Blyk — free, ad-funded mobile operator launching next year
Link: Netimperative - Free ad-funded mobile operator to launch in UK
Blyk, a free mobile operator aimed at young people, is to launch in the UK in mid-2007, and will be funded by advertising rather than customer subscriptions.
The firm has been co-founded by Pekka Ala-Pietilä, former president of Nokia and Antti Öhrling, Chairman and CEO of Contra Group
I’ve been hearing peeps and squeaks and rumours to this effect. I think it’s Blyk the rumours were talking about!
What’s more, they’ve got a blog. Get in! Can you imagine Arun Sarin doing a blog? No way. Blyk looks exciting and interesting. Every success to Pekka, Antti and team.
The business case for this doesn’t stack up. Compare how much a big brand can buy bulk SMS for (for say marketing purposes), and then think about how much at least that same advertiser would need to be charged to cover the cost of a P2P message generated by a Blyk customer.
And then think about who a free mobile network would be attractive to (ie, people without any money), and then how attrative those people would be to advertisers….
Posted by John on November 2nd, 2006 at 12:37 pm.the name is totally horrible. It sounds like ‘Black’ in a South African accent..
Horrid horrid horrid.. (it won’t work anyway, but shouldn’t so with such a sh!t name)
Posted by njar on November 2nd, 2006 at 5:09 pm.I would beg to differ.
I am blown off by the concept. While I too have my doubts on the feasibility of the venture. But I’d say that if they come to a middle-ground things can get pretty exciting. For example, if they say that the first 150 (or whatever number) of minutes are free (including no rentals & other stuff) and calls after that are charged or something on those lines then I am sure they can find a point where profit is funded not only by ads but also by a ’small contribution’ from the user-revenue.
I’d say they can work the analytics better than me.
Posted by Siddharth Thakkar on November 5th, 2006 at 2:54 pm.For more information about blyk, check out Blyk Blog at blogspot.
Posted by Blyk Blog on December 25th, 2006 at 11:20 pm.