Business Process
From VillageTelco
Contents |
Initial Financing Requirement
The minimum financial commitment that is required by the villagetelco entrepreneur (VTE) (a.k.a. the potato farmer) is approximately $5000.00. This is required to build the initial gateway infrastructure, the primary wireless nodes and a starter pack of 40 mesh potato units.
An additional X mesh potatoes can be added to this setup at a cost of Y per MP in batches of ZZ (20?).
Mesh Potato owners could generate revenue from selling access to their phone, thereby increasing the attractiveness of purchasing a phone, and accelerating deployment.
Existing computers with wifi and wifi smartphones will also be able to connect to the network, providing an additional immediate user-base.
Product Offerings
Mesh Potato fixed home telephone
This is a fixed home telephone that will remain active on the mesh network and can receive any inbound calls even if no subscriptions have been paid.
Monthly subscription for free outbound and inbound local calling
There are 2 options available to ensure that there is paid for utilisation of network while providing free local calling. This may be needed to make sure that the cost of providing the network is recovered from the customers and that the network isn't only used for free local calling. This is optional though and the best implementation will likely be to have a minimal charge per minute for local calls.
1 - Each customers will be able to purchase a 30 day subscription for $5 which will give them free outbound calls to other customers within the local mesh network. It should be possible for the customer to pay for a long subscription period at a discount e.g. a 1 year subscription for $50.
2 - Each customer will be given a 30 day activation window for free outbound local calling when they purchase any airtime product. After the 30 window the customer will be required to buy another airtime product for an additional 30 days.
Airtime
Customers will also be able to buy airtime to make outbound calls to the PSTN/GSM networks and for calls on the local network. These will be provided in the form of different value vouchers which are used to recharge their account (e.g. $2,$5,$10,$20,$50). This airtime account will be decremented at various intervals during any charged for call that is made. Once the customers account reaches $0, the call will be terminated.
Some airtime revenue could be diverted to the phone owner.
Value added services
Apart from standard voice calling, the customer will have access to the following value added services:
- Voicemail
- Airtime query
- IVR for local services e.g. time, weather
- Directory services
- Emergency services
- Virtual phone access (i.e. login to another device)
- Public phones
- Personal phone management (i.e. locking the phone)
Marketing
The VTE will need to get a marketing pack of stickers and posters to brand the mesh potato devices and to advertise their services to people in the local area.
Customer Engagement
New customer setup
The VTE will sell the mesh potato units to the all new customers for a fee of $80. This could include an on-site installation in certain cases to check wifi availability. The mesh potato device will have a mechanism to indicate signal strength (either with LED's or tones from phone).
Each new mesh potato device will be connected to the VT gateway server which will then flash the device with the correct details to allow it to connect onto the network and allow the phone to connect to network and get dial tone. The VTE will create a customer entry on the gateway server system which will include name, address details and the assigned phone number and a pin number for airtime. The VTE will print out this information for the customer which will include their pin number. Ideally each new customer should be assigned a full enum number that is active and interconnected with the local PSTN/GSM networks.
The customers phone will remain active on the network and able to receive incoming calls unless its specifically deactivated by the VTE. The customer may also purchase a subscription and airtime voucher at the same time as getting their phone. This will follow the same process for selling additional vouchers detailed in the next section.
Selling additional subscriptions and airtime
Any customers who purchase a subscription of airtime voucher, will pay the money directly to the VTE. It is likely to be a cash transaction that will occur at the VTE's shop, however the VTE will also have the ability to print vouchers that can be activated by the customers over the phone through an IVR.
If the VTE in taking cash the directly from the customer, the airtime/subscription details can be added directly on the gateway server.
The VTE can also create and print vouchers from the gateway server. These vouchers will contain the details of the value and a numerical code. The customer who has purchased a voucher will call a specific number from any phone on the network which will route to an IVR. The IVR will prompt the customer for:
- Their phone number
- Their pin number
- The voucher code
The gateway server will then process the voucher and the code will no longer be active.
Vouchers will have an expiration date and the VTE will have the ability to cancel an unactivated voucher should they suspect fraud.
Stolen or damaged phones
The VTE will need to keep mesh potato spares to swap out damaged ones and to keep a stock holding for new customers. Should a phone be stolen, the VTE can deactivate the phone on the gateway system and it will not be able to connect into the network at all.
On going support
It is recommend that the VTE have a relationship with a vendor who will provide technical support and RMA for the gateway and mesh potato equipment.
