According to Pyramid Research, mobile number portability (MNP) was first instituted in the U.S. on November 24, 2003 � a date wireless carriers feared most. U.S. mobile operators braced themselves for what they expected to be one of the largest challenges within their industry. Eighteen months after its introduction, number portability has been more of a lumbering elephant and less of a roaring lion. At the onset, the FCC, wireless operators, and many industry analysts expected 30 million subscribers to transfer their wireless number within the first 12 months of MNP�s introduction. Only 7.8 million actually did. The top five national carriers have all added customers during this time, with AT&T/Cingular growing by about 5 percent on the low end, and T-Mobile growing by more than 33 percent on the high end. Overall, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile have been the biggest winners as they have focused on improving network quality and customer service. However, the new Cingular may soon become MNPs largest beneficiary as it has become the nation�s largest carrier.
Every executive who has approved a connected product roadmap has made a quiet assumption: the network underneath it will still be there. That assumption is about to be tested at a scale the automotive industry has never faced. The global connected vehicle installed base is heading toward a billion units, and the cellular technology most of those vehicles depend on is scheduled to begin its retirement before the end of the decade. For automakers, fleet operators, insurers, and the telecom carriers that serve them, the question is whether the recurring revenue those services promise can survive a connectivity layer with a shorter life than the vehicle carrying it. How Scale Meets an Expiry Date Omdia research forecasts that the global connected vehicle installed base will surpass 1.05 billion units by 2035, up from 473.7 million in 2025. Few installed bases of any kind more than double in a decade, and this one signals that connectivity is moving from premium differentiator to baseline e...