The so-called "push-to-talk" (abbreviated as PTT) is actually a mobile phone with integrated intercom function. Users can directly talk to groups or individuals anywhere by pressing the intercom button on their mobile phones.
Push-to-talk is a kind of PTT mobile phone, which combines the functions of mobile phone and walkie-talkie. It uses a mobile phone network. PTT mobile phone is different from ordinary walkie-talkie. First, the walkie-talkie does not need to go through the network. Second, compared with ordinary walkie-talkies, which can only make short-distance calls and rely on power transmission, this service has strong advantages, including roaming.
trait
1. You can make "one-to-one" or "one-to-many" calls quickly, just like using a walkie-talkie.
2. Compared with having to wait after dialing, Push-to-Talk can be connected in about 3 seconds after pressing the call key, and the call delay is within 1 second, which is close to the professional walkie-talkie.
3. Unlike walkie-talkies, which can only make short-distance calls, push-to-talk service can reach places that can be covered by mobile phone networks, with almost no distance limit.
4. Compared with the high investment of the private network on which the walkie-talkie depends, the mobile intercom can make full use of the existing CDMA network, greatly reducing the operating cost of operators and the use cost of users.
capacity of the market
According to the estimation of the Ministry of Information Industry, the potential market demand of domestic digital trunking is 8-9 million, and the output value in 2000-2005 will reach 50 billion yuan.
Current bottleneck
1. How to control the delay within the range that users can "tolerate";
2. To realize the interconnection between two major operators, terminals and different systems, the standard problem is still the bottleneck.
successful case
Nextcl, the fifth largest operator in the United States, has 40 million PTT users.
[Edit this paragraph] "Push-to-talk" is very popular, and it is a wave of new technologies.
Push-to-talk (PTT, translated as "push-to-talk" in Chinese), a mobile service that is neither new nor old, has now become synonymous with new mobile phone technology, and its popularity is second only to 3G, and it is even considered as one of the "two hot spots of the next generation of mobile phones" by the survey report of Seelos Group in the United States. The call cost of users can be reduced to a certain extent.
In 2004, at the just-concluded CeBIT exhibition in Hanover, Germany, manufacturers spared no effort to display their push-to-talk mobile phones, which is also the best example: Samsung SPH-A760 mobile phone has just surfaced, Sony Ericsson T637 and Z500, which support push-to-talk and are expected to be listed in the second quarter of this year, have also emerged, Siemens products are said to be launched at the same time, and Motorola has also released three PTT mobile phones overseas.
Nokia, which launched the world's first "push-to-talk" GSM mobile phone, said that in 2004, Nokia will launch a full range of GSM mobile phones with "push-to-talk over wireless" function, including smart phones with Symbian operating system. Starting from 2005, all new GPRS/WCDMA phones launched by Nokia will fully join the "push-to-talk over wireless" function.
Another wave of new technologies has begun.
What is a push-to-talk mobile phone?
Push-to-talk (PTT) function is a brand-new mobile technology, which can make "one-to-one" or "one-to-many" calls quickly, just like using walkie-talkies. This function is suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises that need frequent contact and individual users who need to chat with relatives and friends. However, you must use a mobile phone with built-in function, and ordinary mobile phones cannot use PTT function. However, some mobile phones supporting Qualcomm BREW can support PTT technology through software upgrade in the future.
After the mobile phone turns on PTT, press the corresponding button of the mobile phone to make "one-to-one" or "one-to-many" calls with the selected group. The PTT service of Nextel, an American CDMA operator, requires the owner to hold down the button before calling, and after releasing it, the other party can not call until it hears the beep.
Unlike walkie-talkies, which can only talk over short distances, push-to-talk service can reach places that can be covered by mobile phone networks, with almost no distance limit. PTT service can be charged according to duration, time period and traffic, or it can be paid monthly, depending on the operator. According to the business precedent of Qualcomm and CDMA operator Nextel, the monthly subscription system is adopted, and the cost is between $65,438 and $05-30.
