All eyes will be on Germany next week as teams from 32 nations open play in the FIFA World Cup, a four-week, 64-game tournament to determine the planet’s best soccer club. And the wireless industry is hoping many of those eyes will be watching through their mobile phones.
The tournament should generate about $300 million in mobile video revenues, according to figures released last week by Informa Media and Telecoms. Astoundingly, World Cup broadcasts and downloads are expected to account for one-fourth of wireless video revenues worldwide this year, Informa said.
It’s no surprise, then, that European carriers are hoping to use the tournament to showcase their 3G video offerings.
“With the growth of mobile TV in mind, the allure of the World Cup has seen operators clamoring for rights to the event in Europe’s key markets,” according to Nick Lane, a principal analyst with Informa. “This is placing heightened pressure on the mobile community to deliver.”
Two German operators are leading the way. Mobiles Fernsehen Deutschland GmbH Ltd. is launching TV service next week, using DMB (digital multimedia broadcasting) technology to deliver four channels for subscribers in the 12 German cities that will see live World Cup action. T-Mobile Germany plans to stream 20 live matches to its 3G customers thanks largely to parent company Deutsche Telekom, a primary sponsor of the event.
Italian operator Hutchison 3 Italia has acquired rights to deliver Digital Video Broadcast for Handhelds broadcasts of World Cup action. France’s second-largest carrier, SFR, will deliver four-minute video updates of every match as well as post-game coverage. Across the English Channel, Hutchison’s 3 UK expects to broadcast highlights five minutes following each of the 64 matches.
Even Canada’s Rogers Wireless is jumping on the bandwagon, offering “near-live” video clip alerts of up to four minutes per game. And EBClosion, a Latin American mobile technology company, has acquired rights to deliver World Cup action to wireless users in Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.
But while wireless video content from the World Cup is sure to be an eye-catching novelty, it’s not likely to give the nascent mobile TV market legs, according to a study released earlier this year from Visiongain. Instead, operators and content providers hoping to cash in on the event should target more familiar offerings.
“The telecoms industry has the potential to generate significant revenue from the 2006 World Cup,” said Visiongain analyst Adam Walkden. “However, operators aiming to utilize the tournament’s popularity to push 3G at the expense of more traditional services will miss out. The key revenue generators will be tried and tested text services, ringtones and logos.”
Visiongain predicts the tournament will generate $6.35 billion in mobile revenues. Meanwhile, a recent report from the Wireless World Forum forecasts a staggering $8.5 billion payday for wireless, with text messaging accounting for more than 85 percent of the haul.
Indeed, while this year’s World Cup may become the most-photographed sporting event in history, less than one-fourth of the estimated 4.5 million photos expected to be taken will be sent via multimedia messaging service. So operators and content providers are offering everything from standard text-message updates to a live-action animated series based on FIFA’s mascot Goleo VI, a lion, and his soccer-ball sidekick Pillie.
Yahoo Inc. is powering the event’s official offering, dubbed Mobile Matchcast. The push service, which is free aside from carrier charges, delivers match schedules and commentary, standings, images and other content to handsets.
MundiTone, an Israeli content provider, is offering ringtones and images of each team and key players, while Electronic Arts Inc. is teaming with T-Mobile International and Nokia Corp. to distribute games, images and other content across special-edition Nokia handsets. ESPN’s mobile-content business will launch in seven Asia-Pacific markets to coincide with the World Cup.
U.S. carriers, of course, are pursuing the event less aggressively due to lesser demand and the lack of dedicated multimedia networks. But Verizon Wireless has launched Spanish text alerts and trivia questions, and mobile search provider 4INFO.net is selling unlimited text alerts including scoring updates and game recaps for $3.
Mainstream European companies are using the event as a platform for mobile marketing campaigns. The United Kingdom’s two largest tabloids have launched free Java-based applications in an effort to reach readers on their phones, and McDonald’s Corp.’s U.K. locations are offering a World Cup-branded text-to-win promotion that rewards winners with mobile content or tickets to the tournament.
Like the teams battling on the pitch, though, carriers and content providers looking to leverage the World Cup need to bring their “A” game, Informa’s Lane warned. Users who venture into new applications or services only to be disappointed aren’t likely to return soon.
“The success of any initiative will hinge on providing content capable of capturing the action, goals, news, mood, emotion and atmosphere on the mobile phone,” according to Lane. “But get it wrong, and the consumer continues to be discontent with content until the next major opportunity, which will not present itself until the Beijing Olympics in 2008.”
