Should mobile operators sell laptops?
By Dusan Belic on Monday, March 10th, 2008 at 5:55 AM PST In General
It’s an interesting idea when you think about it. With its huge buying power mobile operators could drive laptop sales through the roof while getting more mobile data users at the same time. The problem is that with an exception of Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and Sony, most computer makers have razor-thin margins, giving them little space to slash prices further, even if the buyer is as powerful as Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) or T-Mobile (NYSE: DT). On the other hand, mobile operators may just want to use laptops as a sales tool and subsidize them to get more people to use data services. It’s not unimaginable that in the near future some carrier starts offering Asus eeePC like computer for free with an appropriate plan. As a matter of fact, according to Pyramid Research’s recent report, some carriers are already selling laptops — Russia’s MTS, Telefonica (NYSE: TEF)’s O2 (NYSE: TEF), T-Mobile, Orange, Vodafone and PLDT all sell laptops in some of their markets. Is this a new trend or what? What do you think?
[Via: BusinessWeek]
Hah!
Going by the past behavior of US mobile operators, you can bet they’ll disable everything and make it only work with a data connection supplied by them
And even otherwise..this also begs the questions-
Should the transport authority sell cars?
Should the electricity company sell appliances?
Let service providers stick to doing just that and leave the rest upto their customers-it’s called sticking to one’s core competence.
I believe this is already happening in the UK – you can get £300 off any laptop if you sign up to an 18 month ‘3′ mobile internet contract.
This is already very common in Sweden.
Sure this is a great operatunity for resellers who deal both in mobilphones/mobile-broadband and computers. But support and other expertice will often be lost at the typical supermarket style phoneshop…
” But support and other expertice will often be lost at the typical supermarket style phoneshop…”
Indeed.
Include Poland in it too..Three out of four operators are doing it.
To Rex…Actually you’re wrong…you get the laptop and you are forced to PAY FOR, not USE the data so it’s even better for the operator if you use WiFi instead of 3/3.5G as you’re not sucking down on the precious bandwidth. Either way you still have to pay for the data plan you sign up for…the same way you do with a phone..you sing up to get a freebie, you are locked in for two or so years. The operator doesn’t give a damn if you pop a different sim card as long as you pay for the contract you signed up for. You stop – you pay the ETF – that’s all. The only downfall is that the laptops they provide are on the lower side of the scale.