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The purpose of this paper is to identify the factors influencing investment decisions in mobile services for profitablity and to become a global leader in mobile services sector.

A two-stage methodology is followed. In the first stage, factors are identified from literature, and are validated with telecommunication domain experts using the t-test. In the second stage, interpretive structural modeling (ISM) is used to understand the complex interrelationships among various factors. Further, MICMAC analysis is performed to analyze the indirect relationships and their effect on different factors by stabilizing the rank based on driving and dependence power. Based on MICMAC analysis, four clusters are identified to aid the policy- and decision-makers.

The major contribution of this research is imposing directions and dominance of various factors to make informed decision-making for investment in mobile services to meet the upcoming demand for mobile services in Indian telecommunication sector.

The applicability of these research findings is limited to emerging telecommunication market.

This paper forms the basis for identifying various factors that act as the driving force for the Indian telecommunication operators to pay special attention toward mobile services, with telecommunication data analytics and developing context-aware services. This paper will aid policy-makers in the government, managers in telecommunication companies and other stakeholders such as content providers, channel partners and application developers to take a lead role in developing appropriate mobile services to meet local needs of Indian users. It will help in developing strategies to collaborate and motivate other stakeholders, including device manufacturers to understand and work collaboratively to become world leader in mobile services.

This paper provides a framework for understanding the various factors that encourage telecommunication companies to establish and invest in mobile services and setup a separate vertical in their organization with a focus on mobile services to meet the future demands of Indian market. Appropriate utilization of telecommunication data analytics, personalization of services, customization in local languages and support for convergent services would encourage adoption of mobile services.

The strategic management literature emphasizes the concept of business intelligence (BI) as an essential competitive tool. Yet the sustainability of the firms’ competitive advantage provided by BI capability is not well researched. To fill this gap, this study attempts to develop a model for successful BI deployment and empirically examines the association between BI deployment and sustainable competitive advantage. Taking the telecommunications industry in Malaysia as a case example, the research particularly focuses on the influencing perceptions held by telecommunications decision makers and executives on factors that impact successful BI deployment. The research further investigates the relationship between successful BI deployment and sustainable competitive advantage of the telecommunications organizations. Another important aim of this study is to determine the effect of moderating factors such as organization culture, business strategy, and use of BI tools on BI deployment and the sustainability of firm’s competitive advantage.

This research uses combination of resource-based theory and diffusion of innovation (DOI) theory to examine BI success and its relationship with firm’s sustainability. The research adopts the positivist paradigm and a two-phase sequential mixed method consisting of qualitative and quantitative approaches are employed. A tentative research model is developed first based on extensive literature review. The chapter presents a qualitative field study to fine tune the initial research model. Findings from the qualitative method are also used to develop measures and instruments for the next phase of quantitative method. The study includes a survey study with sample of business analysts and decision makers in telecommunications firms and is analyzed by partial least square-based structural equation modeling.

The findings reveal that some internal resources of the organizations such as BI governance and the perceptions of BI’s characteristics influence the successful deployment of BI. Organizations that practice good BI governance with strong moral and financial support from upper management have an opportunity to realize the dream of having successful BI initiatives in place. The scope of BI governance includes providing sufficient support and commitment in BI funding and implementation, laying out proper BI infrastructure and staffing and establishing a corporate-wide policy and procedures regarding BI. The perceptions about the characteristics of BI such as its relative advantage, complexity, compatibility, and observability are also significant in ensuring BI success. The most important results of this study indicated that with BI successfully deployed, executives would use the knowledge provided for their necessary actions in sustaining the organizations’ competitive advantage in terms of economics, social, and environmental issues.

This study contributes significantly to the existing literature that will assist future BI researchers especially in achieving sustainable competitive advantage. In particular, the model will help practitioners to consider the resources that they are likely to consider when deploying BI. Finally, the applications of this study can be extended through further adaptation in other industries and various geographic contexts.

The purpose of this paper is to show how the development of location‐based services (such as those using global positioning satellite (GPS) systems) has accompanied the growth of mobile telecommunication, providing mobile telephone users with a variety of functions. The paper aims to considers the benefits and concerns that these location‐based services present to consumers.

The paper identifies issues based on the academic literature, relevant theory, and current mobile telecommunication developments.

While location‐based services offer many benefits to consumers, issues pertaining to privacy, trust and justice are significant areas of concern.

Testable research propositions pertaining to consumer behaviour are offered to guide future research.

Socially‐responsible telecommunication firms should consider the issues that are raised here. They should adopt policies to safeguard data, build trust, and offer consumers fair policies as the firms offer location‐based services.

