A Study On Pricing And Settlement In Mobile International Roaming Market

Scope of this thesis focuses pricing and settlement in mobile international roaming market. Regular pattern and characteristics on international roaming services are explored and analyzed.The whole international roaming market is split into two parts:retail and wholesale market. Pricing is the way that home operator provides roaming price for mobile users. Settlement refers the way that home operator negotiates inter-operators tariff with roaming partners. For home operator, settlement price is the cost of roaming price.This dissertation explicates roaming services' characteristics and classifies mobile international roaming market into different types based on market structure or cooperation ways. The first part of this paper mainly analyzes and extracts important influence factors of pricing in retail market and settlement in wholesale market. The latter part of this paper gives in-depth study on patterns of pricing, patterns of settlement, profits of mobile operators and market stabilities.Chapterâ… , introduction, proposes research background and analytical framework, shows basic idea of international roaming service and market.Chapterâ…¡analyses ways of international roaming pricing and settlement, discusses current research literature, gives analysis on competition environment with six-power-analysis model and proposes research model for pricing and settlement.Chapterâ…¢make in-depth study on pricing on retail market. Corresponding research work is done based on the influence of switching cost. Model analysis, data simulation and actual data verification are given.Chapter IV focuses on settlement on wholesale market. Research on patterns of settlement is based on three cooperation ways:way of direct cooperation, way of agency based cooperation and way of roaming alliance.Chapter V gives strategy framework and proposals for operating international service. Finally Chapter VI is the summary and further research proposal.(1) Based on model analysis and emulation, this paper unveils the principle of mobile international roaming pricing. Main factors such as switching-cost, market share of home operator are analysed.(2) This paper makes in-depth study on direct cooperation between home and visiting operators. Best settlement price is calculated and requirements for market equilibrium are obtained on the condition of different cooperation ways.(3) Propose a model for discount return mechanism in reality, make analysis and find requirements for increasement of operators'roaming profit.(4) Make analysis and emulation on the way of agency based cooperation; prove the existence of market equilibrium and calculate the best reward parameters on condition of asymmetric information.(5) Present decision-making factors and proposals for cooperation of roaming alliance. Best settlement price within roaming alliance is derived from market analysis and emulation. Influence factors on best settlement price are pointed out.