MOBILE network operators, with their traditional revenue stream under threat, have been trying to expand into new business ­areas such as the provision of content. John Sims, president of mobile technology firm Sybase 365, however, feels they should pay more attention to offering new services and applications instead.

"Generally, the most successful operators are those that are investing not so much in content. There's a whole wealth of content on the Internet and it will find its way into the mobile environment. I think that's an unstoppable movement," says Sims in a recent interview with Management@Work of The Edge Singapore.

On July 26, Optus, the second-largest Australian telco, acquired restaurant review website Eatability for A$6 million (RM19.14 million). This announcement came just two months after Singapore Telecommunications, which owns Optus, gobbled up Singapore-based Hungrygowhere.com, also a food review website, for S$12 million (RM29.92 million). Sims, however, did not comment specifically on these two deals.

"If I were a consumer, what will compel me to use one company versus another company? It is the service, it is the value its service can offer to my life. Is it more convenient? Does it offer me the opportunity to make some money? Does it save [me] some money? That's what creates the stickiness to the relationship," says Sims.

Sybase 365 has traditionally offered the technology to help mobile network operators manage data traffic in different countries and networks. It also supplies technology to nearly 1,000 mobile network operators worldwide, handling some two billion international SMSes daily.

However, technological advances and new applications such as Whatsapp, which lets users send text, pictures and video free of charge via a mobile data connection, are forcing a rethink. "International SMS traffic has provided good revenue sources to operators all over the world… But I think they are very aware that the market is changing," says Sims.

And a growing chunk of Sybase 365's business these days is selling messaging technologies to around 500 large enterprises to help them reach out to customers.

"For big-brand organisations, they want to build their relationships with customers; they want to provide the customer with information that would make the customer more comfortable," explains Sims. An example of this involves retail banking — a customer, upon withdrawing cash from an ATM would receive an SMS alert from the bank about the transaction, he says. This is especially reassuring if the withdrawal is made in another country.

In another case for Sybase 365, a client that makes baby products found its market share decreasing as babies grow — from as high as 80% for those in the youngest age range to 60% for older babies.

The company began to use SMSes to reach out to customers, building greater brand loyalty, providing them with regular offers, promotions and so on, which had the effect of reminding them to stay with the brand. In no time, its market share improved by 10 percentage points, says Sims.

Sybase 365 is a subsidiary of German business software giant SAP and this has no doubt given the former an edge in its efforts to work directly with large corporations. SAP, a market leader in providing applications for payroll, supply chain management, accounting processes and the likes, serves companies in 24 industries.

Sybase 365 has been transformed several times over the past decade. In 1999, MobileWay Inc was founded in California to provide wireless data services such as ringtones, text messages as well as service data used by its customers. In August 2004, it was acquired by InphoMatch, and the combined entity was called Mobile 365.

This company, in turn, was bought over by Sybase barely two years later and renamed Sybase 365. In May 2010, Sybase 365 was itself taken over by SAP for US$5.8 billion, becoming part of a company with revenue of more than €14 billion ($21.53 billion) last year and nearly 60,000 in its headcount.

Besides messaging technology for large corporations, other new growth areas for Sybase 365 include mobile banking. On June 13, Sybase 365 announced its partnership with Neurosoft Technologies to provide a mobile banking system for ONE Bank Ltd, a commercial lender in Bangladesh. Users of this system can perform various transactions with their mobile phones.

Of the 160 million people in Bangladesh, only 13% have bank accounts. "To the unbanked, and the under-banked, to be honest, this is their only alternative because traditional banking, with physical branches, is too expensive to offer to people who may have only US$10 per month to put into the system," says Sims.

Meanwhile, there are some 84 million mobile users in Bangladesh. Sims notes that so far, the take-up has been "amazing". "Thousands are signing up every day to join the banking system. These are people who never had the opportunity to have a banking relationship before," he says.

With this mobile banking infrastructure in place, its uses can then be expanded beyond those offered by the bank. The United Nations World Food Programme, the international body tasked with fighting hunger, is planning to tap this system. "Once you get the infrastructure, once you get the people participating, there are other opportunities beyond just the basic movement of money," says Sims.— The Edge Singapore

This story appeared in The Edge Singapore on Aug 13, 2012.