Posts tagged Prices
Android Market vs. App Store Prices: Why Android Users Pay Double [Study]
Feb 25th
Analyst firm Canalys’ App Integrator study found that the top 100 paid applications on the Android service carry an average cost of $3.74, compared to an average cost of $1.47 for the most popular paid iOS apps, likely due to a smaller audience.
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AT&T CEO Randall Stevenson Blasts FCC, Hints At Higher Prices and Data Restrictions
Jan 26th
AT&T has a bone to pick with the Federal Communications Commission. In the mobile operator’s quarterly earnings call this morning, CEO Randall Stevenson blasted the FCC over its leadership in making additional spectrum available to carriers to handle the explosion of mobile data flowing through the operators’ pipes. Stevenson and AT&T are bitter after the FCC blew up its proposed acquisition of T-Mobile. Stevenson said that because of AT&T’s spectrum crunch it will be forced to raise prices and take additional actions against the highest data users.
Stevenson’s remarks come as AT&T announced that it sold 9.4 million smartphones including 7.6 million smartphones the the fourth quarter of 2011. AT&T has been crying about its spectrum paucity for several years now with the iPhone and other smartphones driving the company’s desperation. See Stevenson’s harsh message to the FCC below.
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Here are Stevenson’s pertinent comments during the scripted portion of AT&T’s earnings call. Since it was scripted, this message was something that Stevenson and AT&T thought quite a bit about before issuing the statements.
The No. 1 issue for us, and the industry I believe, continues to be spectrum. This industry continues to see just explosive mobile broadband growth. It provides one of the few bright spots in the U.S. economy but I think we all understand that this growth cannot continue without more spectrum being cleared and brought to market. Despite all the speeches from the FCC, we are still all waiting. The last significant spectrum auction was nearly five years ago now. This FCC has made it abundantly clear that they will not allow significant M&A to help bridge these delays in clearing up new spectrum. So, in absence of options, our company and others have taken the logical step to make smaller transactions to acquire the spectrum we need to meet demand.
But, even here we need the FCC’s action and leadership and unfortunately even the smallest and most routine spectrum deals are receiving intense scrutiny from this FCC, often times taking up to a year and sometimes longer for these to be approved.
Now, I hope I am wrong but it appears the FCC is intent on picking winners and losers rather than letting the markets work. A lot of recent comments and speeches by certain members of this FCC suggest that they and not congress should decide how spectrum auctions are conducted including who can participate and what the conditions should be for participating. Meanwhile we pile more and more regulatory uncertainty on top of an industry that is the foundation for a lot of today’s innovation, making it difficult for all of us to allocate and commit capital. In this industry we all know that capital investment equals jobs. So, the end result of this is that we have an industry that is just really stuck in creating real capacity.
We will certainly do our part to provide leadership on these issues but it is also clearly time for Congress and the FCC to step up. In the interim, this environment has clear implications for our business.
First, while our overall spectrum position is competitive, we’ve led the way in mobile data. Therefore our utilization rates are running very hot and demand continues to accelerate. So, we will continue to do a number of things. In a capacity constrained environment we will manage usage-based data plans, increased pricing and managing the speeds of the highest volume users. These are all logical and necessary steps to manage utilization. LTE deployment is also going to play a roll. We ended 2011 with 74 million LTE POPS covered and will accelerate that pace considerably in 2012 setting us up to complete deployment to 80% of the U.S. population in 2013. LTE does give us a 30%-40% lift in network efficiency but at current growth rates that equates to only a year’s growth in traffic. So, LTE is important but it is not the silver bullet in terms of capacity planning. What that means is that to meet customer demand we need to continue our spectrum push.
Note: Bold emphasis ReadWriteWeb.
What does this boil down to? AT&T says it needs more spectrum and is threatening the FCC that it will end up punishing users with data restrictions and higher prices if it does not get it. This message is relatively unchanged from the spin that AT&T used when trying to buy T-Mobile.
Steveson also said that AT&T no longer has plans for rolling out rural broadband. The spread of broadband to the far-flung reaches of the country is a big goal of the Obama administration and the FCC. AT&T said that it would be able to reach near 99% of the country with broadband if it was allowed to purchase T-Mobile. Now, it has little strategy outside of a vague notion of rolling rural broadband outside of building up its LTE network across the country. At that, LTE still will only be available to 80% of the U.S. population on AT&T’s network by 2013.
