Telco offers pay-to-play service

Now that sufficient bandwidth is available, software applications will be rented over the Internet with greater frequency. And MT&T, a Halifax-based telecom provider is leading the way with a service called Mpowered PC.

Mpowered PC is an analog display services interface (ADSL) Internet service that gives subscribers the capacity to download software from the Internet. Users are then able to choose from a library of educational or businessrelated software titles and use them for a cost of around $0.50 an hour.

"You can pick an application and say 'I want to try this for two hours to see if I like it or don't like it,"' explained Monty Sharma, chief technology officer for Mpowered. "Or somebody sent me a file, I just want to convert it. I just had that problem with my boss. He sends stuff out in Visio. Who uses Visio?"

Users get a two-week trial, and Sharma used the example of an association that does bulk e-mailings once or twice a year.

"Why buy this $120 piece of software when you keep your data file, and you fire it up for two weeks for each of your events and you pay $40 to use it?"

Mpowered offers games, education programs, productivity software and design programs, including Corel Draw. Eventually, products like highend database development tools will also be available.

"Our intention is to export the service that we've built," said Sharma. MT&T has approached resellers and integrators across North America to develop the network needed to deliver Mpowered PC. Nova Scotia-based customers are able to buy directly from MT&T over the Web. But in further flung locations, integrators have to set up the service.

"So what we're able to do is build up this massive network of broadband islands that we're able to deliver these services across and integrate through," said Sharma.

The setup of the ADSL connection will cost $150, and users pay $45 a month for the Internet connection. Sharma noted that many customers would likely be switching over to ADSL anyway to take advantage of bandwidthintensive Internet applications.

Not many companies are doing that," said Terry Murphy, senior vicepresident of sales at eWarehouse, a Montreal-based electronic software distribution service provider. Murphy sees a market for a service like Mpowered in the future but he believes it will take time. He says industry estimates that indicate the rental application market will grow to US$400 million by 2000 are overly optimistic.

"It's not there right now, partly because publishers don't quite understand the market," said Murphy. "We've had some experience where we're talking to games companies and even though it seems to be a slam dunk for a game company - because you could easily get more money out of it than if you just sold the title once - there's a lot of convincing to do."

But Murphy is working with companies such as GT Interactive, who is piloting a trial, pay-while-you-play version of its gaming software.

Murphy estimates that around 20 percent of the software programs an organization buys are rarely used.

"Those are the ones you'd want to target," he advised.

Copyright Plesman Publications Ltd. Jul 1998
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