WW-170 -- Disney loves Softbank - a marketing plan for the saturated mobile market

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Disney Mobile - Will the new MVNO succeed this time.

After two attempts in the US to launch a MVNO, Disney announced
this month it will start a MVNO in March in close collaboration
with Softbank Mobile in Japan. This time Disney’s MVNO approach
will be different than its previous ‘trials’ in the US that
failed due to high distribution costs and heavy competition
from carriers offered heavily subsidized handsets.

Disney will work very close with Softbank mobile, the host
network provider. Walt Disney Japan will directly contract to
customers to offer access to the Softbank mobile network with a
Disney branded phone and its original Disney line-up of
contents.

Disney is an experienced contents player in the Japanese mobile
market. It offers 88 mobile sites in the carrier portals with
about 3.5 million subscribers of which 75% belong to the young
ladies segment of girls in their twenties. The content giant is
targeting the same segment with its MVNO services.

Price plans will be similar as the current Softbank Mobile
including the successful White Plans that offer fixed monthly
fees for phone calls inside the Softbank network and all you
can eat data traffic. Disney will sell its service through
Softbank retail shops, electronics stores and its own Disney
online shops.

Initially it will offer a single handset type made by Sharp - the
DM001SH. This model is based on the 821SH handset that Softbank
already introduced. This 3G-model (W-CDMA, HSPDA) is a clam
shell and features a 2m pixel camera, OneSeg digital mobile TV,
and Felica. Disney plans to release three times a year a new
handset model.

With a single push on the phone’s D-button, users can access the
Disney portal which is a Disney branded version of the popular
Yahoo! mobile portal. Exclusive Disney content and the 23
existing Disney sites offered can be accessed free of charge.
Subscribers get a mobile email address with the domain name
‘@disney.ne.jp’.

Since May last year, Softbank Mobile is the fastest growing
mobile carrier in the Japanese market-it has now 17 million
subscribers. After a slow start following the re-branding,
Softbank successfully disposed the unappealing Vodafone image.
New customers are attracted by phones tailored for the Japanese
market with a wide variety of colors and the ‘all-you-can-eat’
price plans.

The highly competitive Japanese market is almost saturated with
105 million mobile contracts. Expect more to follow from
Softbank to keep its momentum going. Stay tuned.

By Arjen Van Blokland

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the article at www.japaninc.com/ww170

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Comments

I think that it is not accurate to say that Disney is deploying a MVNO in Japan, all characteristics show that this is just a co-branding effort or a distribution strategy.

1) Same pricing plans of Softbank
2) Distribution through Softbank retail stores
3) First device is the same 821SH but with the Disney logo
4) The portal is a Yahoo's customized version
5) Although not very clear, the invoicing is done by Softbank
...and I wonder if customer service is also Softbank's.

A real MVNO in my understanding is a company using a MNO's infrastructure to provide its own service, and that requires a careful and close network monitoring, a proprietary pricing plan based on the available network offering and targeted segment, own invoicing and subscriber management at the least.

For a good example of a MVNO, please see Virgin Mobile, it is hard to determine which is the underlying network since all the offering is controlled by themselves from end to end, with the obvious exception of the network elements.