and services, from traditional TV to advanced online video. The study features consumer surveys and country profiles of the top European markets.

CONNECTIONS™ Europe Summit will include two panels, “The Evolution of Video Devices” and “New Connectivity Applications: Entertainment, Control, Home Networking, and Communications,” focused on the new opportunities and obstacles for companies in digital entertainment.

Prior to CONNECTIONS™ Europe Summit, the WirelessHD Consortium will host a pre-show workshop on August 28, followed by a reception for CONNECTIONS™ Europe attendees. The summit concludes on August 29 with a tour of the Fraunhofer Institute’s Exhibits at IFA 2008, hosted by Fraunhofer Heinrich-Hertz-Institute.

Premium Technical Support Services Lead to Broadband Value-added Services Revenue

...White paper encourages service providers to use remote and automated digital home customer support solutions for cost savings and as tools to drive new services revenue.

Broadband service providers will benefit significantly from the deployment of premium technical support services that not only contribute to cost savings but allow them to use analytics to better target additional value-added services revenue, a new white paper from Parks Associates reports. Parks Associates, author of Customer Analytics to Drive Value-added Services, predicts that premium technical support services will grow from $400 million in 2008 to $900 million by year-end 2012, accounting for 70% of value-added services revenues.

Customer Analytics to Drive Value-added Services includes industry forecasts, consumer data, and data from premium support programs by HiWired Inc., a company specializing in customer support and marketing campaign support technologies.

Customer Analytics to Drive Value-added Services is a free white paper available for download at www.parksassociates.com. Parks Associates will discuss customer support value-added services in a special panel of industry experts at the upcoming CONNECTIONS™ leadership conference in Santa Clara, California, June 24-26, 2008. More information on the panel discussion can be found at http://www.connectionsconference.com/.

Premium Technical Support Services Lead to Broadband Value-added Services Revenue

White paper encourages service providers to use remote and automated digital home customer
support solutions for cost savings and as tools to drive new services revenue

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Broadband service providers will benefit significantly from the deployment of premium technical support services that not only contribute to cost savings but allow them to use analytics to better target additional value-added services revenue, a new white paper from Parks Associates reports. Parks Associates, author of Customer Analytics to Drive Value-added Services, predicts that premium technical support services will grow from $400 million in 2008 to $900 million by year-end 2012, accounting for 70% of value-added services revenues.

Customer Analytics to Drive Value-added Services includes industry forecasts, consumer data, and data from premium support programs by HiWired Inc., a company specializing in customer support and marketing campaign support technologies.

Customer Analytics to Drive Value-added Services is a free whitepaper available for download at http://www.parksassociates.com/. Parks Associates will discuss customer support value-added services in a special panel of industry experts at the upcoming CONNECTIONS™ leadership conference in Santa Clara, California, June 24-26, 2008. More information on the panel discussion can be found at http://www.connectionsconference.com/.