New Florence. New Renaissance.

T-Mobile's "Simple Choice"

Not sure it will stick because telcos rarely change their business model so dramatically, and there are the usual gotcahas as CNET points out in graph below, but I  was struck at the 3 fairly dramatic components of this T-Mobile announcement to tackle invoice shock, lock in and lack of network portability in industry today:

"Dubbed "Simple Choice," T-Mobile's plan will offer unlimited "everything." There are no data caps, no bill shock, and no hidden fees. Just one rate plan, which will cost $50, $60 or $70, respectively, for varying degrees of service.

You can either pay for your new smartphone at the full price up-front when you start your new plan, or you can pay off the device over time with additional monthly costs. What's different is that you can leave T-Mobile at any time. That said, if you take the latter option, you will can't just jump ship to a rival network — you will have to pay off the rest of the phone's price upon leaving.

T-Mobile will also allow you to effectively bring your own device to the network — giving an entirely different spin on the enterprise buzzterm "BYOD.""

ZDNet

Photo Credit CNET

Dynamic Pricing comes to retail

Surprised it has taken so long after airlines and other travel companies have used for decades, but Holiday shopping in 2012 brought out Dynamic Pricing in spades.

Excerpts from Chicago Sun-Times

"Amazon.com now offers “Lightning Deals” that are posted throughout the day, have limited quantities, last a limited few hours, and offer discounts of as much as 50 percent off retail prices.

WalMart.com now features a deal-laden home page — with prices and offerings constantly changing as the company assesses its business. Y

Target.com has the same splashy home page featuring daily deals — and you’ll see yellow highlighted items marked as “temporary price cut” with discounts of 50 percent or more.

BestBuy.com, not to be outdone, is now featuring deals online and an email newsletter to let you know when they are posted — as well as the ubiquitous free shipping."

Photo Credit: Amazon

Technology in the new “fast lanes”

"High-occupancy toll lanes quickly are becoming the new fast lane in America. Transportation agencies nationwide, responsible for addressing rapidly growing congestion with rapidly shrinking budgets, are discovering these HOT lanes are cost-effective tools for moving traffic while giving motorists options."

HNTB

and it is impressive how much technology is going into real-time tolling

“Through numerous demand management techniques — such as changing eligibility requirements, pricing and access control — managed lanes regulate traffic to squeeze more capacity from existing, high-traffic corridors.   
 
Fees vary throughout the day to ease traffic if it begins to get heavy or to encourage customers if use is light. Using congestion pricing, the operator can maintain a high level of traffic flow, even when regular lanes are congested.”  

and exemption and enforcement technology as in Atlanta via Gwinett Daily Post

“Each morning, a list of the vehicles who have indicated on their Peach Pass account that they are exempt from the toll -- by having at least three people in the car -- will be downloaded to the officers' laptops, and it will be updated throughout the day.

When an automatic license plate reader picks up one of the vehicles, a ding will alarm, and the officer can look and see if there are at least three people in the car, Wilkins said. If not, they can pull over the drivers and give a $75 ticket,,,

Wilkins said the system allows for people to set their status for an indefinite period of time or to just switch for one day, when maybe a third carpooler won't be along for the ride. The system can also be set to default for one mode on weekdays and another on weekends, if someone plans to carpool during the week but drive alone on weekends or drive alone during the week and have the family in tow on weekends.”

The video below describes a mobile app to set their status. It also shows some of the  reactions of local citizens to the tolls

 

 

Hollywood evolves – kicking and streaming

“Film premieres get all the attention in Hollywood, but the cash cow for years has been selling those silver DVDs to a home video market far more predictable—and profitable—than the hit-or-miss theatrical release game. That’s why it was widely thought the movie business would take it on the chin as disc ownership gave way to digital distribution of content, just as the music business has been decimated by the shift to MP3s. Yet Hollywood is discovering there’s life after the DVD. With Netflix, Amazon.com, and soon Verizon Communications and Redbox bidding for rights to stream movies on Kindles, iPads, and TVs, the studios are enjoying a boomlet that’s taking the edge off declining disc sales and rentals.”

BusinessWeek

click on image to enlarge. Depicts Hollywood's business model evolution.