In addition to the advantages of free roaming, long-distance calling, convenient use and low cost, increasing operators' income and reducing communication costs are also the main selling points of "push-to-talk". However, "push-to-talk" still has some shortcomings. Technically, POC does not have a high technical threshold. In fact, judging from the reaction time and other technical indicators, this technology of realizing trunking intercom function on mobile phones cannot compete with trunking communication technology. Judging from the current situation, the average POC delay takes two or three seconds. From the experience of some American operators, the success of this service mainly depends on the time delay. Therefore, it is the technical core of this service promotion to control the delay within the range that users can "tolerate".
In addition, if PTT wants to locate high-end business people, there is still a certain gap in confidentiality and call quality. If it wants to locate the low-end blue-collar workers, it is not only a question of whether it can make big profits, but also a question of whether it can successfully cultivate their usage habits, because even "push-to-talk" is only a one-click call, but it needs certain operations in passively receiving messages and sending voice messages, not to mention it is difficult to cultivate a new habit.
Industry experts predict that "if the pricing and positioning are accurate, PTT should succeed in the youth market first."
The two camps lead to different standards.
According to the estimation of the Ministry of Information Industry, the potential market demand of domestic digital trunking is 8-9 million, and the output value in 2000-2005 will reach 50 billion yuan. According to the internationally accepted ratio of professional users to mobile users 1: 10, by 2005, according to the calculation of 300 million public users, the number of professional mobile network users will reach 30 million.
Nevertheless, some people are not optimistic, because the standard problem is still the bottleneck to realize the interconnection between the two major operators, terminals and different systems.
Last year, Motorola, Ericsson, Siemens and Sony Ericsson all released their POC systems, and they plan to launch push-to-talk mobile phones that can communicate with each other in the second quarter of 2004. On the same day, Nokia also released POC technology, but this technology is not compatible with the technologies of the above four manufacturers.
Although several companies are members of "OpenMobility" (OMA), in view of the attractive prospect of this technology, they are still taking different paths and eagerly formulating their own standards. At present, OMA members are mainly divided into two camps. One is the alliance between Nokia and Samsung, while the other camp is dominated by Motorola, Siemens and Sony Ericsson. Although the two camps have adopted the POC technology of Finnish mobile phone manufacturer Espoo, the problem is that the push-to-talk mobile phones of the two camps are not interoperable at present. In addition, many enterprises are doing their own research. For example, Qualcomm developed the PTT technology Qchat based on CDMA2000 network.
Technology incompatibility is the last thing in the industry. If the standards are different, then the market is bound to enter a fragmented state, and the differences in standards will greatly affect the orderly development of the market.
"Only when everyone reaches a * * * understanding can technologies be compatible with each other and mobile phones of different operators can communicate with each other. This is crucial if push-to-talk is to enter the market. " Industry experts believe that.
Operators are still brewing.
On the one hand, in the face of the huge potential POC business market, Motorola, Siemens, Nokia and other manufacturers are secretly making efforts. On the other hand, in sharp contrast to manufacturers' scrambling, operators' attitude towards POC is still ambiguous.
The possibility of "push-to-talk" across operators is very small. At present, operators, equipment manufacturers and mobile phone manufacturers have not yet issued a unified standard. The PTT services of China Mobile and China Unicom are based on GPRS network and CDMA 1X network respectively. So far, operators have not tried to communicate with each other. In the case that the standards have not been unified, operators are obviously not fully prepared.
However, experts believe that mobile phone operators are well aware that this feature can encourage users to talk more, thus increasing their income. At the same time, this business is likely to be positioned as a new market killer application by China Unicom. The implementation of this service may mean that China Unicom can stabilize existing mobile phone users and strive for more new users.
Some technical experts also pointed out that PTT is a technology based on future 3G and existing 2.5G networks. If the operator has a good IP foundation on the core network, it will be easier to realize the national enterprise private network and it will be more convenient and practical to make PTT calls.
