‘A2P’ (Application to Person) communication is currently undergoing the customary generational shift. The leading channel for ‘A2P’ communication ‘the old guard SMS’ is slowly gaining the legacy status. It (SMS) is still relevant and being used as a primary channel for ‘A2P’ communication but the challenge has started and the decline will accelerate in the coming years as it has happened in the ‘P2P’ (Person to Person) communication space. In the past few years we have seen OTT (Internet based – Over the Top) based messengers becoming very popular as an alternative to ‘SMS’, and also in the same period we have seen multi-fold increase in ‘P2P’ (Person to Person) communication. The underlying points could be the reasons why ‘SMS’ could be losing out to the more contemporary OTT based messengers

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INSTANT MESSAGING APPS FOR
‘A2P’COMMUNICATION
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8
Receive Push notifications
even when the Mobile
Application is not active
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‘A2P’ COMMUNICATION
‘A2P’ (Application to Person) communication
is currently undergoing the customary
generational shift. The leading channel for
‘A2P’ communication ‘the old guard SMS’ is
slowly gaining the legacy status. It (SMS) is
still relevant and being used as a primary
channel for ‘A2P’ communication but the
challenge has started and the decline will
accelerate in the coming years as it has
happened in the ‘P2P’(Person to Person)
communication space.
associated with a behavioural change. We
have seen this in the case of ‘P2P’ communi-
cation. People suddenly discovered they can
share images, videos and ‘Rich Text’ based
content apart from plain text with additional
ability to communicate to groups and
broadcast the same, this led to the
explosion of this space.
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Wide Range Adoption of OTT (Over the top) Adoption of Replacement Technology
What will be the behavioural change that
‘A2P’ communication is waiting for? Simply
sending the same message which is being
sent on the ‘SMS’ channel through another
channel (OTT) will not cut ice with users.
They need more than an alternate channel
story to switch and adopt a new option to
receive structured communiction. Here lies
the problem.
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The alternatives that have emerged out
there (based on OTT channel) have
addressed the issue from a one way commu-
nication point of view. That is enabling
communication from the application side
to the person (mobile device). Which takes
care of the current day requirement of
notifying people with transactional
reference information, event notifications,
etc.
This is only half the problem solved. Wide
range adoption of OTT (Over the top) channel
for A2P notification is on the anvil of
accelerating. But, there are always
challenges and teething problems when it
comes to wide range adoption of any new
technology, can these contemporary OTT
channels support bi-directional structured
communication? This would be a game
changer. The jury is still out there.
History has shown us that any wide range,
game changing, market defining adoption of
a replacement technology will have to be

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PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS
Should the contemporary ‘A2P’ channel support bi-directional messaging which can lead
to the user being able to avail services and customer support in a ubiquitous fashion?
Publishers could state that they are switching to the new contemporary (OTT) channel
based messengers.
Should the contemporary channel offer more security for messages in terms of password
protection, encryption on the communication channel?
Should the contemporary channel support ability to initiate and consume transactions?
Should the contemporary channel support messages with more intelligence built into
them like a ‘button’ which can initiate a response?
Should the contemporary channel support solicited communication which would lead to
elimination of unwanted unsolicited communication?
The answer is not too far away, we should see this shift from SMS to OTT channels for ‘A2P’
communication starting to take shape in the next few quarters.
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SOLUTIONSPROBLEMS
?
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OTT Messaging is winning over ‘SMS’
Problems of A2P Communication through SMS
SMS does not work if mobile
SMS is not very elegant when it
communication
High cost of SMS$
SMS is Limited to 140
characters per message
SMS does not have the features
like text chat, voice chat, video+
SMS does not support
Rich Text communication
A I
SMS does not support
Images and Videos
connectivity is not available
comes to broadcast or group
chat, etc
Today ‘SMS’ is the predominant channel when it comes to ‘A2P’ messaging. All of that is
going to change in the near future. A2P messaging is on the anvil of getting more OTT
(Internet Based-Over the top) based messaging options.
As more contemporary OTT messengers emerge in the market, ‘SMS’ is slowly being relega-
ted to legacy status. ‘SMS’ is losing significant ground when it comes to ‘P2P’ messaging.
But it is still clinging on the ‘A2P’ (Application to Person) messaging space.
In the past few years we have seen OTT (Internet based – Over the Top) based messengers
becoming very popular as an alternative to ‘SMS’, and also in the same period we have seen
multi-fold increase in ‘P2P’ (Person to Person) communication. The underlying points could be
the reasons why ‘SMS’ could be losing out to the more contemporary OTT based messengers.
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CAPABILITIES OF OTT MESSAGING
Our prediction is that the SMS as a
communication channel has served its
purpose and has reached its peak in
terms of patronage. Starting 2016 it
would start stagnating in term of
message growth and will slowly start
its long drawn decline.
‘A2P’ messaging at present is in the
transformational process/stage to
keep pace with changing life styles of
people, which could result in people
transacting securely and reliably
through messages. This behavioural
change will revolutionize the way ‘A2P’
messaging will be perceived and used
in the future.
A I
PAY
Rich Text content
Bi-directional structured
messaging capability
Ability to invoke transactions
through commands
Larger Message size
Ability to embed transactional
buttons in messages
Password protection
for Messages
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