Mobile Social Networking: a Case Study in an Australian Mobile Network Operator Marcelo Nogueira Cortimiglia Industrial Engineering Department Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) Porto Alegre, Brazil cortimiglia@producao.ufrgs.br Filippo Renga Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering Politecnico di Milano Milan, Italy filippo.renga@polimi.it Antonio Ghezzi Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering Politecnico di Milano Milan, Italy antonio1.ghezzi@polimi.it Abstract — In the context of increased importance of social applications and convergence between mobile and Web technological domains, this paper investigates potential strategies that MNOs can adopt regarding the offer of mobile social networking services. A case study in an Australian mobile network operator is presented in order to highlight the decision-making process for the launch of mobile networking services. General conclusions and potential implications for mobile network operators are presented, including a three-step strategy for carriers wishing to enter the social networking arena. Social applications; business model; mobile social networking. I. INTRODUCTION While computer-supported communities are not new, they have reached the mainstream only in the last few years, first with the consolidation of the Web 2.0 phenomenon and, more recently, with the emergence of online Social Network Sites (SNS). These are highly popular websites that facilitate and promote direct interaction between users, and have attracted much attention from consumers, academics and businessmen alike. Recent researches [28], [29] indicate that at least once in their lifetime “two-thirds of the world’s Internet population visit[ed] a social network or blogging site and the sector now accounts for almost 10% of all Internet time”, and time spent online in member communities (comprising online SNS and blogs) in August 2009 was already at 17%. A report by Forrester Research [1] indicates that approximately one third of the U.S. population visit online SNS at least once a month. Similarly, [26] found out that the percentage of U.S. adult Internet users that have at least one profile in an online SNS has increased from 8% to 35% from 2005 to 2009, with 51% of the U.S. adult Internet users having more than one profile. The staggering amount of time people spend on these sites has ramifications for how people behave, share and interact within their normal daily lives. At the same time, the increasing popularity of social networks resulted in increasing demand to access them on the move, as mobile social networking usage estimations illustrate [8]. Mobile technology is a natural fit for social networks, as consumers are used to connecting with friends via mobile calls and text messaging. Using the phone to access social networks doesn’t require much change in consumer mindset. The advent of flat rate tariffs and the proliferation of smartphones that provide better user experience for personal mobile Internet are additional reasons for believing in the convergence between social networks and Mobile technology. Besides, Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) are suffering with declining voice-related revenues and, in many countries, are still recovering from financial strain from the overestimated prices paid for 3G licenses and slow uptake of mobile data services. In this context, it is only natural that mobile social networking is seen as the ideal approach for the mobile industry to boost adoption of data services. This scenario opens up a wide range of possibilities for revenue creation, including the adoption of social marketing strategies and revenue sharing agreements with Internet companies. This may be critical given recent data that suggests that the growth of mobile data revenue may not keep up with increasing mobile data usage [5]. However, there are many uncertainties related to such strategic move. There has been an intense trend towards the reconfiguration of the mobile data industry value network, with the creation, integration or transformation of roles and the entry of new players [14], [17], [33]. A number of MNO strategic positioning alternatives for affronting this changing environment have been proposed, including the media company, pure carrier and smart pipe positioning [16]. Nevertheless, it seems that these strategies are highly dependent on the precise type of service being offered, the 2011 10th International Conference on Mobile Business 978-0-7695-4434-2/11 $26.00 © 2011 IEEE DOI 10.1109/ICMB.2011.21 84