Press Coverage

Telstra and SurfKitchen place mobile applications on the idle screen

Australian telecoms operator Telstra has chosen SurfKitchen to provide it’s new TelstraOne Experience service. The new service will place a selection of on-phone services and mobile applications on the idle screen of Telstra customers - giving them one-click access to these services.

Surfkitchen is pretty much providing this entire service for Telstra, using the Surfkit Mobile Internet Platform. The user interface on the idle screen will give users access to any selection of services that Telstra chooses - including apps, widgets, native applications and Web links. These links won’t necessarily be free to use, as Telstra can choose to link to third-party apps that users will have to pay to download and install.

From the release:

“We know mobile users want a navigation experience that is intuitive and allows them to get to their favourite features quickly without having to hunt through endless submenus,” said Mr Ross Fielding, Executive Director, Telstra Product Management. “TelstraOne Experience delivers on our one-click vision, giving customers greater control over the services they want to use on their mobile phone. This means fast, easy access to the most popular applications and services like phonebook and calendar and social networking and search.”

“Revenue from mobile Internet services is now a critical element of operators’ growth strategies and has the potential to significantly expand if data service usage can be increased on mass market devices.” said Michel Quazza, chief executive officer, SurfKitchen. “Telstra has always been at the forefront of innovative wireless products and services and the launch of TelstraOne Experience sets another industry milestone. Combining a diverse range of mobile Internet services with the personalization, discoverability and usability that mobile subscribers are increasingly demanding will help attract new users and drive mobile data revenues.”

What we think?

Now this seems to me like an operator is applying creative thinking to a growing problem - how to monetise web-apps without driving customers away. Mobile users want cheap (or free) applications, but they also want a fast and easy-to-use service. And the faster the better, as many users would like for operator portals to link directly to popular and favourite services. By using it’s resources cleverly, Telstra has given itself a real opportunity to make money from popular applications. If a user pulls their phone out, and sees a link to the hottest new gaming app on the idle screen, they’re more likely to purchase it off the cuff. Developers and producers would pay good money for that kind of exposure.