[Ben]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7341391.stm

The BBC has a nice video (above) of an interview with Arun Sarin. Now, I think many of us are Sarin fans here, and even for those who aren't it's always interesting to see some braincells at work atop such a vast company as Vodafone.

Enjoy!

[Hands0n]

I finally got to sit down and watch the presentation (9.5 minutes) which was a very interesting "read". This is the first time that I have seen Sarin in action, although I have read some of what the Vodafone CEO has had to say in the past. For sure, under his stewardship Vodafone have done quite well for themselves.

A few points came out of the video that were interesting to me.

Indian market penetration is 5%, UK is 105% - we are now completely oversubscribed.
Indian calls are 1/5th the cost of Europe yet healthy margins are made - Vodafone want to learn from this. Good news for Europeans? Maybe.
Vodafone is a Mobile, Internet and soon to be a Financial Services company - In Kenya they are "Banking the unbanked" - more to be done in the emerging countries


I think that Vodafone is changing visibly in 2008. Who, this time last year or even during the final quarter of 2007, would have thought that the company would be selling £15/3GB data packs - after all, the original price was an unaffordable £30/15GB initially. Who would see Vodafone offering BOGOF deals like this (https://talk3g.co.uk/showthread.php?p=26992#post26992) one recently spotted by an eagle eyed Talk3G poster ;) These are the behaviors we have come to expect of our fifth mobile network company, 3. But clearly Vodafone think it is going to sell - and all reports are that their "Mobile Broadband" is selling very well indeed, above even their expectations.

And so we will see Vodafone through 2008 pulling some more surprises, I would think. Clearly, from the video interview with Arun, they are only getting started.