Skype and the iPhone

Quite lot of words have been written about Skype’s new iPhone app. As several people have asked me about this, here’s a quick round up of what’s being said:

Michael Arrington accuses Skype of being arrogant (his pot/kettle/blackness interface is nestled in the early comments)

Om Malik gushes

Techdirt tells us it’s not for Canadians – would love to know the real Techdirt on this story.

Whilst over at All About Symbian, in a fantastic post, Steve Lichfield tells it like it is. Why won’t Apple let an app run in the background? Steve will tell you why.

Why hasn’t Morodo made a MO-Call app for the iPhone?

You can’t run an app in the background – unless you jailbreak
You can’t make calls over the native data-bearer (3G) – unless you jailbreak and use VPN

(And Apple really don’t like you jaibreaking any more).

So, how useful is a telephony app for the iPhone that is going to switch off when you receive an incoming call over the GSM network? Well, just read Steve Lichfield’s post if you haven’t already.

Here at Morodo we decided to focus on the main utility that customers are after – making a call – and we created a great set of MO-Call pages for iPhone that enable low-cost international calls – from the browser. As we use GSM as the bearer for our call, call waiting will work as you would expect it to.

Got an iPhone? Give MO-Call a try. Bookmark www.mo-call.com from the Safari browser on your iPhone and you’ll enjoy instant access to great international call rates direct from your dashboard. It even works in Canada…

App stores aplenty

Amidst all the noise from CITA you might have read that RIM’s Blackberry App World went live yesterday. The cynics are asking: “Yet another App Store for mobile downloads?” Personally, I believe this is great news for Developers and the mobile business in general. Looking at RIM’s close yesterday, the markets obviously agree with me.

Why are more App Stores a good thing? Education, Education, Education: five years ago my Mum didn’t know how to download an MP3, now she can BitTorrent with the best of them. How did she learn to do that? The knowledge entered the mainstream and ceased to be something that normal people believe is the preserve of the techno-geek. In other words, it became easy to understand.

In 2009, downloading-applications-to-your-mobile is climbing through the Early Majority to the top of Rogers curve. Brace yourself for the roller-coaster ride ahead.

You can download MO-Call for free from Blackberry App World, we’ll even give you some trial credit. Why spend more than you have to on your international calls?

Skype ate all the pies

Resident Fierce VoIP Skype-fanboy, Doug Mohney has alerted his readership to yet another Skype-related press release, this time from research company Telegeography.

It seems as though Skype are now carrying 8% of the world’s ‘cross-border’ VoIP traffic. You can see the impressive pie-chart after the jump.

Doug ponders: “Why would anyone (eBay) want to sell off the world’s largest long-distance provider, so long as it is making money?”

Here’s a recent news article about a company that claimed to carry 8% of the world’s VoIP traffic in 2001. Telecoms is a fickle business and being the biggest does not always mean being the best. In 2009, the words “too big to fail” are no longer on anyone’s lips.

See how the little guys do it better at www.mo-call.com

Press Release: Morodo offers VoIP calling from PCs and Mobiles

LONDON – Virtual International Mobile Network Operator, Morodo Limited is pleased to announce the release of its MO-Call PC service.  Morodo Managing Director, Andrew Reid, said. “The release of MO-Call PC compliments our existing MO-Call mobile service offer; this is a significant milestone in Morodo’s roadmap and step closer to our stated aim of becoming a complete telecommunications service provider.”

Mr. Reid continued. “MO-Call has always been defined by convenience and usability, it doesn’t matter where you are in the world, there is a MO-Call solution that will save you money.”

James Barnes, Technical Director at Morodo, states, “MO-Call PC allows consumers to make free international calls from MO-Call account to MO-Call account. It also provides our customers with access to low rate VoIP calls to landlines and mobiles. The extras include an Instant Messaging client enabling chat through MO-Call, MSN, Yahoo and ICQ.”

Mr. Barnes went on to say. ‘MO-Call P.C is simple and easy to download and even easier to use. We’ve taken the logical next-step of porting this application to mobile and you will see MO-Call VoIP for mobile on smartphones very soon indeed. We want our customers to be able to enjoy free and low-cost calls anytime, anywhere.”

