作者：Ahmad Al-Assad，Maktoob Research

有一次，我妻子在我们一起购物时说，如果我们买了这张沙发，我绝不会再要求任何东西。这张沙发丑陋又昂贵，但我却从字面上理解了她的话，并被她的承诺所诱惑：不再要求任何其他东西！好吧，我应该对此做更多的分析。后来我发现，我妻子的意思是，除非她喜欢其他东西，否则她绝不会再要求任何东西！

One of the most important questions in competitive mobile markets if you can keep your mobile number when changing between mobile operators, would you be willing to change. In most surveys, a two-digit percentage of respondents always say yes.

由于这种巨大的潜力和竞争促进，一种称为“移动号码可携性”（MNP）的技术应运而生。MNP 使移动用户在从一个移动网络运营商转到另一个移动网络运营商时能够保留自己的移动号码。

Telecom professionals thought that introducing such technology would change the market shares of operators in any Arab country. In mid 2006, Saudi Arabia was the first Arab country to introduce MNP, followed shortly by Oman. UAE, Jordan and other Arab countries are close to doing the same.

So, did MNP change the market shares in the Saudi Arabian mobile marker? No, it t! After six months of launching MNP to the public for free, less than 15,000 mobile users used it (out of around 20 million mobile lines in Saudi Arabia!). So what were the reasons behind the poor adoption MNP by subscribers? And does this mean that MNP was a failure in Saudi Arabia?

On the contrary, MNP was a success in Saudi Arabia, as it achieved its main objectives: Boost competition between mobile players and enhance quality of services provided in the market. As a reaction for introducing MNP, the Saudi Mobile operators were alarmed. The mobile operators have launched extensive campaigns promoting new services, new offers, reduced rates, as well as enhancing their network quality and coverage. Hence, the reasons behind willingness to change operators vanished. Another minor reason for poor embracement of MNP was the sluggishness of mobile users of going through the process of MNP which takes up to 5 days in some cases.

MNP can be considered a preemptive procedure for fighting monopolistic competition in mobile markets. The telecommunications s main goal of introducing such service is to push operators (and mainly the dominant ones) to compete on the bases of better services, rates and quality, thus boost competition in a healthy way. The regulator t want any operator to depend on the fact that subscribers would not change their operator just because their mobile number is very precious to them.

总结一下：如果在某个市场推出 MNP，移动运营商要么真正满足他们的需求，要么面临失去他们的风险。

贡献公司：
Maktoob 研究。阿联酋迪拜。www.maktoob-research.com/
联系人：Ahmad Al-Assad，区域研究经理。 [email protected].
电话：+971 4 360 279