Citrix De-invests ByteMobile; Blaming Encryption

Citrix acquired Bytemobile in July 2012 (here) for $435M (see "Citrix Expects $15M Bytemobile Revenues in 4Q12" - here) the then leading vendor of video optimization for mobile networks.

Expectation did not met, and during this year Citrix made several announcements about "Exploring Alternatives" for the product line (see "Citrix: Bytemobile Business Declined by 50%" - here). 

So the final decision has been made. Closing. 

Patrick Lopez, Founder and CEO,{Core Analysis} reports that "Citrix has decided to "de-invest" in the ByteMobile product line that was initially reported for sale. Citrix provided this week an update in an investor's call, on the results of its strategic review that was announced in September.

Executives commented:

"The underlying premises for the acquisition of ByteMobile have now vanished.We acquired the company for its ability to optimize video traffic,but today a significant amount of the video traffic is encrypted and can no longer be optimized. [...] We will transition some of the capabilities in the NetScaler product but for the most part phasing that product line out."The company mentioned that ByteMobile revenue for 2015 were expected around $50m and breaking even. XenServer will also be discontinued (unsurprisingly looking at VMWare and KVM's relative success)". 

Related post from September 2014: "Flash Networks (40%) and Citrix (30%) Lead the Mobile Optimization Market" - here. 

See "Citrix shuts down ByteMobile" - here.

Citrix: Bytemobile Business Declined by 50%; "Exploring Alternatives"

 
Along the problems we saw in the past with the optimization market (see related links below), came the next statement from David J. Henshall [pictured], COO & CFO, Citrix during the company's 2015 Q2 earning call:

".. our delivery networking, total revenue decreased 3.5% in the quarter to $173 million. The decline is driven by two factors. First, license contribution from our ByteMobile business declined by about 50% from last year. As we indicated in our release ["The company also announced that earlier this year it engaged a financial advisor to provide strategic advice related to a potential sale of its ByteMobile business. Citrix is currently in active discussions with third parties regarding a potential sale - here], 

.. we've been in the process of exploring alternatives for this business over the past several months, and as you'd imagine, this process has been significantly disruptive to the team and ultimately the results". 

Related posts:

• [Jan '14] Citrix: Traction in Bytemobile Business; Need to Wait for Revenue Recognition - here
• [Oct '13] Citrix: "Bytemobile deals are large and infrequent" - here
• Flash Networks (40%) and Citrix (30%) Lead the Mobile Optimization Market - here

See "Citrix Systems (CTXS) Mark B. Templeton on Q2 2015 Results - Earnings Call Transcript", by SeekingAlpha, here.

[ABI] Encryption Drives Mobile Optimization to a $40B Over 5 Year Market

While many think that the legacy DPI, optimization and traffic management functions lose their role in network management due to customers' demand for QoE, OTT services and growing video traffic, ABI research thinks differently - and the reason is the use of encrypted traffic.

A new report by Joe Hoffman [pictured], Practice Director, Mobile Networks, ABI Research sees the "worldwide market for mobile network monitoring and optimization exceeding US$40 billion over the next 5 years... LTE uptake in China leads worldwide traffic growth, including video, and pulls along the monitoring and optimization markets. 

Widespread adoption of SSL-encryption changes the game from compression, transcoding and transrating to throttling, pacing and manipulating the Adaptive Bitrate Stream from the content provider to achieve operator goals. State-of-the-art traffic management technology delivers a better customer experience and virtual capacity gains that operators will appreciate.

Mobile optimization is more important than ever and the advent of all IP services, including VoLTE, VoWi-Fi, LTE-U / LAA requires close attention from the operator to assure QoE. With an eye to monetization, DPI, Optimization and Policy remain the largest segments and come together as part of a total revenue enhancement solution. 

All leading network infrastructure vendors, including Ericsson, Nokia Networks and Alcatel-Lucent, offer their own or partnered solutions.Likewise, the independents, such as Citrix ByteMobile and Openwave Mobility, provide differentiated, targeted and ready-to-use solutions for every mobile broadband operator"

See "LTE Adoption to Drive Network Monitoring and Optimization Spend Past US$40 Billion" - here.

Citrix Virtual WAN Reduces WAN Costs by 80%

Citrix announced the "CloudBridge™ Virtual WAN Edition, which reduces the cost of delivering applications, documents and IT services to branch offices by up to 80 percent, while ensuring nearly 100 percent application availability. The new CloudBridge Virtual WAN solution provides businesses with the flexibility to employ multiple cost-effective WAN technologies, offering the ability to scale WAN bandwidth at dramatically lower cost than traditional approaches".

