Telcoinabox Managing Director Damian Kay offers TWNetwork a snapshot of his business.

Telcoinabox has been very successful. Why do you think this is and what makes you different?

We have seen great organic growth over the last few years.  The premise of the Telcoinabox (as an aggregator) model is ‘Just Add Customers’ which is about providing value-added services in addition to just minutes and megs. The services include:

• billing and rating to the end user
• provisioning
• reporting
• extensive training
• business development and coaching to the service provider
• payment processing
• end-user customer service
• bill print and mail.

This approach has allowed us to target people who were not or would never have become a service provider.  Forty per cent of our business comes from people who did not come from the telco industry and whose businesses now make up our franchised business channel. Due to our model, we also appeal to current service providers (our wholesale channel) that want to simplify their business and concentrate on growth while we deal with the heavy lifting in the background. 
Additionally I have never been driven by massive growth at all costs.  I have stayed away from acquisition as it is fraught with danger.  I prescribe to long-term sustainable growth. It may mean that we have grown more slowly than our main competitor but it is real growth and I believe we are stronger for it.

Where do you see Telcoinabox’s growth coming from over the next few years?

We have segmented our market and we have a clear growth plan. We see growth coming from the following key areas:

• development of our current customers through coaching and mentoring
• additional investment in sales people to grow the number of providers in our two key channels, franchise and wholesale
• investment in new products such as ADSL2+ and products that are synergistic with this product
• focus on growing mobile as a percentage of our business (approximately 20 per cent)
  development of a new channel which is commercial-in-confidence but is a natural progression for us.

What do you see as the emerging trends in the market?

It is all about the National Broadband Network. We are well placed to take advantage of this but we will need to reinvent ourselves to some degree.  We see mobile continuing to grow and we are investing heavily in systems and support this growth.  Mobile is our number one growth product and has been for a couple of years.  It currently delivers approximately 20 per cent of our revenues but over 35 per cent of our margin contribution in dollar terms. It is a higher margin product for us and over the past six months it has grown by more than 30 per cent (SIOs).

What characterises value for Telcoinabox when choosing a supplier?

Great account management, great support and a clear product roadmap.  We have seen woeful account management from other carriers and ultimately it is why we left them and partnered with Telstra.  We value the systems and exceptional account management provided by Telstra Wholesale. I’d like to see a more defined product road map showing a longer term view of product development. However, Wholesale has brought some great products to market such as ADSL2+.

What do you believe Telcoinabox will look like in ten years?

Putting aside industry trends such as the NBN, we will be in many more countries.  We are already in the UK and in NZ which are both doing well and I see that we will have expanded to Canada and selective European countries.  We have a licensed model that will not risk the home operation.  We will finally have competition so we will be stronger than we are today.  I get asked often if we will go public with Telcoinabox and at the moment the answer is no, but things can change and I have learned to never say no.

Facts about Telcoinabox

• began the business in March 2004
• group of companies includes Telcoinabox (Aust), Telcoinabox (UK), Telcoinabox (NZ), Utilibill and United TechTelcoinabox
• turnover is more than $40m
• expected growth in 2009/2010 is approximately $10m
• products include ADSL, ADSL2+, Fixed Wire, Mobile, Inbound, VoIP, VoDSL, Domain, Web and Mail hosting, Billing, customer service
• number of service providers is around 97
• key network suppliers (after migration to national aggregation solution) are Telstra Wholesale (85%), Optus (10%), AAPT (5%).