MO-Call enables low-cost international calling direct from a mobile phone, without the need to change mobile number, SIM or network. Offering seamless connection of low-cost calls, MO-Call provides savings of up to 90% over existing Mobile Network International Tariffs. The service can be downloaded, free of charge, from the MO-Call website www.mo-call.com

Morodo is exhibiting MO-Call at the GSM Mobile World Congress in Barcelona from 16th – 19th February. Come and see Morodo in Hall 1-0 Stand ID70.

Press Release: MO-Call Launches its Cheap Mobile Calls Service on Google Android G1

LONDON – Morodo Ltd is pleased to announce that its popular low-cost calling service, MO-Call, now supports the T-Mobile Google G1 mobile.

Morodo’s Managing Director, Andrew Reid, stated, “We’re very pleased to offer a completely seamless alternative calling solution for the G1. Android’s ability to run an application in the background makes it a perfect fit for the MO-Call plug-in.  Once MO-Call is installed, all international calls are directed to the Morodo Network. It’s a great money-saving solution for consumers. This is yet another step towards our goal of becoming a global Virtual International Mobile Network Operator.”

James Barnes, Technical Director at Morodo, stated, “Manufacturers around the world are working on Android mobiles for release in 2009. MO-Call is the perfect complimentary application for this disruptive and groundbreaking Operating System. Once the application is switched on, just dial and save. Forget about paying traditional Mobile Operator call charges”

Mr. Barnes went on to say that he was “Particularly happy with this achievement as it represents a good example of porting an existing application to yet another technology platform.”

Morodo’s Research and Development team in Beijing, China is now hard at work on a VoIP application for smartphones that will offer free calls between MO-Call accounts and cheap calls to fixed and mobile networks. Applications for the Symbian and Windows Mobile Operating Systems are scheduled to be launched this spring.

MO-Call enables low-cost international calling direct from a mobile phone, without the need to change mobile number, SIM or network. Offering seamless connection of low-cost calls, MO-Call provides savings of up to 90% over existing Mobile Network International Tariffs. The service works through a plug-in software application that can be downloaded, free of charge, from the MO-Call website www.mo-call.com

Morodo is exhibiting MO-Call at the GSM Mobile World Congress in Barcelona from 16th – 19th February. Come and see Morodo in Hall 1-0 Stand ID70. www.mobileworldcongress.com

Press Release: MO-Call launches Affiliate and Reseller programs

MACAU - Virtual International Mobile Network Operator, Morodo has announced the  launch of an Affiliate and Reseller program, enabling everyone to share in the success of the popular MO-Call mobile international calling service.

Speaking at GSMA Asia Macau, where Morodo are exhibiting, Morodo Group Managing Director, Andrew Reid, said, “We had not planned on launching an Affiliate and Reseller program so soon but we were inundated with requests from around the world. It’s a great means of letting everyone share in the success of MO-Call.”

The MO-Call Affiliate program has been created to reward website owners for referring and creating new customers; Affiliates earn uncapped commission, in perpetuity, based on customer spending. The MO-Call Reseller program offers discount on volume airtime purchases. To join either program, simply visit www.mo-call.com

“Everyone wants to save money on international calls made from a mobile, MO-Call let’s you do just that.” Said Mr. Reid. “In the present economic climate, we believe the Affiliate and Reseller program will be a welcome source of extra income for members of the MO-Call global community.”

MO-Call enables low-cost international calling direct from a mobile phone, without the need to change mobile number, SIM or network. Offering seamless connection of low-cost calls, MO-Call provides savings of up to 90% over existing Mobile Network International Tariffs. The service works through a plug-in software application that can be downloaded, free of charge, from the MO-Call website www.mo-call.com

Morodo is exhibiting MO-Call at the GSMA Asia event in Macau from 18th – 20th November. Come and see Morodo in Hall D Stand B42. www.mobileasiacongress.com

How much?

The Register posted an article this week about a subject that must be close to everyone’s heart at the moment: tariff transparency.

Seems that the gentlemen in grey from the UK telecom regulator, Ofcom, have once again been prompted into action to do something about telephony provider tariffs. Why? Because the public just cannot understand the tariff plans on offer and are fed up. Biggest amongst the complaints is switching network provider for a better deal that turns out to be more expensive.

