The telecommunication sector in the Middle East offers lucrative business opportunities, and many companies are vying to gain a substantial market share by introducing innovative technologies.
The latest example of this trend is the entry of India’s leading mobile technology service provider, mCarbon, to the Middle East market by establishing its headquarters in Dubai.
mCarbon is the largest supplier of airtime advance and credit in the world and has established itself as a clear leader in the space. With this service, a subscriber can request a talk-time or data or a value-added service advance from the operator when they are needed, thus generating incremental minutes of usage in the network. The system runs advanced analytics in the background to check in real-time things like eligibility and credit score which gets a dynamic rating with paybacks.
“The company has chosen Dubai as its Middle Eastern headquarters owing to a sound mobile infrastructure network base which can serve the predominant regional telecom business,” Rajesh Razdan, founder and CEO of mCarbon, told the Gulf News Journal. “This is aimed to meet the communication needs of the prospective subscribers and conveying value-added services to propel the network base.”
mCarbon, with 8 million transactions a day, touches almost 400 million subscriptions every month. The launch of Airtime Advance and credit service and its deployment at leading telecom companies in India and the South Asian region has resulted in almost a 10 percent increase in average revenue per user.
Offered as various business models like an emergency need-based or just as an overdraft kind of facility, a user may request an emergency top-up via phone, SMS or mobile app, and the system will offer the corresponding amount instantly. If accepted, the advance will be made available immediately with the validity period as defined by the telcom. Basically, the product is a pay-as-you-go model, and users will be charged only as per the usage.
“Our new launch comes in response to the ongoing demand from the telecom operators in the Middle East and African region to help support them in launching innovative offerings,” Razdan said. “The solution developed by mCarbon is highly scalable and provides enhanced customer analytics and usage information that enhances the effectiveness of the service and drive revenues from increased usage.”
Razdan added that the business need for the "instant credit" service was to create new revenue opportunities from operator’s existing low average-revenue-per-user subscriber base with an innovative service. It will enhance the end-user experience, help to recoup potentially lost revenues from the insufficient balance in prepaid accounts and boost customer loyalty.
Established in 2008, mCarbon has been successful in monetizing the telecom realm while serving India and South Asia.
“mCarbon provides robust telecom services that enhance usage, revenue and create superior customer engagement,” Razdan said. “Our microloan for talk time and data and dynamic end of call notification as part of the broader revenue management portfolio enables service providers to simplify and personalize the customer experience.”