It is reported that Qualcomm and China Unicom have started cooperation. China Mobile also conducted multi-vendor business tests in Guangdong, Hunan and Sichuan. According to Guangdong Unicom, the actual commercial service of PTT will be launched as early as the end of May and early June this year.
[Edit this paragraph] Is "push-to-talk" too much?
According to Guangdong Unicom, the push-to-talk (PTT) commercial service will be launched as early as the end of May and the beginning of June, and this almost global mobile phone craze will finally show its talents in China. It is reported that at present, there are more than 10 manufacturers providing push-to-talk solutions in China, and Dongfang Communication and Southern Hi-Tech have also launched push-to-talk mobile phones. From the time point of view, the development of push-to-talk service of domestic mobile phone manufacturers is basically synchronized with that of foreign countries.
Just as major mobile phone manufacturers and mobile operators have opened up the "push-to-talk" front, sirens came from the "push-to-talk" world summit in London on March 30. Otto, CEO of T-Mobile, publicly stated that it would be dangerous to make Push-to-Talk so popular, just like the mobile Internet made a big splash a few years ago.
At that time, merchants were bent on applying WAP to the mobile Internet. Due to its fragmented operating environment and incomplete compatibility and supporting hardware, its practicability has been greatly reduced, and the WAP application has not been greatly improved so far. Now "push-to-talk" is just like WAP, and the danger remains the same. Will enterprises make the same mistake?
However, since many businesses have come all the way and can't go home, they may have to reflect: has "push-to-talk" reached the business model they need? Do users really need it?
Nextel model is questioned
In the development process of "push-to-talk", Nextel is undoubtedly regarded as the successful creator of this technology, and therefore it has become a model for many operators who want to enter the "push-to-talk" market. It is said that 1993 started to operate the push-to-talk network, and now Nextel has130,000 users, far from being the largest telecom operator in the United States, but it is the operator with the highest ARPU (revenue per user) and the lowest user churn rate in the world, and it collects a profit of $69 from each user every month. It is generally believed in the industry that all this is not supported by beautiful mobile phones, nor is it a lively third-generation mobile communication network, just because of the simplest "push-to-talk".
However, T-Mobile CEO Otto doesn't think so. He argued that Nextel's high user return rate and low user churn rate have little to do with "push-to-talk" but with its business operation mode. Otto emphasized that Nextel's main business focuses on the small and medium-sized enterprise market and commercial users, and it can do well with or without "push-to-talk". (Note: T-Mobile is the only European company that can compete with American Nextel, and it has more advantages than other companies in promoting push-to-talk business. )
In fact, besides Nextel, it is still difficult to find a second successful person. When American or European operators copied Nextel's model, they didn't get immediate results. Sprint and Verizon in the United States began to provide push-to-talk service in 2003. According to the latest issue of Fobers (Forbes), the two big-name mobile operators "have hardly heard about push-to-talk service since the uproar last autumn". Since then, French Orange has made a detailed plan for this year's "push-to-talk" business, but its foothold has been criticized a lot.
Richard Brennan, executive vice president of Orange, confidently pointed out at the "push-to-talk" conference that 80% of users over 40 can't use SMS service now, and the voice message of Orange's "push-to-talk" service will solve this problem for them. However, analysts believe that it is difficult to guarantee that they will use the fashionable and novel "push-to-talk" if they can't use the fairly mature SMS service. Even some European analysts believe that "push-to-talk" will only become a toy that a few users are interested in, and will never become a mass business like SMS.
In addition, an obvious problem is that Orange can't prevent existing SMS users from switching to "push-to-talk" while developing the habit of using voice SMS for users over 40 years old. Will you lose this part of users and SMS business? If it is lost, whether the loss can be averaged by the newly developed business is a very realistic problem. It is not impossible for the ARPU value of operators to fall instead of rising.
In short, Nextel's model is interesting. According to Nextel's research, the biggest selling points of Push-to-Talk are "no need to spend time dialing or connecting to the network, convenient use, shortened call time" and "low cost". However, it is undeniable that, just like IP telephone is to traditional long-distance telephone, "Push-to-Talk" has potential substitution for traditional voice communication and short message service, and may even become their "killer". Whether ARPU can really be improved still requires operators to have a very good profit model and promotion methods.
