The 0913 people…
Does that sound familiar? Does anyone remember the Nissan NP300 single cab trucks that were branded the 0913 people?
Those were the days! Bullish Thoughts remembers buying his 0913 line for $65 when sanity was returning to the mobile sim cards market.
It was quite interesting to see an article in the Herald of 19 July 2012 indicating that some Econet sim cards had seen prices skyrocketing to $20 at a time where Telecel is saying $1 for 2 sim cards.
Bullish Thoughts got thinking…Econet is surely doing something right in the telecoms sector to warrant a black market premium of +800% on its sim cards.
There is no doubt that despite the relatively high prices, Econet Wireless still offers the best internet and voice connectivity deal for the mobile user.
Still on Econet Wireless, it was quite interesting to read the Econet Wireless CE update to Parliament. Not that he said anything new… its stuff we all knew…that Net*One refused to share its base station towers when it still boasted of bringing “the world in your pocket”. What happened in between is history suffice to say Econet Wireless had eureka moment and got “inspired to change your world” and Net*One is now crying foul.
There is a lesson to be learnt from this by all would be entrepreneurs and business managers. Do you really understand what gives you competitive advantage? Isn’t there a competing business that will leap frog your business by just a slight different value proposition?
Are you sure that you have got your business model right to the extent that you will not be left claiming that you have “the widest coverage” when all mobile phone users including my grandpa in Bhegedhe know who is the boss on coverage?
Apply your mind and introspect your business model and value proposition. Do you have a unique advantage or you will be history once another player lands in your space?
Recently Econet Wireless announced a slash of the 4G Mobile WiMax service prices and a return of the Mobile WiMax dongle that hasn’t been on the shelve since a while ago.
The slash is quite significant and outright makes redundant the need for a 3G dongle. For US$45 dollars you can purchase a ZTE TU25 Mobile WiMax dongle and be charged just US2.5c per megabyte for Internet.
To understand just how big the price slash is, consider that the same dongle used to cost a staggering $175 just two years ago and the price per megabyte was 15 cents just weeks ago.
Was/ Is price your competitive advantage? If so, you are probably history!
One last issue on value proposition is that never make a mistake when you introduce a competing product! Do you remember the EcoCash advert/ by-line:-
“No new sim card, no bank account, works across all networks”.
You get the idea, don’t you? Competition will “kill you, make you mincemeat and be package as dog food”!
The mid term fiscal review...
Bullish Thoughts can only say “YAWN!!!!!!!!!”
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