M ETHODS

4.5.1.1 Major Product Lines Market Segment

Mobile Industry has been very effective in introducing new and innovative products and services over the years. The major product lines can be segmented into, three categories, which are as follows:

1. Consumer Packages

2. Value Added Services

3. Corporate Packages and Services

These product lines have a range of different services, catering to different market segment.

4.5.1.1.1 Consumer Packages

The consumer packages of the mobile Industry include the prepaid and postpaid packages being provided by the different cellular providers of Pakistan.

Prepaid packages, due to their nature is the most common type of package being used today by millions of Pakistani’s. Prepaid packages provide a sense of affordability, whereby consumers have the option of only recharging their accounts, when needed.

This affordability has led to a massive increase in the prepaid subscriber base, with everyone from housewives to teenagers; to electricians to small shop owners all using prepaid packages. The main user segments of prepaid packages include the lower, middle and middle upper class of the country. Furthermore, a number of people use prepaid packages as a second number, which also include people from the upper class.

Mobile companies today have used immense popularity of prepaid packages to introduce packages that are targeted to different segment. These include Telenor’s Djuice, targeted towards teenagers and young individuals and Mobilink’s Ladies First, targeted towards house wives. Furthermore, packages that bill at 1min, 30 second and per second have also been introduced by mobile companies.

Postpaid packages were introduced, keeping in mind, the businessmen and executives. Postpaid packages, due to their nature provided the benefits of connectivity 24/7, without the fuss of scratch cards and recharge of accounts.

Furthermore, as competition rose in the mobile industry and new entrants came;

postpaid packages were made more affordable. The work of Warid in this concern is an example, creating postpaid packages as affordable as prepaid ones. The main market segments, towards which the postpaid packages are targeted, include small and medium businessmen, industrialists, bureaucrats and people of the upper class.

However with the affordability of postpaid packages, people from the middle class have also been seen using post paid packages.

4.5.1.1.2 Value Added Services

Value Added Services have become an essential tool for generating revenues for mobile companies today. Starting in the early years, from wallpaper and ring tones download, today mobile companies provide a range of services to their customers.

Some of the popular services include, religion services, music services, which includes song dedication, voice and timed messages, sports and cricket services, food and recipe services, WAP/GPRS/EDGE, themes, wallpapers, games and ringtones downloads, credit share, MMS, voice mail, email, missed call alert, conference call, mobile TV, web2sms and many more.

Value added services have been designed by companies, so that there are services for every segment of their users and that these services completely satisfy them, as and when needed.

4.5.1.1.3 Corporate Packages and Services

Cellular providers in Pakistan are also providing corporate clients with services catered to them. Corporate clients due to their huge operations have special requirements. Mobile packages and tariffs; secure email and instant web connectivity, being some of the most important issues.

Today mobile companies provide BlackBerry solutions, Mobilink and Warid being forefront in this technology, furthermore to add to this innovative service, companies today are providing SMS marketing feature, SMS management facility, fax mail, Wireless connectivity through EDGE, private numbering plans, closed user groups and mobile email to their corporate clients.

All above features and many more have helped corporate clients to manage their operations effectively and efficiently.

4.5.1.2 Growth Rate of Entire Industry

The mobile industry has seen phenomenal growth over the years. Today there are five major competitors competing for their subscriber base, increasing the services provided, reducing their call rate and having aggressive marketing campaigns. Simply put, competition is heating up in the mobile industry.

In July 2008, according to Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), the total subscriber base in the mobile industry reached to more than 89 million to 89,325,296.

This was an increase of 41.4% from December 2007. Although this is phenomenal growth, analysts believe that it would be even higher, if taxes would have not increased, in the financial budget.

The mobile industry saw phenomenal growth from 2005-2006. According to PTA, on average 2.3 million subscribers were added every month during 2006-07.

Furthermore, in 2003-04 the sector was offering 466,068 direct and indirect employments, which in 2006-07 more than doubled to 1,366,698 employments. Also the cellular mobile density or mobile penetration in the total population has also increased over the years. In July 2008, the mobile density reached 55.62%. It was 54.7% in Dec 2007 and 39.94% in Dec 2006, according to official figures.

Also during 2006-07 the revenue of mobile industry was Rs.133 billion, an increase of 48% from pervious year However, none the less, the growth has subsided since 2006, from 170.2% in December 2006 to 80.7% in December 2007, the major reasons of which include the crackdowns on SIM registration, rising taxes and the general economic conditions of the country.