“Rental Nation”

Time (sub required) has a nice article on a trend sweeping the country and the role on-demand tech and pay as you go business models are accelerating the rental boom

“The transformation of American rental culture in recent years has turned that notion on its head. There are still many Americans for whom renting the basics is about making ends meet. But a shinier, more affluent cadre of renters has also emerged, and they are shifting mainstream thinking about the ideals of ownership and what we want out of the dollars we spend. For these renters, the philosophy is more about having it all--designer dresses, haute tech gadgets, modern art--than it is about hardship or frugality. Why own a BMW when you can rent one for a night out on the town? Why shell out for a diamond necklace when you can rent one for a black-tie event this week and another for the next event? Armed with iPhones and intent on a grander but lighter style of life, this new wave of spenders has come to see renting, rather than owning, as the surest path to achieving their dreams. The trend, still in its infancy, has been termed the "sharing" economy, one that gives us access to the stuff we want without our having to own it. In some ways, rentals offer what we need for a busier, more crowded world: environmentally friendly car-sharing schemes, cloud-based apps and software to maintain and upgrade myriad home gadgets (refrigerators that tell us when we need milk, thermostats that track our energy use, alarm systems that send us video of our home). We save money, and parts of the economy grow as these new sharing-oriented business models are created.”

Photo Credit of Toy Rental site

Do you see the irony in this?

Malcolm Frank, SVP at Cognizant had this slide during his talk at Community 2012 about industry “melting points” and the magazine’s  recent decision to go all-digital

Look Ma No commercials

“Hopper stores the shows for eight days after airing. Ergo, what you get is a running set of prime-time programming, about 100 hours of prime time TV, stored on your DVR, that you can watch commercial free. Whee!

The feature allows you to start watching the shows you’ve recorded starting at 1 a.m. Eastern Time the day after a show has been recorded. Before that, you can watch using the Hopper system’s 30-second “hop forward” feature to skip through ads. Dish notes that Auto Hop does not work on live broadcasts.”

Forbes

The WSJ on the reaction of the TV networks. Photo credit also WSJ.

Amazon Prime keeps evolving

To me, it was one of the most innovative things Amazon did – take shipping cost and time out of the web buying equation. With Prime at $ 79 a year (in US, other countries vary) you can get as many orders as you want shipped in 2 days – no minimum order value required.

And it keeps adding to the Prime features, as my recent renewal email pointed out:

• Prime instant videos — unlimited streaming of thousands of movies and TV shows
• Instant access to thousands of Kindle books to borrow for free through Kindle Owners' Lending Library (as in photo below)
• Ship to multiple addresses and send gifts to anyone in the continental U.S.
• Share your benefits with up to four members of your household at no additional cost
• Special Prime 1-Click buttons, order cutoff details, and delivery dates on every product page

I offered to add my daughter at college, and she responded “As a University student, I already get it for free”.

The Silicon Valley Airline?

SurfAir grew quickly and is already launching its beta this month. It’s starting with six destinations. 500 people were selected to participate. It’s a subscription model, just like Netflix. For less than $1000 per month, members can fly multiple trips between California destinations on a private Pilatus 8-seater aircraft. Passengers drive right up to the aircraft, where a valet parks their car and takes their luggage. They’re all pre-screened, so all they have to do is board the aircraft, and they’re at their destination within an hour with a car waiting for them as they exit the plane.

Who’s the target audience? It’s targeting high-level entrepreneurs, executives, and venture capitalists. SurfAir wants to give first-priority to the who’s who, in order to create an environment prime for networking and relationship-building. People who travel four-to-five times per month would benefit the most from this service.

Pando Daily

Photo Credit

J.C. Penney’s Business Model Innovation

So when Penney's newly appointed CEO, Ron Johnson, declared in mid-January that most of the original prices in his store have long been "fake" and inflated, the only surprising thing was that he had the guts to admit it. More surprising: Johnson said he was going to make changes.

Instead of facing infinite discounts and promotions--there were 590 different "sales" at Penney alone in 2011--the department store's shoppers will now see just three price categories. One will represent discounted seasonal items that change monthly. Another is clearance merchandise marked down on the first and third Fridays of each month. But the majority of goods will be offered every day at 40% or 50% less than the prices Penney used to charge. In retail parlance that's called EDLP, as in "everyday low price."

Time (sub required)

Photo Credit of Penney’s new logo to go with its “fair and square” pricing model