New European mobile price caps ratified

The European Parliament today ratified the recently discussed mobile price caps that go a long way to finally making roaming less onerous and less prone to very unpleasant bill surprises. Enterprises that send their end-users logging on and texting around the continent will benefit the most.

Highlights include capping text messages at 11 Eurocents per message, and capping roaming data usage at 1 Euro per MB, starting July 1 of this year, with more mandated cuts to come. Caps on per-minute voice charges, already in place at particular levels, go down further in progressive stages on July 1 of each of the next three years. More details are in my colleague Ben Fox's recent guest post.

Remember that whether the impact on you is direct or indirect depends on whether the caps apply at the wholesale or retail level, and also whether the charges are coming directly from European carriers or from U.S. carriers under their roaming agreements with their European counterparts, as Ben explained. Also significant is how much your awareness of these developments can be leveraged into further price improvements in the context of your overall negotiating position.

We'll also be continuing to follow the network infrastructuring-sharing and other key developments in the particular landscape of wireless suppliers in Europe and elsewhere. As my overseas colleagues like to remind me, wireless data apps as well as voice grabbed hold of end-user behavior in many places around the world earlier than in the U.S. That's made it a significant challenge for international enterprises. Feel free to pass along any experiences you've had in managing these costs as well.