While much has been written about GPS systems and wireless telecommunications, almost no empirical research has been conducted and little theoretical guidance has been offered to prospective researchers. The paper reviews the literature from a variety of disciplines and identifies important theoretical areas to guide future research on consumer behaviour. The paper identifies important issues for researchers and managers.

Although the benefits of customer loyalty are well researched and understood, a clear explication of how customer attitudinal loyalty evolves is lacking. Cultural discrepancies across contexts are also argued as restraining the search for universal and dominant antecedents of loyalty. As a result of the high collectivistic ranking of the Nigerian culture, the purpose of this paper is to explore the antecedents of attitudinal loyalty within the Nigerian telecom market.

This study is based on survey data obtained from 138 informants who are experienced users of telecommunication services in Nigeria. The cross-sectional data were examined for internal consistency using Cronbach α internal consistency measure whereas the proposed hypotheses were tested using a multiple regression technique after conducting series of validation tests to ensure that none of the assumptions of regression was violated.

The results indicate that service reliability and customer commitment explains 65 per cent of the total variance in attitudinal loyalty. Additionally, customer commitment was established as a stronger predictor of attitudinal loyalty than service reliability.

This study is limited to the extent that it used a convenience sampling approach which may not have allowed for a fully matched profile of the respondents. But the satisfactory fit of the regression model allows for the research to be a basis of a reliable comparison for future studies. Additionally, due to the limited evidence on how attitudinal loyalty evolves in the telecommunication sector, the results that emerged from this research should only be compared cautiously to the findings of previous studies.

For users of telecommunication services to become attitudinally loyal, telecom firms must get customers to become committed to their brands and also deliver reliable services. Consequently, capacity building investments that enable reliable services to be delivered and creative pricing structure and information sharing as well as promise fulfilment which attract customers’ commitment are therefore at the core of developing attitudinally loyal customers’ pool.

Although studies on customer loyalty are not new, the fact that this paper examined how attitudinal loyalty evolves in a saturated telecommunication context with a high collectivistic cultural ranking makes it a significant contribution to customer loyalty research because of the concentration of most studies in the western markets, the likelihood of disparities across markets influencing the antecedents of the construct and the absence of such research in the Nigerian telecom setting.

A review of relevant literature reveals a great deal of information on the possible use of cell phones for Internet access via the emerging wireless application protocol (WAP) technology, but little information if any exists about the link between cell phones and libraries. Going by the wide use of wireless networks in libraries especially in Western countries, it is possible that as cell phone technology continues to evolve and mature it could have a significant impact on libraries in the same way the Internet did. Ironically, today, a review of cell phone use in libraries only reveals efforts that are being made to dissuade users from making or receiving calls on their handsets within libraries. Few efforts are geared towards exploring ways that cell phone technology could be used to enhance library operations. Attempts to demonstrate that cell phones may in future provide solutions to libraries’ problems of connectivity especially in the remote areas of the Southern African Development Community member states.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how firms can influence customer loyalty through customer commitment by leveraging two constructs of service quality: service assurance and service reliability.

The analyses are based on 138 responses retrieved from experienced users of mobile phone services in one of the big cities in the South-eastern part of Nigeria through a survey questionnaire. The validity and reliability of the measurement model as well as the proposed hypotheses were examined through the partial least squares structural equation modelling procedure.

Service reliability is a direct predictor of customer loyalty while service assurance is not. Affective commitment has a direct positive effect on customer loyalty and partially mediates the relationship between service reliability and customer loyalty. In contrast, the mediating effects of affective and continuance commitment on the relationship between service assurance and customer loyalty were positive but insignificant. Finally, affective commitment mediates the effect of continuance commitment on customer loyalty.

The mediating role of the individual components of commitment in the links between the individual dimensions of service quality and customer loyalty is largely untested in the literature. This line of inquiry can form the basis for future research proposals. Additionally, the outcomes that emerged from this research must be interpreted with caution due to the size of the sample on which analyses were based. Future research should employ larger samples.

Services organisations especially telecommunication firms may benefit from customer loyalty by pursuing a combined strategy of increasing service assurance, service reliability, affective commitment and continuance commitment both independently and in tandem.

As far as could be established, this paper is the first to explore the mediating effects of affective and continuance commitment on the links between service quality dimensions and customer loyalty.

This study aims to identify and analyze factors affecting the business-to-business (B2B) relationship between Sri Lankan telecommunication operators and vendors. The authors conduct a survey and develop models to explain relationship strength and satisfaction. The authors find that telecommunication operators and vendors value trust, commitment, adaptation and communication. Operator satisfaction varies by perception of product quality, service support, delivery performance, supplier know-how and value for money. The vendor’s relationship strength is impacted by trust and commitment; vendor satisfaction is affected by economic factors and referencing. The authors suggest formulating management strategies using these results to strengthen business relationships.