Caveat emptor? In the world of mobile, bundling minutes and SMS has to be one of the greatest legitimised scams of all time. Ever tried to compare either prepaid or post-paid mobile plans? It’s hard and it should be a lot easier. More choice does not always equate to better value.

Once upon a time I sold corporate airtime from one of the world’s largest mobile operators to suits in the City of London. Were these companies offered bundled minutes and SMS? No, we would not insult their intelligence so. The offer? Straightforward line rental, service charges and per minute billing. Keep It Simple Stupid we would say.

We tried to keep MO-Call rates as easy as possible to understand. Despite the fact that MO-Call World can be a fairly complex service for the new-to-mobile to understand, we think that we have done just that. Plain per minute rates, no surcharges and no hidden fees.

PS: if you’re interested in seeing how we stack-up against our MO-Call competition, please have a look at this site: www.lowcostmob.com. We might not be the cheapest of the alternative operators but we like to think we are one of the best. If you live in one of our MO-Call Home countries, we’ll even give you some free credit to try before you buy.

The Wolfman Cometh

Phandroid has posted a noteworthy story on Huawei’s plan to launch a mobile based on Google’s Android Operating System in early 2009.

Huawei is well known locally as China’s Wolf in the Network Hardware business and in recent years has gobbled up Ericsson/Nortel/Lucent/Alcatel’s customers in this sector, supplying kit to British Telecom, Vodafone and France Telecom amongst others.

Huawei’s adoption of Android comes as no surprise. Firstly, I do not know one single mobile developer in Beijing who does not want to work on a Linux-based mobile platform. Secondly, whilst Symbian and Microsoft continue to sell OS licenses at between GBP 5 and GBP 10 per unit, who wouldn’t want to choose a ‘free’ OS?

The Missionary Position

As smartphones are getting smarter, it’s good to see not-so-clever phones being blessed with a little more intelligence too.

Planning to build on the incredible success of the 1100 Ultra Low-Cost Handset (ULCH) Nokia has announced an upgrade to its ULCH range, introducing seven new low cost devices, each one packed with more features than ever before.

Pricing the mobiles from Euro 25 through to Euro 80, Nokia aims to capture the next billion unconnected consumers in the emerging markets and with missionary zeal, build that Brand.

Converting the masses to the Nokia experience is very much in evidence in the feature-set across new the ULCH range. Nokia’s Life Tools and Ovi Mail service offerings are as prominently promoted in the press kit as I am sure they will be in the packaging. Read the Nokia mantra.

And perhaps packaging is one of the key issues: many of these ULCHs will ship  to sales channel as subsidised and bundled with a Network Operator prepaid SIM. How many will be ‘box-broken’ for the mobile and SIM to be sold separately? In the prepaid segment, how much greater is the consumer’s loyalty to the hardware than the Network bitpipe?

Network Operators should perhaps be watchful of Nokia pulling off an ‘iPhone’ in the emerging markets.

Amen to that.

The iPhone is the lowest common denominator

Has the iPhone become so pervasive in the market as to be the lowest common denominator of smartphones? According to a post on IT World that was Slashdotted this weekend, it would seem that way. For the world outside America, Symbian still rules supreme but there is no denying the way that the iPhone has changed the common expectation of what a mobile can and should do.

Most Slashdot comments focused on the whys and wherefores of those on US$25,000 pa buying US$200 mobiles on US$70 pcm contracts. I’d argue that this focus detracts from a more interesting point: post iPhone everyone (and I really do mean everyone) expects more from their new mobile phone.

We expect our mobiles to be smart enough to cope with email, WiFi powered web-browsing, IM and a bunch of clever applications. Perhaps a significant segment is prepared to over-extend their budget to get what they want? Perhaps these people are switching off their fixed line to do so?

When we founded Morodo, a little under three years ago, some people thought we were mad to base our business on downloadable mobile apps. “Applications? Bah humbug! Ringtones, Games and Enterprise applications are all that’ll ever amount to.” They said. Now, Apple, Microsoft and Research In Motion are serving mobile download stores for the masses and the masses are coming.

The plug: Our flagship application, MO-Call, can save you money on every international call you make and can be used anytime, anywhere, without the need for an Internet connection. We planned ahead so that you could use MO-Call on practically any mobile you choose, over 1,100 at last count. Sign-up and download it for free. You’ll be very glad you did.