Testing membership based VoIP business model
Everything seems obvious in hindsight as, for example, in the case of the business model pioneered by Vonage in 2001. I can report navigating toward the business model during 2000 it was not at all obvious what would work. The previous successful VoIP businesses were all straight per minute plays and primarily in the International LD world. No one was sure exactly what business model might work to break into the domestic telecom business. The basic architecture of the network or end user offer were unknown. FWD's effort to test a paid membership model gets into similarly uncharted territory. The $30 price point was set at 10% of the basic Vonage offer, although FWD and Vonage offer very different value propositions for users. FWD will put as much communication value into the $30 bucket as possible, but the approach holds as sacred elimination of usage based charges and retaining global flat rate connectivity. We are looking to enable new forms and context for communication rather than simply cheaper forms of the same old thing. The fact the process starts with a thin story does not mean it fails. It is not obvious today why anyone ever purchased a 286 based computer in 1988. No Internet connectivity. No RAM or storage. The thing was little more than an oversized paper weight. However, it had characteristics that allowed continuous improvement and 3rd party application development. The membership based FWD seeks to enable the same dynamics.
posted by Daniel @ Friday, August 08, 2008
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