I think you may be getting it wrong in thinking NOR is trying to build an Aussie customer base. It is not.
It is trying (and succeeding) in building a GLOBAL business.
NOR has already announced (in last announcement maybe?) that they are going to start giving different pricing, for different countries. This is what all global companies try to do, usually. Especially if it is low cost products. Some countries, that for reasons I do not understand, have high phone costs per phone call. I think it was Finch that addressed that in a fairly recent posting? If I remember correctly (and I may be wrong) he stated that Paul O had mentioned some high cost phone call countries like Ghana, were using World Phone for all their phonecalls - even those within their own country. Could be wrong on that but I certainly do remember a NOR announcement talking about different WP costs for different countries was a strategy they were working on.
There is also the currency differences - which is another whole different issue again. So, as one example, one British pound is worth two Aussie dollars (approximately) at today's exchange rates. The US Dollar is also worth more than the Aussie dollar. The iOS version of World Phone has been ranking high in both those countries.
The other way Paul O has talked about increasing the worth of World Phone (and App Annie has one of their Insight blogs on this ) is that an App which has caught on, then needs to make itself important to the consumer. Booking.com was a warm up exercise in that regard - and an important one.
The next one, as far as I know, will be Mobile Banking via Peppermint Innovation and Stripe partnership.
App Annie says this is one of THE trends for 2016. If you go to 'Finance ' instead of 'Travel ' on App Annie, you will see several mobile banking apps there already.....can't think of the name of any of them right now - but the point with Peppermint Innovation linkup, is that they are targeting the 'unbanked ' in the Philippines for starters, then other SE Asia economies. 'Unbanked 'means what it says i.e. the person cannot afford, or does not meet, the requirements for opening a retail banking account, so is denied a lot of opportunities. I sense you will be all for this opportunity that World Phone and Peppermint Innovation is about to deliver (don't ask how soon?, as I don't know) to the 'unbanked 'of the Philippines? You sound like you have a caring heart and mind (or soul, if you prefer).
This model will be truly disruptive - to the big retail Banks - in much the same way as Uber is disruptive to the traditional taxi business.
If you want to think of it in more traditional business model terms, it is exactly what retail shops do - both big supermarkets and small corner stores. There are certain items that sell all the time (bread, milk, eggs....those sorts of things), so the big supermarkets try to stock enough items, at bargain prices (the daily specials) to keep you coming through their doors - and not the rivals - so it becomes a habit to shop at a particular supermarket, most of the time. NOR is working on the same type of business model for World Phone.
It is like all smartphones these days. Originally, a phone was for making phone calls. Nowadays, we use it for much more than that...and now, the smartphone has become part of our daily lives.
Don't take this the wrong way....but I do believe you should have more faith in what this company is doing. This is a man (Paul O) and a great Management Team, who know exactly what they are doing, know how to reduce costs to the business, know how to reduce the costs of the product (World Phone) to the consumers in different countries with different cost structures .......and are now working on the 'add ons' to the App which will make customers want to use WP for more than just making the phone calls when overseas. They are targeting the customers within a country and trying to find ways to give the customers things they cannot always get from traditional sources.....and to be able to do that via World Phone's app (or maybe another app(s) linked to World Phone - we may know more on Thursday)?
Anyway, I have waffled on enough for one night and one posting. I am out of here for the night.
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