Report from Strategy Analytics Shows that Users are Paying Less for Mobile Broadband Services

Last week I reported that due to Sprint’s acquisition of Clearwire spectrum it could deliver a tri-band LTE network. I also mentioned that this network could deliver speeds of 50-60Mbps. In addition to Sprint reaching one gigabit speeds in their lab, earlier this year Samsung also achieved one gigabit speeds in their labs.

As you can see, with the rapid deployment of 4G LTE services expanding by all of the major carriers, speed seems to be easier to get. Now you would think that providing higher speeds would come at a premium cost. That would be the norm, you get more, you pay more.

Oddly enough, that doesn’t seem to be the case. Go figure! The most recent mobile broadband price benchmarking results from Strategy Analytics shows that while over the past year service speeds have grown dramatically, users seem to be paying less for these speeds.

The OECD Mobile Broadband Price Benchmarking service is provided by the Teligen division of Strategy Analytics. It is designed to offer an on-going insight into the price developments and relationships for mobile broadband services in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, plus a selected number of non-OECD countries.

Currently, there are 34 countries listed in the OECD. Some of these include the U.S. Australia, Belgium, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Turkey and the U.K. just to name a few.

Senior tariff consultant, Josie Sephton, said, "The area of mobile pricing is very exciting at the moment. We are seeing a lot of innovation in pricing structures around things like speed tiering and data share plans, as providers look at how best they can monetize revenues from data, and encourage greater use."

According to the report, the average monthly cost for a tablet user needing 2 GB per month has fallen 4 percent since the same period last year. The cost dropped to Purchase Power Parity (PPP) $17.79, however the average advertised speed shot up by 123 percent to 26 Mb/s. On the laptop side for 5 GB we are looking at PPP $25.24 with 24 Mb/s speeds.

Halvor Sannaes, who is Teligen’s director had the following to say: "We are seeing some very dramatic movements with mobile broadband pricing. The impact of 4G rollouts on speed is very evident, with some providers offering download in excess of 100 Mb/s. What is perhaps surprising, though, is that these big increases in speed are not resulting in extra costs for users. Of course, this will vary by provider, but the overall trend is clear."

Who would expect that you could get more (or maybe I should say faster) and pay less. We are seeing that not only are all of the major carriers working to deliver faster speeds. Companies like Samsung are also working to deliver gigabit speeds. Let us hope that this trend of more for less continues.