Browse by Tags

Deutsche Telekom's second quarter profit dropped 35 percent to 394 million euros ($608.2 million) from 604 million euros ($934 million) a year ago. The company blamed the strong euro and higher interest costs for the decline. Net revenue was down 2.9 percent to 15.13 billion euros ($23.39 billion). The company's mobile unit T-Mobile, meanwhile, reported revenue of 8.68 billion euros ($13.43 billion), holding stable from 8.65 billion ($13.37 billion) a year ago. Core profit, or adjusted EBITDA, was up 3.4 percent to 2.84 billion euros ($4.39 billion), up from 2.75 billion euros ($4.25 billion) year-on-year. Earnings Highlights: T-Mobile USA: — US operation is "continuing to demonstrate robust development of operations", though the weak US dollar dragged down revenues. Counted in euros, revenue in the first half of 2008 fell 0.8 percent to 6.96 billion euros ($10.76 billion). In dollars, revenue jumped 14.3 percent. Total revenues rose to $5.47 billion from $4.78 billion in the prior-year quarter. — T-Mobile USA added 668,000 net subscribers in Q2, with 525,000 being the more valuable contract customers. Still the figure was a 22.1 percent drop from 857,000 year-n-year compared to last year, which the network blamed on customers failing to renew their two-year fixed term contract contracts that were imposed on new customers in April 2006 for the first time. During Q2, the network added more than one million MyFaves customers, giving it a total of 6.5 million using the service. T-Mobile USA now has a total base of 31.5 million customers. — ARPU was $51, down slightly from $52 a year ago. Data ARPU including messaging--17 percent of total ARPU--came in at $8.60 in Q2, up slightly from $8.50 sequentially. More T-Mob Territories after the jump. Release | PDF Presentation | Financial Charts in PDF | Conference Call T-Mobile UK: — Total revenue dropped 13.8 percent in Q2 to 1.02 billion euros ($1.57 billion) compared with the same period in 2007. Measured in...

Toshiba mobile TV subsidiary Mobile Broadcasting Corporation is shutting down, after failing to attract enough interest, the company said Thursday. "The number of subscribers has not reached a sufficient level to sustain operations and, following a thorough review of operations, the company has decided to cease broadcasting," it said in a statement. MBC's digital satellite mobile TV service Moba-Ho! began broadcasting in October 2004, and had some 40 channels of audio, video and data information programming. The service will shut down at the end of March 2009, with Toshiba expected to take a 25 billion yen ($232 million) hit on MBC's closure. So what happened to MBC's Moba-Ho? The likely story is that Japan's other mobile TV technology, the very popular digital terrestrial mobile TV service One-seg helped kill it off. In an interview in 2005, Mobile Broadcasting Co. President Tetsuya Mizoguchi said that he wasn't concerned with terrestrial digital mobile TV, since the focus was different. One-seg offers local broadcasts for free, while Moba-Ho! had its own special line up of content. But One-Seg has proven very popular--especially after handset manufacturers began building recording functions into phones that allowed Japanese consumers to record and watch programs whenever they wanted. In February, One-Seg hit the 20 million-handset mark less than two years after its launch. This week hasn't been the best for mobile TV services—at least paying ones. MBC's news follows just days after German press reports that the country's DVB-H mobile TV service Mobile 3.0 is on the verge of shutting down . German operators after losing out on the DVB-H license to Mobile 3.0 have brought the service it seems to a halt, after deciding to support a competing technology—the "free" DVB-T, or digital terrestrial mobile TV technology. ( Release ). Related Operators Kill DVB-H In Germany Shipments of Japan's Mobile TV Enabled Handsets...

German mobile social network Aka-Aki , which uses Bluetooth to do location-aware proximity networking and is also available in English, has raised a small investment of an undisclosed size from Crea Thor Ventures . The service started as a Berlin university diploma project but will, from August 15, have staff working full-time from an office in the city, Deutsche Startups says . This pretty mad explainer video is slightly confused but gets to the point in the end… ContentNext's EconCeleb Seminar examines what drives the economics of celebrity content. July 23, 2008 at the Roosevelt Hotel, Hollywood. Learn more .

Nokia ( NYSE: NOK ) is continuing on its social media related acquisition trail: it has now bought out Zurich and Berlin-based social networking service Plazes . Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Founded in Dec. 2005, had seed funding from business angels such as Esther Dyson and Marc Andreessen and then raised its first round of $3.5 million from from Doughty Hanson Technology Ventures. It has 13 employees. Plazes provides a location based social-activity service that people can use to plan, record, and share their social activities: why they are at a given location at a given time, whether in the past, present or future. Nokia will integrate this service into its own handsets. After an expected Q3 closing, Plazes will become part of Nokia's Services & Software unit. More details in release . Nokia has bought a slew of social networking and media services over the last year of so, including Twango, Enpocket, Loudeye and then its big buy of mapping company Navteq. Related Geo-Social Net Plazes Raises $3.5 Million Nokia To Buy Navigation/Digital Maps Company Navteq For $8.1 Billion ContentNext's EconCeleb Seminar examines what drives the economics of celebrity content. July 23, 2008 at the Roosevelt Hotel, Hollywood. Learn more .

Rafat was almost right on the button. In a meeting today, Jamba decided to stop developing its own mobile games, so is shutting its Ojom development unit. Berlin-based Ojom is actually one of VeriSign's ( NSDQ: VRSN ) contributions to the venture with News Corp ( NYSE: NWS ). which will now concentrate only on marketing and distribution as far as games go. CEO Mauro Montanaro (via emailed release): "The games market has matured significantly over the past few years. We now already have over 100 partnerships with well-known games publishers ... Therefore, we no longer see the need to develop our own content in this specific area." Ojom had produced titles including Men In Black, Charlie's Angels (pictured) and Macho Or Nacho. Related Updated: Jamba COO Lee Fenton Leaves, Replaced By Kaj Hagros Industry Moves: Jamster Takes Content EVP Linders From Endemol 10-K Watch: Verisign's Call/Put Options on its JV With News Corp on Jamba; Sells Services Business

Arun Sarin, who defined Vodafone ( NYSE: VOD ) as the big global telecom conglomerate in his five years as CEO, is going to step down in JUly and will be replaced by Vittorio Colao, who is presently Sarin's number two and has responsibility for the company's European operations, reports Telegraph . The exact timing of Sarin's departure, along with record headline full-year profits of about £13 billion will be announced on Tuesday, the story said. The timing of his departure comes as a surprise, if only because he was almost ousted two years ago in a board battle, but has since managed to steady the ship, with his focus on building Vodafone's presence in emerging markets including India. Sarin is expected to move into private equity world. Times UK : As well as success in emerging markets, Sarin has also seen revenues rise thanks to data. Last year revenues from this area—the downloading of music clips, e-mailing and so on—surged nearly 50 per cent in the first half to £1 billion. Data revenues now account for 7.3 per cent of the group's total Western European revenues. Register for our EconAds seminar , June 3rd, at the New World Stages in New York City. Covering the economics of online advertising.