Tag: EC

Europe missing BYOD gravy train

Posted on July 30, 2013 by - News

nexus4-ceEurope appears to be behind the curve when it comes to BYOD. The “bring your own device and ruin your techie’s day” trend is taking off in North America and Asia Pacific, where BYOD volume exceeds 80 percent of all business smartphones purchased for business users.

In Europe the figure is less than half of business smartphone sales, according to Strategy Analytics.

Sarcastic punters could say that the poor showing has something to do with the fact that many Europeans can only bring their own device to the employment office, but that’s just part of the problem. The BYOD trend is facing a lot of opposition in Europe from all fronts.

Operators dislike it because they believe it siphons revenue away from stable corporate contracts and messes with their separate billing systems for commercial and civilian users. Enterprises have their own concerns. They are protecting their operator support commitments that are available only through corporate contracts. Many end-users aren’t willing to embrace restrictions they would have to follow due to roaming and other problems.

In spite of European Commission caps, roaming is still a big deal in Europe and it obstructs BYOD growth. Carriers aren’t willing to do much about it and split billing options to better meet the needs of businesses and end-users. Direct billing options that allow operators to bill individual workers directly for their corporate plan seem like the obvious solution, but they are very hard to implement across Europe.

“The time for European operators to fear BYOD needs to be over,” says Kevin Burden, Director of Mobility at Strategy Analytics. “Accepting the change will lead to additional revenue opportunities and will help to distinguish themselves to the corporate customer in a time when the EU continues to put regulations and policies in place that further homogenise their services. It will be a huge competitive win for the first operator that gets it right in a time when every European operator is scrambling to protect its markets and understand how to best support the trend.”

As usual, it all comes down to EU lawmakers and their counterparts in member states, which basically means that this problem won’t be tackled anytime soon.

 

EU slashes roaming charges

Posted on July 1, 2013 by - News, Products

dubrovnikThe EU just got a bit bigger. Croatia entered the fold at midnight, just in time for the summer holiday season – which is economically vital for the new EU member. Good thing, then, travelling in the EU just got cheaper with roaming caps in place cost cutting on all networks and services, effective Monday.

European Commission cracks down on e-commerce scams

Posted on March 19, 2013 by - News

european-commissionThe European Commission is planning to crack down on aggressive e-commerce practices which are apparently discouraging consumers from shopping across union borders online.

The commission has announced plans to promote coordinated enforcement efforts and help member states share best practices in light of a review of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive.

The directive introduced standardised rules across the EU five years ago, including bans on unfair business-to-consumer commercial practices, bans on misleading consumers, fake free offers, consumer baiting, hidden advertising and direct marketing to children. However, the European Commission found that consumers and businesses are still uncertain about how the new rules need to be applied by national authorities., reports Out-Law.com.

“Consumer spending accounts for 56% of EU GDP, but a lack of consumer confidence in shopping across EU borders means we are still not tapping into the full potential of the Single Market,” said EU Justice Commissioner Vivienne Reding. “We have good rules in place to protect consumers, but we need to make sure they are better enforced, especially in cross-border cases.”

Reding stressed that rogue traders should not be tolerated and that consumers have to know exactly what they are buying. Consumers must be sure they are not getting ripped off in the process, especially when they are spending across the border. The EC found that only 40 percent of EU consumers shop across EU borders online. British retailers are leading the cross-border e-commerce charge, so this should be good news for them, provided the EC doesn’t botch it.

The commission said that consumers are a lot more interested in making cross-border purchases now than they were in 2006, before the Directive came into force. However, plenty of other factors contributed to growth and the Directive was just a small piece of the puzzle.