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When A/B Testing Prices, Proceed With Caution
Jan 25th
I had an interesting A/B testing experience over the holidays. This time, it wasn’t an A/B test that I was running, but rather an A/B test in which I was an (initially) unsuspecting participant. It reminded me of the negative side effects that certain kinds of tests can have on customers —…
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SEO Company Ajax Union Promotes Low Prices on its Pay-Per-Click Management … – ABN Newswire (press release)
Jan 24th
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SEO Company Ajax Union Promotes Low Prices on its Pay-Per-Click Management …
ABN Newswire (press release) As an SEO company, we further distinguish ourselves by making ourselves accessible to clients whenever they want to check in,” said Josh Lewinson, the PPC Manager of the search engine agency. The PPC plans hosted by the internet marketing agency begin … Ajax Union Search Engine Agency Reaches Out to Business Owners with Upcoming … |
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Seo Las Vegas Announces Wholesale Prices For Local Companies Looking to Expand … – Emailwire (press release)
Jan 13th
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Seo Las Vegas Announces Wholesale Prices For Local Companies Looking to Expand …
Emailwire (press release) With the announcement from Seo Las Vegas offering wholesale pricing for local companies seo services have become affordable for all Las Vegas businesses. (EMAILWIRE.COM, January 13, 2012 ) Las Vegas, NV — Seo Las Vegas today announced that they would … |
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Freshrank.com Offers Guaranteed SEO Service At Prices Affordable For Small And … – Emailwire (press release)
Dec 3rd
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Freshrank.com Offers Guaranteed SEO Service At Prices Affordable For Small And …
Emailwire (press release) Freshrank.com offers result oriented SEO services. (EMAILWIRE.COM, December 03, 2011 ) Mumbai, Maharashtra – The SEO industry is one of the fastest growing niches on the web and one need not expound the reasons any further for this given the high level … |
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Google Drops Chromebook Prices & Adds A Black Friday Model
Nov 21st
Google gave Chromebooks a refresh for the holidays, introducing a new Samsung Series 5 notebook and dropping the price of Acer and Samsung Chromebooks to $299. The new Series 5 is sleek and black (and Wi-Fi only), an impressive-looking refresher for the ailing netbook category.
Google has also overhauled parts of the Chrome OS user interface. The login screen is now so fresh and so clean, and the new tab page now includes a shortcut to the file manager.
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“The computer that keeps getting better” lives up to that promise, but the Chromebook category hasn’t caught on. It advertises “nothing but the Web” as a feature, but our experiences have found that to be a limitation. We weren’t sure why Chromebooks had to be more expensive that plain old netbooks, but today’s price drop – and for a sleek, new model, too – is a welcome gesture.
The Chromebook and Chrome OS have gotten some important updates this year. Will you be getting one for the holidays?
Read more on the Google Blog.
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Groupon IPO Prices Shares at $20
Nov 3rd
Daily deals website Groupon has priced its IPO at $20 a share, a few dollars above the anticipated range of $16 to $18, in a heavily oversubscribed offering. Groupon added five million additional shares to its offering, bringing the total to 35 million shares sold. That still only accounts for 5.5 percent of the company. Groupon will be valued at almost $13 billion before it debuts on the Nasdaq Stock Market this Friday (GRPN).
The Wall Street Journal reports that Groupon will be the highest-profile Web IPO since late summer.
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Groupon is selling a small amount of shares, which has become common for recent Internet IPOs.
In Groupon’s SEC filing on October 21, it planned to share only 30 million shares, valuing the company at $11.4 billion. Groupon’s initial filing in June 2011 expected to raise $750 million. At its highest, Groupon’s IPO was valued at $20B.
In May, LinkedIn became the first of the major social networks to go public. It initially priced shares at $45; by the end of the day, they shot up to $122 per share.
Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Credit Suisse Group lead the Groupon offering.
Groupon will go public tomorrow on Nasdaq as GRPN.
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Bing Holiday Travel Report: Domestic Travel Prices Expected to Fall
Sep 20th
Earlier today, Bing Travel issued its preliminary 2011 holiday travel predictions. The search engine uses a comprehensive dataset that includes future airfares, past airfares, and search data to perform the predictive analysis.
Some of the interesting statistics Bing Travel released in its report include:
- Domestic airfare fell 1.4% to $302 on average
- 3 and 4 star hotels are approximately the same price
- 5 star hotels have decreased in price 8% on average
- Airfare to Asia has increased by 15% to $1,226 on average
- Airfare to Europe has increased by 9% to $936 on average
Kari Dilloo of Bing Travel said:
“Given this summer’s sharp increases, it’s a relief to see travel prices normalize this holiday. Travelers looking to stay in the U.S. should be able to find some great deals this holiday, but those people planning travel to Europe or Asia will likely face a different story unless they plan ahead.”
While holiday airline fares and hotel prices have decreased in most domestic markets, flexible travelers will be able to save the most. Travelers should thoroughly research travel options using travel tools such as the Bing Price Predictor, Hotel Rate Indicator, and Flexible Search. Using these tools, which look at a combination of past data and the most advantageous future travel dates, will ensure travelers maximize their travel budgets and make smart travel choices. Bing has a prime opportunity to highlight its travel site while Google Flight Search capabilities are still greatly limited.
Google Flight Search, the new travel tool that utilizes ITA data, officially launched last week. However, Google Flight Search does not currently provide users the ability to search premium fares, international destinations, or small cities. In addition, Google Flight Search misses some airfares and displays fewer travel choices than competitors’ sites.
While Google Flight Search is perfecting its product, Bing Travel should seize the opportunity to establish itself as more authoritative in this market niche.
[Sources Include: MarketWatch & Bing]
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Bing Holiday Travel Report: Domestic Travel Prices Expected to Fall
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