Once Bitten Twice Shy....

The Year : 2006. The High profile US Market sees the entry of two top notch brands into the Wireless Space. These Brands neither have any experience of managing any part of Telecom Network, Billing or Customer Issues. All they had was Content... Probably two of the biggest Content Owners in the World market today. The Two Brands i'm talking about are ESPN & Disney. Both entered the market through the MVNO route]

The Year : 2007. ESPN & Disney shut their Wireless operations citing low volumes and less than expected take up for their much hyped content.

January 2008. Disney Mobile has entered the world's most competitive 3G market, Japan and it plans to launch commercial services from February. It has already introduced handsets (custome made for Disney by Sharp) for its service and is the first MVNO of Japan. It has a network sharing deal deal with Softbank corp.

Will Disney Mobile be successful after a bitter end to its US operations ?? Well to answer that Question, lets take a look at their strategy.

• In the US, it primarily targeted teens and children who have a longing for its content. Its LBS service (a first !!!) was touted as being very useful especially for parents to locate their children. Its Marketing strategy was to lure children and teens so that they force their parents to buy a mobile for them.
• Its Strategy in the Japanese market is different. Here its Target Market Segment is females below 20 years of age. It is said that there is a huge take up of Disney's content among the pupil in this segment (wasnt the same true with children & teen segment in the USA ??). Disney bases this argument primarily on the huge popularity of Disneyland in Japan.

Well, First things first, I Dont see much of a change in Disney's strategy. In both US & Japan eventhough the segments are different it is targeting the segment where the probability of Disney's content take-up is high. What disney is failing to understand is the reasons for its failure in US were different. It cited poor network sharing agreement with Sprint in US as the reason for its failure there but i believe the primary reason for its failure was positioning content before the core offerings of a mobile service. Users want content today as complimentary to their mobile service. Disney Mobile i believe got it wrong by concentrating more than required on its content.

But this doesnot mean that Disney Mobile will not be succesful in Japan. I Believe there are other market factors which will define its success there. Firstly, none of the existing players in the Japanese market have a youthful brand image. Vodafone tried to exploit this opportunity but failed few years ago and eventually ended up selling its unit to softbank, which is primarily targeting the price sensitive users. But there is no denying the fact that Japan can take one such brand in its Telecom market. Secondly, the operators mainstay in Japan is the mobile data market and rightly so (because of higher revenues involved) they are targeting corporates. So a operator which focuses on youth alone will be a welcome change. what Disney must not forget is the fact that it is niche operator in this market. But if Disney follows its content centric strategy in Japan(similar to its strategy in the USA), we may soon see another operator logging off the Japanese Market soon. Also Disney being the first MVNO, it can also leverage its first mover advantage for better content sharing deals and operator revenue share agreements.