Description

The convergence of the telecommunication industry and the Internet industry results in a transformation of the established value network and the business landscape, creating both opportunities and threats for incumbent players and new entrants. Major uncertainties affecting the telecommunication industry are not technical factors, but rather stem from the evolution of underlying business models.
The aim of this thesis is to figure out the business logic behind successful mobile Internet services. Business model is such a broad concept that covers a large rage of aspects. Besides, none of the existing business model analysis framework is universally accepted in the academic world. The present thesis will focus on revenue model study and value network analysis.
In this thesis, an analysis framework is developed and applied to the study of mobile Internet services. The framework categorizes all the value exchange into three groups, namely services & goods, monetary benefits and intangible benefits. In addition, a
revenue model classification is adopted, in which the revenue models of mobile services are sort out into advertising model, subscription model and transaction
model.
The study picks out the top twenty mobile Internet services present in the Finnish market on the basis of a set of pre-defined criteria. The results of analysis indicate that generally services adopting advertising model outnumber their counterparts in several
aspects. Moreover, a cross-case study among all the advertising model services is conducted, in which the advertising models are further broken down into four
variants. They are two-sided market model, double two-sided market model, three-sided market model and hybrid model. Another lesson learned from this study is
that the orchestrator of value network varies from case to case, which doesn’t necessarily have to be the telecom operator like in the traditional value networks.