This article seems to have provoked quite a bit of controversy. I specifically told the reporter that this was triple play bundle of voice video and data. She did not report this. Many operators have 40% of two products, but this is not three products. In general, most consumers are not yet to buy this style of bundle. Many do buy Local LD or cable and BB for example. Also, my operators count these bundles differently. For example, you would count voice as 1 service, Verizon would count it as two if it was local and LD. Broadband is one for everyone, and cable TV is one or several depending on the services definitions. At any rate, the quote is a classic misinterpretation of the data. This frequently happens when the analyst provides the information, but not a written report for reference. In April, we will be publishing a report with numbers for 2 products and for 3 product bundles.

There is an issue with the quote in that it does not explicitly say triple play. However, the issue in my mind is still that consumers are not yet interested in acquiring all of their primary services from one provider ( voice video data) – which is what every provider is now trying to pitch. Also, they will buy some things bundled but only to get a discount. If we as an industry want bundling to be successful, we need to offer more value than a cheap sale. This is when triple play will take off. Also, I think we all need to have one industry definition of what we mean when we say bundling. Would you consider bundling local and LD? Would you consider it cable and broadband? Everyone I speak to has some fuzzy definition that is any two products. No one is yet reporting triple play. So to be clear. I don’t believe consumers want triple play/quad play…because we have given them no valid reason to want it.