The countdown to Gamma's launch of a 4G business mobile service has begun. Here, Rob Davis, Head of Converged Products, explains how the company is exploiting the core mobile network infrastructure that it acquired in 2014 and discusses the big opportunities for partners.
Ahead of Gamma's much anticipated business mobile launch the company has been busy briefing channel partners on its plans via a series of events leading up to its annual roadshow this month. "Our main aim is to help more channel partners to be successful selling Gamma Mobile than the 153 MVNO partners who are doing so today," explained Davis. "Gamma Mobile is critical to our long-term strategy to deliver converged fixed and mobile services to businesses, and we believe we are the only provider in the UK that has this capability exclusively for business use and designed to give our channel partners an edge in this market."
Gamma Mobile has been an important part of Gamma's telecoms services since 2007 but the acquisition in 2014 of a complete mobile core network has taken things to a new level, giving Gamma a full MVNO capability and total control over all calls, texts and data from mobiles in exactly the same way Gamma controls the calls and data for its fixed services. The acquisition and integration of the new mobile core is a multi-million pound ongoing investment but Gamma's values remain the same.
"What has stayed constant since 2007 has been the focus on giving channel partners full ownership and control over the mobile contract with the end user, service wrap, pricing and profit they want to make," commented Davis. "This means our channel partners can provide a better service to their customers and, unlike the typical channel-based mobile dealer offerings from the big mobile operators, channel partners get from Gamma the full value of the mobile contract as a business asset."
In the first release of the new mobile service Gamma will include voicemail with options for separate messages inside office hours and outside office hours as well as much longer storage of messages. "We believe we are the first to offer a dedicated business mobile service in this way and we have plans to provide many more business-specific features in the future," added Davis. "Our channel partners will also see similar portals, billing feeds and support tools to their existing ones but with the advantage of a better service for their end users with new features like 4G and business-class voicemail built-in as standard."
Gamma provides a range of both bundles and pay-as-you-use options so partners can either take pre-built bundles or build their own. "This gives our partners the full flexibility to deliver what their business customers want rather than being tied into what the large mobile operators want to force business customers to take," added Davis. "We aim to keep our wholesale pricing as low as possible for channel partners and allow them to generate the healthy margins they need from mobile and provide the quality service wrap that businesses expect.
"We have worked hard to make the portal, billing and knowledge base tools that partners use to manage and control the new service almost the same as the current service, so our partners will find it easy to use. However, there has been an extensive project behind this to integrate the new core with Gamma's existing fixed network core. This has involved more than 44 staff on the project over an 18 month period and required new agreements to be put into place with more than 25 different suppliers.
"The biggest challenge has been getting all of this core network and systems development work done without impacting the simple and easy-to-use way we allow our partners to manage and control the Gamma Mobile service."
According to Davis there is a significant build up of demand for what Gamma can offer the market as a full MVNO. "We intend to provide a wide range of enhancements to the service and are currently talking to partners about what they would value most to ensure we can continue giving them an edge in the market," he added.
Davis believes that Gamma has also gained an edge because of the current dynamics of the mobile market in terms of M&A. "There is much change planned with many large mergers and acquisitions," he explained. "This creates a great opportunity for us and our channel partners to focus on the important task of delivering great products and services for UK businesses while the larger operators' attention is consumed with internally-facing merger and integration activities that take many years to get right."
Gamma's ability to knit together its fixed and mobile technologies combined with its flexibility and focus will provide a springboard for partners wanting to leapfrog their competitors, says Davis. "Our size and agility means that from 'flash to bang' we can bring products to market more quickly than other network providers," he said. "And our relationships with our partners, who are closet to their customers, provide us with great feedback on what the market requires enabling us to produce innovative and relevant products."•