Virtual Communications Designed To Boost Revenue And Reduce Churn Across Caribbean, Latin America And The Rest Of The World

Movius executive tells CANTO conference that Telefonica initiative is only the beginning

CURACAO, Netherland Antilles and ATLANTA, Ga., U.S.A. – 15 July, 2010 – Virtual Communications have enormous potential to help telecommunication operators improve revenue, increase their customer base and reduce churn, according to Neil McGowan, Senior VP Worldwide Sales for Movius Interactive Corporation.

Mr. McGowan, a recognized industry figure with nearly 30 years of experience both in the Latin American market and globally, addressed the 26th annual Caribbean Association of National Telecommunication Organizations (CANTO) conference, being held this week at the World Trade Center in Piscadera Bay at Curacao in the Netherland Antilles.

“Virtual Communications can address two large market opportunities, from getting someone on to the network for the very first time to helping people utilize multiple numbers on a single device,” said Mr. McGowan.

“Both of these solutions create all the benefits that operators are looking for – increased market penetration and satisfied customers that are therefore more loyal to the operator that created such an opportunity for them in the first place.”

Movius, one of the industry’s leaders in messaging, collaboration and mobile media solutions, already has a strong presence in Latin America. Mr. McGowan’s presentation came shortly after the company signed a 12-country agreement with Telefonica to deploy Movius’ Side-Line™ multi-line mobile application across Latin America.

With Side-Line Service there is no need to purchase special phones or multiple SIM cards. The service also provides them with the flexibility of having incoming calls to these secondary numbers automatically forwarded to a separate and private voice messaging account versus receiving them live. The subscriber as necessary can modify this setting.  No new client software is required nor do new technology skills need to be learned by the user.

Mr. McGowan shared market data that supported the demand for this service in the Americas including independent research carried out on behalf of Movius by Frost and Sullivan that showed that more than 60% of multi-phone users in the U.S. would be interested in such a service.

Mr. McGowan also spoke about reaching the next billion subscribers with virtual phone services that help aspiring people who do not currently have their own phone to have access to voice communications. He presented market data to support the potential appeal of this type of service in many Latin American and Caribbean countries.  He also briefly talked about Movius’ approach to this solution, Virtual Subscriber Service (VSS), which is currently in trial in Africa. VSS provides individuals with their own personal number accessible by dialing a network short code from any phone, whether mobile or fixed, and giving them the ability to make calls and receive messages like any other subscriber.

“Virtual Communications offer operators the best of both worlds,” concluded Mr. McGowan. “Whatever the economic situation the operator and its customers are facing, this technology can be embraced to support economic success for the operator and to give customers a solution to their needs – advanced or basic.”