Ya-Ching Lee
Telecommunications Policy 35 (2011)
電管一
R96001081
吳委政
OUTLINE
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Introduction
Literature review
Research questions
Method
Results
Discussion and conclusion
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1.Introduction

Rapid diffusion of new telecommunication technologies,
approximately 5.3 billion mobile cellular subscribers on a
global scale (940 million in 3G, 21million in VoIP)
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Contemporary telecommunications
 3G, VoIP (Skype, Line, Viber)
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Traditional telecommunications
 2G,Home landline
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1.Introduction
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Prior research tend to focus on the acceptance factor for
or customer satisfaction of telecommunications services.
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Most studies do not emphasize on competition within the
telecommunication service market as a whole.
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Prior studies provide no explanation as to why people
adopt new telecommunication services (3G and VoIP)
and discontinue (or continue) their use of old
telecommunication services
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1.Introduction

The competitiveness of the telecommunications market
raises some interesting questions, such as
1.
2.
3.
4.
can one type of telecommunications service satisfy the entire
needs of all customers?
do VoIP services pose a serious threat to the survival of
traditional telecommunication (home landline telephone) services,
as well as 2G and 3G services?
is the emergence of VoIP likely to make home landline telephone
systems obsolete?
do the traditional (home landline and 2G) and contemporary
telecommunication (3G and VoIP) services complement each
other, or is latter type of system likely to replace the former?
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1.Introduction
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This study uses a framework constructed around
gratification and niche theory to provide a better
understanding of the competitive attributes of advanced
telecommunication services
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The findings may ultimately further the forecast of the
adoption and use of new telecommunication services as
compared to the more traditional types of services
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2.Literature Review
2.1 Telecommunications competition and product differentiation
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Oligopolistic
 Fewer sellers compete with differentiation in product characteristics
and advertising
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Monopolistic
 Compete with only price
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Successful differentiation creates brand loyalty and establishes an
entry for new entrants (Porter,1985)
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2.Literature Review
2.2 Niche Theory
 Niche theory from ecology focus on the ecological
competition
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A niche is defined as the n-dimensional space which
describes the characteristics a species needs for survival.
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Niche theory predicts the existence, co-existence and
extirpation of species.
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2.Literature Review
2.2 Niche Theory
 Researchers use niche theory to investigate the competition
between new and old media(Dimmick et al.,2000)
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Competitive relationships can be forecasted in terms of
consumer satisfaction(Dimmick et al.,2004)
The approach of niche theory provides assessment to
examine the competitive relationships between traditional
and contemporary media,their differentiation strategies and
influence that the new types of media can have upon
traditional media(Dimmick et al.,2004)
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2.Literature Review
2.2 Niche Theory
Dimmick et al.(2000) develop several important indices of the
competitive relationships between the various types of media
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Niche breadth
 Refers to a diversity of consumer needs served by a medium
 Niche breadth broad – generalists
 Niche breadth narrow - specialists
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Niche overlap
 measures the intensity of pairwise competition between species by
describing a situation in which different media offer the same or similar
gratifications
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Niche superiority
 Niche superiority index provides an indication of which particular
medium is superior to all other media
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2.Literature Review
2.3 Uses and gratification
 The uses and gratification assumes that consumers actively
use and access media to fulfill their needs for sociability,
entertainment, information-seeking education, habit,utility and
fashion
Two dimension of gratification to analyse with the niche theory
 Personal dimension
 fashion, sociability, entertainment, information-seeking and utility
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System dimension
 economic factor, system quality, and mobility
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3.Research Question
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Based on the dimension of gratification and niche theory, this
study sets out to explore the following research questions:
RQ1: Is there a presence of displacement effects in telecommunication
market?
RQ2: What is the niche breadth of home landline telephone, 2G, 3G and
VoIP services?
RQ3: What is the extent of the niche overlap between the traditional
(home landline & 2G) and new types (3G & VoIP) of
telecommunication services within the dimension of gratification in
the provision of telecommunication services?
RQ4: What is the niche superiority for home landline telephone, 2G, 3G
and VoIP services?
RQ5: Are the new telecommunication services superior to traditional
telecommunication services?
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4.Method
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Eight gratification factors were developed from the extant literature
which indicating these motives are associated with new media usage
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The online survey yielded 363 usable responses
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4.Methodology
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4.Method
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Niche breadth Eq. (1) represents the diversity of
consumer needs served by each type of media
 Specialist - narrower spectrum of needs - narrower niche breadth
 Generalist - broader spectrum - broader niche breadth
B : niche breadth(0 to 1) K : total scales in the
n : the first subject
dimension
u : highest score
k : the first gratification
l : the lowest score
scale
GO : gratification score
N : total of subjects
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4.Method
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Niche overlap (Eq. (2)) measures the resource overlap
status between the various types of media
 larger number in the niche overlap formula indicates a lower level
of resource overlap
○ less keen , little influence over each other
 smaller number in the niche overlap formula indicates much
greater resource overlap
○ Keener, rely on similar resources
O : extent of niche overlap
i,j : the media
N : the subjects using media i and media j in
the same time
N : first subject.
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3.Method
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Niche superiority (Eqs. (3) and (4)) refers to the extent to
which one type of media has superiority over others ‘‘from
the forms of its resources
Higher value - gain more resources from other inferior
types of media - offer more gratification
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5.Result
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5.1 Validity and reliability
Using principal-axis factor analysis to verify validity
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The eigenvalues of all of the items also exceed 1.0
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The Cronbach alpha coefficients of the measurement
scales exhibit an acceptable threshold of 0.70
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5.Result
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5.Result
 5.2
Niche analysis
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RQ1 : displacement effect
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3G significantly use less home landline (M = 3.83, SD =
0.813, t = 4.89, p < 0.001) and 2G (M = 3.76, SD = 0.818,
t = 6.01, p < 0.001)
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VoIP usage, respondents significantly use less 3G (M =
3.03, SD = 0.841, t = 6.44, p < 0.001).
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5.Result
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RQ2 : determine the niche breadth of the four services.
2G and 3G have bigger numbers – generalist
VoIP and Home landline have smaller numbers specialist
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5.Result
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RQ3 : niche overlap between old and new services.
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A higher value demonstrates a lower degree of
overlap/similarity between the niches of the two types of
telecommunication services on the gratification dimension
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A lower value indicates a higher degree of
overlap/similarity.
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5.Result
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2G and 3G have a high degree of similarity on the
gratification dimension
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2G and Home landline have a lower degree of similarity
on the gratification dimension
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5.Result
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RQ4 : determine competitive superiority between new and
old services.
3G is superior to VoIP and Home landline
3G is superior to VoIP and Home landline
No significant differences between home landline and
VoIP or 2G and 3G.
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5.Result
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RQ5 : Are the new telecommunication services superior
to traditional telecommunication services?
Wireless services superior in
Fashion ,Sociability ,information-seeking, utility, mobility
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6.Discussion and conclusion

New telecommunication services (3G and VoIP) partially
replace old telecommunication services (home landline
and 2G) in providing greater satisfaction in entertainment
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New telecommunication services complement the
traditional services in many ways
 fashion, sociability, information-seeking, utility and mobility with
mobile services.
 Lower price and better system quality with home landline and VoIP
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6.Discussion and conclusion
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VoIP service providers need to create a sense of fashion,
expand mobile VoIP market to offer mobility to attract
potential customers, so that network externality effects
can be created.
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Quality problems and higher costs in 3G technology must
be solved to gain acceptance in Taiwan.
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Thanks for paying attention
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