Peter Curwen and Jason Whalley review the strategic operations of, and technological options available to, the 30 most prominent international mobile operators. This review is initially based upon the Asia-Pacific, African, European, Latin American and North American regions before moving on to take a worldwide perspective. The authors place these mobile operators within a wider business context via a broad ten-year appraisal of the companies involved in the entire telecommunications, media and technology (TMT) sector. The issue as to whether there truly is such a thing as a global mobile operator is addressed; the answer, in practice, is negative. Based upon the very latest data available, the underlying premise of the book is that mobile telecommunications is such a fast-moving sector that operators are obliged to alter their international strategies as circumstances unravel without necessarily having a long-term master plan, and hence that opportunism is a hallmark of operators' international strategies. This state-of-the-art overview of the internationalisation of mobile telecommunications will prove essential reading for academics and practitioners with a vested interest in technology, telecommunications and strategic management.
