I refer to the Today Article “Telcos ‘may cut network investments’ if they can’t ride on app messaging wave”.

There will be more technology innovation over the internet. This will happen more aggressively in the future. This is only good for the world. The challenge is how Telcos will have to equally innovate to keep up. The “rent seeking” behaviour may not be the best course of action.

What else could a competitive Telco do?

1. They could compete in the apps development field. What is stopping Telcos from creating their own Whatsapp and charging a fee for a better service? If they provide an encrypted service that guarantees privacy, many will pay.
2. They could acquire more applications during the starting up phase. I understand many Telcos have done that and some have purchased “losing” start ups. This is a matter of business judgement.

The Telcos cannot complain that applications like free messaging cut deeply into traditional revenue sources. They need to innovate and find new revenue sources. It is not up to the application developers or the customers to help Telcos maintain the same margins as before.

In fact, Government should bring in more foreign competition and allow obsolete business models to fade away.

Contribution from public