What partners should be capitalising on now

Selling mobile data has become one of the most profitable revenue streams for the channel in recent years, and the opportunity is still growing. If you are only thinking about SIM cards for phones and routers, you are seeing a fraction of the picture.

Where the opportunity actually sits

End users are still buying SIMs for phones, and for routers used as primary connectivity or as back-up. But the bigger, less obvious opportunity is in the estate of devices quietly running on ageing 2G and 3G connections: smart meters, alarm panels, intruder and fire monitoring, vehicle trackers and fleet telematics, lift lines, vending machines, parking meters, ATMs, agricultural sensors, environmental sensors and asset tracking equipment.

2G/3G sunsetting and the PSTN switch off are compelling events. Customers do not have a choice about whether to upgrade the legacy SIMs sitting in these solutions, only when, and partners who get in front of that decision win the contract.

Through our MRG™ programme, we help partners find and win mobile data opportunities in retail, transport and logistics, healthcare, agriculture, security, construction and the public sector, turning a known, unavoidable upgrade cycle into a pipeline of winnable deals.

The barriers you will need to plan for

End users delay swapping out SIMs, particularly where the devices sit in hard-to-reach places or where sending an engineer to site is costly relative to the value of the contract. In some locations mobile signal is poor enough that a fixed line or satellite connection is still the preferred option. Any partner strategy needs to price and plan around these two realities rather than assume every customer will move quickly.

Building a strategy around selling mobile

The most successful partners are not selling generic connectivity. They build solutions designed specifically around the needs of their end users, then package and price those solutions to solve a real customer headache rather than sell a SIM. A few models are doing the heavy lifting for partners right now:

• Device-as-a-Service, offering low monthly pricing with the option to refresh hardware and SIMs as required, rather than asking the customer to find capital budget up front.
• MultiNetwork eSIMs, which can reduce operational costs significantly and provide failover should one network fail.
• Pre-configured, plug-and-play solutions that cut engineering effort at the customer's site.
• Pooled data options, which take cost out where usage is unpredictable or needs to be shared across an estate.

Choosing a vendor to build this on

There are very few channel-only mobile data specialists in the market. When you are choosing one to build a mobile proposition on, look for a broad range of solutions, the best possible pricing, and the support to help you actually grow this revenue stream, not just a price list.

How mobile technology will evolve over the next 12 months

We have spent years being told what 5G will eventually do. Over the next twelve months, it actually starts doing it.

5G Standalone rollouts mean network slicing and guaranteed quality of service finally become things businesses can buy, not just hear about. 5G-Advanced is following on, so it can fill the gap between low-power IoT and full 5G, useful for trackers, wearables, CCTV and mid-tier industrial sensors.

With the UK 3G sunset essentially complete, attention is turning to 2G. Smart metering, alarms and telematics estates are beginning the real migration planning, which is driving a sharp rise in LTE-M and NB-IoT activations.

eSIM and iSIM are breaking out of consumer handsets. The new standard finally makes large-scale IoT deployments genuinely manageable, and satellite-to-device is moving from novelty to a standard feature on flagship phones.

The next year is not about a new "G". It is about 5G earning its keep, eSIM unlocking IoT at scale, and legacy connectivity being quietly retired.

Mobile data is easy to sell, support and bill, when you partner with the right channel supplier. To find out more, request our Partner Pack.