The authors develop two conceptual models to analyze the supplier and customer perspectives. This study’s drafted models were drawn from established models and were presented to experts in the industry, both telecommunication operators and vendors. Models were modified based on experts’ feedback, and hypotheses were developed from the conceptual models, developed separately for the two perspectives. Data collection was done via questionnaires; 150 questionnaires were sent via email to identified telecommunication operators and 100 questionnaires were sent via email to identified telecommunication vendors, with follow-up emails and telephone calls to improve response rates.

This study’s findings show that employees in the telecommunication industry recognize the importance of B2B relationships. Employees of both telecommunication operators and vendors agree that stronger relationships are advantageous. The correlation and regression analysis results identify factors that affect the B2B relationship. The following factors impact the strength of B2B relationships irrespective of view point: trust, commitment and satisfaction. The following factors were found to significantly affect the strength of B2B relationships between telecommunication operators and vendors from the operator perspective: adaptation and communication.

To enhance relationship strength, the management of operator organizations should take action to improve trust, commitment and satisfaction. Demonstrating honesty and integrity when dealing with vendors and exhibiting concern for the other party’s interests can help establish trust or enhance trust in existing relationships. Displaying commitment toward the vendor will also facilitate stronger relationships. Reasonable profits for both parties and sizeable business volume will also help satisfy vendors, increasing relationship strength. Positive referencing of the vendor in industrial and public forums will improve vendor satisfaction, enhancing relationship strength. Reputational capital can be built and maintained for both operators and vendors by keeping promises and defending the other party to outsiders. For managers of telecommunications operators and vendors in other emerging markets, this study’s results are important and can inform internal business practices to support trust, commitment and satisfaction.

This study contributes to the existing literature in two ways, a focus on the telecommunication industry and a previously unexplored emerging market, Sri Lanka. In addition, this study includes an analysis of the relationship from both the operator and vendor perspectives.

A framework is presented for the analysis of policy issues which may occur after North‐South Korea reunification. Possible national objectives are first stated, and then policy measures are presented and discussed for the accomplishment of these objectives. Discussion of the framework will focus on regulatory subjects including entry regulation, price regulation, fair competition and relations with foreign firms.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the mediating effect of service quality (SQ) in the relationship between relational capital (RC) and organizational performance (OP) within the Egyptian mobile telecommunication setting.

A valid research instrument was utilized to conduct a survey of 384 top- middle- and supervisory- level managers from three Egyptian mobile telecommunications companies. The hypothesized direct relationships were tested through multiple linear regression, and the mediating effect was tested using a structural equation modeling technique.

The results revealed that the firm's “customer and supplier relations” and “marketing capability” positively affect both OP and SQ, “customer knowledge” positively affects SQ only, while “strategic alliances, licensing and agreements” do not have an association with SQ or OP. Moreover, SQ was found fully mediating the effect of RC on OP.

This is an empirical research applied in the Egyptian telecommunication setting. Its results need further investigation in other settings and countries. Also, traditional limitations of a cross-sectional study apply with respect to the attribution of causality and the time lag effects.

The optimal procedure for the Egyptian telecommunications companies is to focus their efforts on leveraging all four components of RC in order to improve SQ and consequently enhance their OP. The telecommunications companies must do all they can to connect the unconnected. As the current COVID-19 pandemic crisis has shown, connectivity is a public good.

This is the first research that merges the concepts of RC, SQ and OP in an integrated model, and tests this model empirically in the Egyptian mobile telecommunications setting.

The main research target of this paper is to capture the network effects using the case of mobile cellular telephony, identified in European telecommunication markets, and its determinants enhancing the process of digital technologies diffusion.

This research relies on panel and dynamic panel regression analysis. The empirical sample covers 30 European countries, and the period for the analysis is set for 2000–2019.

This work contributes by examining the network effects identified on European telecommunication markets that drive the process of digital technologies diffusion, but it also extends the understanding of the latter by tracing major determinants of fast network expansion, e.g. prices of access to and use of, per capita income, urbanisation, population density, accessibility of fixed telephony infrastructure. The main findings support the initial supposition that the installed base strongly enhances diffusion of new technologies, while other factors, for example, prices, are not of prime importance.

This research has certain managerial implications. The unveiled network effects driving adoption of technological innovations constitute a significant determinant of implementation of differentiation strategy by telecommunication companies. Due to network effects consumers' propensity to join the network is valued higher than the prices of services offered, which is crucial not only from the perspective of the company's pricing strategy but also enables telecommunication companies to introduce to the market new products and/or services concentrating on increasing its quality and usability rather than future prices.

This is the first work that empirically verifies the intercompanies and interpersonal diffusion of cellular telephony, hypothesising that this process relies on unique network effects.