Faced with this hot potato, what operators use to attract users, and whether "push-to-talk" is worth the huge investment of operators has become another problem. It is reported that Orange and some operators in the United States are only in the trial operation stage at present, and the really good model is worth demonstrating and expecting.
There are variables in the "push-to-talk" market
Although "push-to-talk" technology has been widely praised, there are still many variables whether it can stand firm in the communication market.
Market demand is the focus of debate. Although the concept of "push-to-talk" is very practical, how many people are willing to use their mobile phones as "walkie-talkies"? If the service target of "push-to-talk" service is government agencies, fire control, flood control, emergency rescue departments and enterprises, then the service may get a good response because of the wide coverage of this technology. However, the application demand market of government departments and enterprises is limited after all. How many people in the mass market will "play" this service? It should be noted that at present, the push-to-talk service in North America still focuses on users in retail, transportation, logistics and other industries, and the real individual user market needs operators to further tap their potential.
Another big problem before commercialization is user positioning. If "push-to-talk" wants to locate high-end business people, there are still some gaps in issues such as confidentiality and call quality; If we want to position the low-end blue-collar workers, it is a problem not only whether we can make big profits, but also whether we can cultivate their usage habits smoothly. Because even push-to-talk can only talk with one button, it requires some operations in passively receiving messages and sending voice messages. More importantly, it is difficult to cultivate a new habit. It is worth reminding that when Chinese people are fully familiar with and accept SMS, it is worth considering whether there is still market space for "push-to-talk".
In addition, a reasonable tariff level is also crucial to the popularization of "push-to-talk" service. At present, there is no clear statement from domestic parties, but according to Nextel's business precedent in the United States, the monthly cost is between $65,438 and $05-30. Of course, the standard of living in the United States is higher than that in China. If operators copy this standard to China, it is estimated that a large number of users will be isolated from the push-to-talk service. So how to set the price is worth weighing.
It is undeniable that "push-to-talk" is a popular technology, but this new technology inevitably has some shortcomings. According to some people who have used it, the delay problem still exists during the "push-to-talk" call. Moreover, because "Push-to-Talk" adopts data packet transmission mode, its delay is even longer than that of ordinary walkie-talkies, generally within a few seconds, which will make people feel uncomfortable during voice transmission. Of course, some manufacturers claim that the delay can be controlled within one second, but in the process of large-scale network transmission, its real effect needs to be tested by practice.
In addition, the characteristics of push-to-talk service determine that it must have some special functions. For example, such a mobile phone should have a speaker that can amplify the voice in the street, a special button that can talk immediately, and a long standby time to meet the needs of the walkie-talkie. For example, in order to achieve interoperability between different networks, push-to-talk technology must have its unified technical standards. But its unified standard may not be launched until the first quarter of next year. Without a unified standard, users will not understand who can accept the push-to-talk information and who can't. For another example, the voice speed of "push-to-talk" must reach a certain standard to be smooth, but this indicator has not yet been fixed. When you actually use it, it may drop from the theoretical 1 17 kbit/s to 20 kbit/s.
Of course, even in the face of many variables, the market is always demand-driven, and the enthusiasm of merchants has not subsided. Nowadays, how to find the entry point of the market will be the key to the success of the push-to-talk business. Dr. Lu Guoying, general manager of CCID Consulting's Communication and Network Consulting Division, believes that push-to-talk mobile phones are more likely to replace civil walkie-talkies in the ordinary individual user market as long as they can highlight the characteristics of fashion and convenience in marketing. Some insiders believe that deeper marketing cooperation should be carried out in the enterprise user market. For example, operators must introduce a reasonable package tariff model and use VPN virtual private network to provide packaged services and services for corporate customers. Operators and terminal manufacturers can jointly promote the development of "push-to-talk" business market through "bundled marketing" and other means.