Telefonica, Orange, Verizon hope to win the next round in mobile content

Ingrid Lunden| MocoNews | Dec 20, 2010 9:41 AM ET
—Telefonica/BlueVia: The Spain-based operator Telefonica (NYSE: TEF), which has extensive operations throughout Europe as O2 and Latin America, is launching a new open-API program to encourage developers to make apps for its own app store initiatives, which cover 80 million users across its operational footprint. This project is at least a year in the planning—O2 firsttold me about it last January.
What’s so special about BlueVia? It’s one of the first examples of an operator opening up the inner parts of its network to developers for them to interconnect better with their billing and subscriber systems. This is potentially a big thing, giving apps a lot more functionality and ability to target users better, and it of course means Telefonica gets a revenue share on the services. According to the operator’s presentation, this will be anything from 50 percent for mobile ads to the standard 30 percent for apps.
But Telefonica may have lost a lot of time in getting it established, as Android has flooded the apps market and became the most likely competitor to Apple’s App Store. A spokesperson told me today that the delay in launching was because Telefonica “wanted to get it right,” but in the battle to get developers to create services for app stores, Telefonica may be joining the end of a very long line.
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