However, what's really interesting now is the ways in which innovation is happening around the visibility of subscriber data and activity. This might have been an area for spooks a few years ago; now it's seen as a potential goldmine. We had briefings with a number of companies. In their own ways, each of these companies is helping service providers obtain visibility of activity on their networks, be it the actual application use and resource consumption, like GoS Networks, or subscriber browser activity, a kind of Google analytics for the mobile internet.

More on individual offers in future editions, but one thing is certain: mobile (and fixed) operators are increasingly paying attention to this area and, while the headlines have been stolen by a focus on the PCFR, visibility and control of mobile data is going to become not just important, but absolutely fundamental to the ways in which operators run and monetise their networks.