Image via CrunchBase
Earlier this month Comcast announced their moves into the business and enterprise market with VoIP, all based upon their prior acquisition of NGT and the fact that they have pretty much updated their patchwork network they inherited from their may cable company acquisitions that seemed to be put together with spit, chewing gum and bailing wire in some places. The long time coming, one network architecture doesn't happen overnight, especially when you look at some of the companies they bought along the way and how those cable operators came to be, and where they were. With the "one" archtecture and all the same technology in the network Comcast, which is the nations largest network, can now begin to roll out the services that change the game and make them different from the local telco.
With the all IP network what they can do is start to offer free mobile like services to their landline customers including text messaging/SMS to smart devices like iPhones and iPads, Androids and more, as well other services to Xfinity Mobile app. This OTT type play is exactly what pal Dean Bubley referred to in a recent report he authored that was applicable to both mobile operators and telcos, including the cable MSOs.
With the free service bundled into the Xfinity app, as well as the contagiousness of iOS and Android devices, Comcast is seeking to once more use the dumb pipes of the mobile operators for both smarter usage and to take away services from them. Now with landline SMS you can expect to see more calls going to the PC via a softclient, greater integration to the TV screen/monitor and the one thing the mobile operators won't like...loss of SMS revenue, especially on an international level. With the free offer from Comcast comes the ability to "send text messages to anyone, anywhere in the country, as well as more than three dozen countries, including China, Brazil, Canada and, coming soon, Mexico, all for free."
On top of the text messaging, Xfinity is also offering YouMail/PhoneTag like transcription and delivery of voice mail that previously was trapped in the telcos network, right to your email box.
These types of service are not "new" to early adopters, but they are new to the mass market. Given Comcasts marketing clout with all the TV time they could ever want available to them to promote, expect to see more adoption more rapidly of new services by the masses.
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