In addition to a stellar conference lineup, Mobile Asia Congress 2009 will focus upon providing excellent networking opportunities for its high level attendees. Included are:

 

Mobile Asia Congress 2009
Daily Discussion Groups

During the daily lunch breaks, 3 discussion groups will be facilitated to extend interactive debate around the conference session material.  Chaired by industry professionals, delegates will be given an opportunity to participate on a first come, first served basis from 13:15-14:00 in the 4th floor congress restaurant.

Wednesday 18th November 2009
Go- to- Market Models for Rich Communication Services

Rich communication is all about stickiness but how do you monetise this? What is the business case for RC services and what benefits will they bring for operators.

This discussion will cover:

• Go-to-market models for RC
• Ways to differentiate with RC
• Case studies of successful RC services
• The move from technology driven to customer-driven services

Making the Mobile Broadband Business Case work for Everyone

Mobile Broadband usage has exploded and shows no signs of slowing. But as the price point for Mobile Broadband gets squeezed and ARPU goes down, does the sustainability of the Mobile Broadband business case get called into question?  At the same time, 3rd party applications and content become increasingly bandwidth hungry, so how can the mobile community maintain a profitable service whilst still delivering against what the customer wants?

In this roundtable discussion, topics to be covered will include:

• Is a loaded network a good network, even if the traffic generates no incremental revenue?
• What is the right strategy to engage the application and content provider communities, and how do you maintain your margin if you have to share the revenue generated?
• Can vendors help increase margins by lowering cost per bit and/or cost of acquisition for future technologies?
• What is the value statement for LTE – higher bandwidths or greater customer capacity (or both)?

Mobile Money
 
Mobile money is gathering momentum – products such as Mobile Money Transfer, savings and credit are taking off in both banked and unbanked markets. We are also seeing developments in other areas such as Near Field Communications (NFC) which will form the basis of new services such as Pay-Buy-Mobile and mSignatures. With reference to real life examples, this group will address some of the key issues and learnings in deploying mobile money services and explore the mobile money landscape of the future.

Thursday 19th November 2009
M-Health

M-Health, from green screen SMS services to advanced embedded solutions, represents a unique opportunity for all enablers to develop highly innovative next generation healthcare services. Existing solutions merely give us an insight into future possibilities. What lessons have been learnt from these pioneering projects and what shape will future challenges take?

This lunchtime roundtable will invite debate around key topic areas such as:

• Spectrum allocation to medical professionals
• Optimising handset and PDA design, Operating Systems and Platforms
• Security requirements for the healthcare industry
• Legal and insurance ramifications of moving services onto a mobile platform
• Technical and IPR challenges of embedding mobile components into medical hardware

Green Power for Mobile

The GSMA Green Power for Mobile programme was launched in September 2008 to ‘Extend Mobile beyond the Grid’. Just over a year later we have witnessed a huge increase in activity in this sector as mobile operators seek solutions to provide mobile access to the 1.6 billion people who live without grid electricity.

Pulling from industry examples and experience, this discussion group session will explore:

• How mobile operators are deploying renewable energy technologies and energy efficient base stations to reduce diesel consumption 
• How the barriers to handset charging in off-grid regions can be addressed

Mobile Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is already changing the way Enterprises view IT services, and promises a similar paradigm shift for mobile users as data storage and processing requirements are moved out of the device and onto the cloud, allowing for more data intensive services to be consumed on the handset. Beyond the elevator pitch though, a number of serious concerns need to be addressed, most notably that Cloud based solutions can be self-healing, SLA driven and linearly scalable. In addition, there remain serious concerns surrounding the security of data stored on clouds. Join the debate in this lunchtime roundtable and share your thoughts on how these issues will be resolved, and where the future of cloud computing lies.

Networking Party and Awards Celebration

Held on 18 November at the prestigious Happy Valley Race Course of the Hong Kong Jockey Club, this will be the mobile networking event of the year Connect with new business contacts while viewing exciting horse races. In addition, get a glimpse of the best and brightest innovators in our industry as we announce the winners of the 2009 Asia Mobile Awards.

Transportation to and from the race course will be provided to Congress attendees. Buses will depart from the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre (Ground floor, Harbour Road Entrance) promptly at 17:30.

(Please note that due to capacity limitations at the Jockey Club, this is a first-come, first-served event. Tickets for the event will be distributed at the Registration Area in the 5th Floor of the Hong Kong Convention Center starting on Wednesday 18 November.)

Networking Breakfast

Take the opportunity to network with other attendees, delegates and exhibitors. Breakfast will be served from 08:00-09:00 in the delegate catering area on the Exhibition floor.

Wednesday 18 November: Gear up for the Mobile Broadband keynote session by beginning your day with the team from ZTE, this year's Mobile Broadband Theme Sponsor.

Thursday 19 November: Join the GSMA Mobile Money team and their partners to learn about this exciting initiative and how the industry is making Mobile Money a reality.

Networking Area

Enjoy a drink or snack with your next big client or partner in the Networking Area. Situated in the middle of the Exhibition Showcase, this area is sure to be the epicenter of business development activity.

Exhibition Showcase

See the cutting edge products and solutions that will help to define the Mobile Future. And then meet the industry leaders that deliver them. Learn more now.