Phone Card Commercial - Week 8 - TelePinoy

Here is a Filipino commercial for the TelePinoy calling card. A little higher production value than some of the Spanish language ones but still on the low end.

Titan Global Holdings, Inc. Acquires Ready Mobile

Titan Global Holdings, Inc., the parent company of Oblio, announced that they have completed the acquisition of Ready Mobile, a prepaid wireless company with over 9 million dollars in revenue per year and 30,000 subscribers. Ready Mobile also operates under the brand name Mojo in some markets.

This acquisition is expected to help Boost the Oblio wireless brand and give them a greater share of the prepaid MVNO business.

To read more about Titan go to their web site: http://www.titanglobalholdings.com/

Amp'd Mobile Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Protection

The struggles for the nations leading MVNOs continue with the recent chapter 11 bankruptcy protection filing by Amp'd mobile. It looks like they have a debt of just about 100 million and owe about 1/3 of that to Verizon Wireless, the carrier for this MVNO. They also owe almost 16 million to Motorola.

Oddly enough Amp'd claims that the cause of this filing is not because of poor buisness, just the opposite. They claim that they have been growing too fast, adding 20,000 customers a month since late last year, and just have not been able to keep up with the back end infrastructure.

They hope that this bankruptcy protection will give them the room and time they need to get caught up.

IDT Telecom Cuts 300 Jobs

I forgot to post on one of my earlier posts that IDT announced during their earnings call that they have just cut 300 jobs from the Telecom division. Add this to the 570 or so jobs cut in late summer last year and the company is pushing almost a 25% reduction in its work force from last year (Yahoo had IDT listed at 4,000 employees up until last week when they adjusted this number t0 3,000).

Based on their poor performance, bleak prognosis on new businesses and sharp quarter after quarter of declining phone card revenues, it is probably not the end of the layoffs either.

Phone Card Commercial - Week 7 - Very Cheesy!

Here is a phone card commercial I found for the La Catedral phone card. It is in spanish and was obviously done on a low budget fro some local cable channel.

IDT Announces Disappointing 3rd Quarter Results

On Wednesday IDT announced their 3rd quarter results and the picture looked bad. Their net loss, 15.9 million, was nearly double that of Q3 from 1 year ago (8.6 million). Revenue was announced at $485.4 million down from $547.2 million 1 year ago.

This seems to have caught many off guard as most analysts, who up until Wednesday had IDT stock as "hold," quickly changed their recommendations to "sell." While IDT officials kept up beat and political during the announcement, they drew no detailed plans of how they were going to turn the company around. Instead they kept blaming the poor performance on "the unfair business practices" of other calling card companies, a point of contention for them and the subject of an ongoing lawsuit.

The reality is, that unless IDT figures out how to be something other than a phonecard company, they are in for disappointing quarter after quarter.

To read the full details of the announcement go here: IDT Third Quarter Results

IDT Telecom Names Mikhail Leibov as Chaiman

This week IDT announced the appointment of Mikhail Leibov as Chairman of IDT Telecom. It appears as this is a new position and existing CEO, Yonah Katz appears to be remaining on as CEO despite rumors that he may be on the way out (obviously very unconfirmed rumors).

Not sure what the responsibilities of this new position will be, but it looks like they will be counting on him to turn things around on this troubled ship. No word yet as to if this position is ranked above the current CEO or below but I'm sure that will become clear sooner or later.

Leibov's claim to fame was with Corbina, a small Telecom start-up venture that grew into a profitable company offering wired and wireless telecom services throughout 24 industrial areas in the Russian market. He has also served various positions at AT&T, Prodigy and IBM.

Where Have All of The Prepaid Customers Gone?

Going, Going, Gone!

So many in the prepaid calling card business have been suffering through declining sales as the customer base continues to move towards other sources for making long distance phone calls. We know that many continue to use calling cards because of their convenience and savings, but where are all of the rest going to make their calls?

Calling Card Demographics

As far as I can tell, phone card customers are mostly immigrants and are generally credit challenged. They naturally prefer cash transactions as that is what they grew comfortable within their home country. Credit card availability is also less common elsewhere than in the United States.

What Has Changed?

In recent years, the credit card companies have started to cater to the immigrant population more than ever before, especially in the Hispanic market. As a result more and more immigrants are getting credit cards than ever before. Also with prepaid credit cards getting a bigger push than ever before, many who would have never had the credit status to qualify for a post paid credit card are now able to join the ranks of the credit enabled.

What This Means?

What this means is that many of these former prepaid phone card customers are now able to choose from a variety of other services that have been unavailable to them before: Mobile phones, Prepaid Cellular, Voip and traditional long distance as well.

These other companies have also been making a cognitive push towards the ethnic markets by lowering their LD rates to levels commonly reserved by the phonecard industry. Some, like Skype, have taken it a step further by offering free long distance. It's hard to compete with free so what can you do?

Look Ahead

Diversify, diversify, diversify is the answer! Unfortunately their is no one easy answer as to what to do and the answers will differ by each businesses strengths and weaknesses. Some things to consider: Prepaid Mobile (lower margins but a growing business), Voip services, Internet Affiliate programs and so much more... just put your thinking cap on and give it a try!