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February 4, 2014 03:15 pm GMT
The Line messaging app that spent last year pushing beyond its home market of Japan has inked a deal aiming to bolster its presence in markets in Latin America. Today it’s announcing a partnership with telecoms giant Telefnica focused on building traction via exclusivity on the lower cost Firefox OS (FFOS) platform. The partnership givesTelefnicasubscribersexclusive access to the Line app across what is described as “keyTelefnica Firefox OS markets”,including Venezuela, Peru, Colombia, Uruguay, Brasil and Mexico. The deal also includes Spain. The pair said additional markets will be announced “shortly”. This could be a big win for Line — if FFOS takes off. Telefnicahas 320 million global subscribers using its network infrastructure, including a significant presence in the LatAm region where Line believes its cuddly cartoon messaging style, which features a range of cute sticker characters and games, can find a Hispanic home from home. An attempt by the company to crack the U.S. market, this time last year, has evidently proven harder, as Line appears to be reconfiguring its strategy around other regions where growth has been easier to come by, such as LatAm and Spain. Turning to the Mozilla flavoured portion of this partnership, the platform launched with much fanfare and a raft of operator supporters at last year’s Mobile World Congress. It’s since been filtering into various markets via carrier launches, with a focus on developing regions where the network operators see a gap to compete with Android at the lower end of smartphones. Since June, Telefnica has launched FFOS in seven countries, while other carriers such as Telenor, Deutsche Telekom and TIM have also started ranging phones running the HTML5-based platform. However it’s unclear exactly how many users there are of FFOS at this point as its carrier backers have not disclosed sales figures. It seems unlikely growth has been rampant or the carriers would have been shouting about it. Still, FFOS’s backers are evidently continuing to push the platform — and to seek ways to differentiate on it via the likes of today’s messaging partnership between Line and Telefnica. Telefnica is presumably hoping to drive interest in its FFOS devices by leveragingLine’s regional popularity, and the popularity of over-the-top mobile messaging in general. So, while the Line application is now available globally via the Firefox OS Marketplace its FFOS app will be exclusive to Telefnica subscribers in the aforementioned (mostly LatAm) markets. That may seem
Original Link: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/3BnyH-URTio/
Line Messaging App Inks Deal With Carrier Telefnica For Exclusivity In Key Firefox OS Markets
The Line messaging app that spent last year pushing beyond its home market of Japan has inked a deal aiming to bolster its presence in markets in Latin America. Today it’s announcing a partnership with telecoms giant Telefnica focused on building traction via exclusivity on the lower cost Firefox OS (FFOS) platform. The partnership givesTelefnicasubscribersexclusive access to the Line app across what is described as “keyTelefnica Firefox OS markets”,including Venezuela, Peru, Colombia, Uruguay, Brasil and Mexico. The deal also includes Spain. The pair said additional markets will be announced “shortly”. This could be a big win for Line — if FFOS takes off. Telefnicahas 320 million global subscribers using its network infrastructure, including a significant presence in the LatAm region where Line believes its cuddly cartoon messaging style, which features a range of cute sticker characters and games, can find a Hispanic home from home. An attempt by the company to crack the U.S. market, this time last year, has evidently proven harder, as Line appears to be reconfiguring its strategy around other regions where growth has been easier to come by, such as LatAm and Spain. Turning to the Mozilla flavoured portion of this partnership, the platform launched with much fanfare and a raft of operator supporters at last year’s Mobile World Congress. It’s since been filtering into various markets via carrier launches, with a focus on developing regions where the network operators see a gap to compete with Android at the lower end of smartphones. Since June, Telefnica has launched FFOS in seven countries, while other carriers such as Telenor, Deutsche Telekom and TIM have also started ranging phones running the HTML5-based platform. However it’s unclear exactly how many users there are of FFOS at this point as its carrier backers have not disclosed sales figures. It seems unlikely growth has been rampant or the carriers would have been shouting about it. Still, FFOS’s backers are evidently continuing to push the platform — and to seek ways to differentiate on it via the likes of today’s messaging partnership between Line and Telefnica. Telefnica is presumably hoping to drive interest in its FFOS devices by leveragingLine’s regional popularity, and the popularity of over-the-top mobile messaging in general. So, while the Line application is now available globally via the Firefox OS Marketplace its FFOS app will be exclusive to Telefnica subscribers in the aforementioned (mostly LatAm) markets. That may seemOriginal Link: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/3BnyH-URTio/
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