"The solution also ensures the best possible user experience by securely sending mission-critical, delay-sensitive data over the highest performing path. The new CloudBridge Virtual WAN solution extends the CloudBridge platform and its integration with the company’s HDX and application acceleration technologies, to offer the most cost effective and highest performance solutions for securely delivering mobile workspaces with the applications, documents and IT services people need to work better in remote and branch offices". 

".. the new CloudBridge Virtual WAN solution allows enterprises to create a virtualized WAN by bonding multiple network services such as MPLS, broadband, mobile and satellite internet together to maximize WAN capacity and reliability. CloudBridge Virtual WAN constantly assesses the performance of paths within the virtualized WAN to instantaneously and automatically adapt to changing network conditions. This ensures constant connectivity of mission-critical applications without human intervention or complex routing table reconfigurations: 

See "Citrix Powers “Always-On” Branch Workspaces" - here.

[ABI]: Citrix, Openwave and Ericsson Lead the $400M Optimization Space

ABI Research announced it has evaluated the "..leading vendors for Video, Audio, Web and Data Optimization the Gi-LAN space, and finds Citrix ByteMobile with the most compelling total value proposition, followed by Openwave Mobility and Ericsson. ABI Research finds web and video optimization performance as mainly determined by the x86 architecture, and the vendors differentiate along the lines of packaging and the depth of value adding features such as monetization, big data analytics and traffic management bundles.

The leaders in each category include:

• Overall: Citrix ByteMobile, Openwave Mobility, Ericsson:
   
• The Citrix ByteMobile ATM takes top honors with its long standing market reach and total value proposition of its web and video optimization, content caching, and added value in DPI, traffic policy enforcement
   
• Openwave Mobility takes second honors and keeps up the pressure with an innovation clean sweep in depth and breadth, analytics, subscriber and monetization innovation focus
   
• Ericsson takes a not-surprising third award with the rich value proposition of its Multi-Service Proxy and Service Enablement Platform
   
• Implementation: Citrix ByteMobile, Ericsson, Flash Networks
• Innovation: Openwave Mobiity, Citrix ByteMobile, Ericsson
  

Joe Hoffman [pictured], Practice Director, ABI Research said: “Nobody buys just video optimization, and now that the fundamental technologies are commoditized table stakes, we enrich the evaluation to consider the total value proposition including analytics and monetization, When an operator buys into one of these solutions, it is economically efficient to consider the big picture bundle.” 

"This research covers the leading vendors that offer video, audio, web and data optimizations solutions, including Allot, Avvasi, Flash Networks, Huawei, NEC, Nokia Networks, Opera Software, and Vantrix, and accounts for a large part of the US$400M in 2014 revenues in this market space".

See "ABI Research Ranks Citrix, Openwave Mobility, and Ericsson with Top Honors in the 2015 Mobile Web and Video Optimization Competitive Assessment" - here.

Optimization Deployments [338]: WIND [Greece] Uses Citrix Bytemobile

Citrix announced that "WIND Hellas, a leading telecommunications operator in Greece (4.5M subscribers), has successfully deployed its ByteMobile Adaptive Traffic Management platform as well as its carrier-grade NetScaler application delivery controller (ADC) within the mobile core of the WIND Hellas network. The deployment enables WIND to increase the uptake of mobile data services while improving the average subscriber’s mobile data experience, notably by reducing the incidence of video stalling.

To deliver its solutions to WIND, Citrix partnered with mSensis, a European system and software provider"

See "Greece’s Leading Telecommunications Operator WIND Hellas Enhances Subscribers Mobile Video Experience with Citrix ByteMobile Adaptive Traffic Management Platform" - here.

[ABI]: Sandvine, Allot and Citrix Lead the Independent $600M DPI Market

A new report by Joe Hoffman [pictured], Practice Director, ABI Research evaluates the "independent vendors delivering Deep Packet Inspection, Traffic Steering, and Policy Control in the Gi-LAN space, and finds Sandvine as best of breed, followed by Allot and Citrix ByteMobile

... This research covers the leading independent vendors, Allot, Citrix ByteMobile, F5 Networks, Ipoque, Sandvine, and Procera Networks that account for nearly US$600M in revenues in this market space.

With the DPI commoditized, the independent vendors work hard to present differentiated value propositions to the telecom market:

• Sandvine takes top rating because of its industry leading power-performance efficiency [see "Sandvine Adds a 200Gbps/2RU Appliance w/100GE Interfaces" - here], focus on compact form-factor suitable for distributed or centralized networks, and a very rich analytics and monetization emphasis.
   
• Allot takes second place with virtually the same power-performance [see "Allot Launched the New Service Gateway; Orders from 4 Operators (over $9M)" - here] but in a NEBS compliant ATCA platform.

Allot's ServiceGateway Tera

Sandvine's PTS 32000

• The Citrix ByteMobile ATM places third with the added richness of its total package solution, and also with NEBS compliance.

See "Sandvine, Allot, and Citrix Top ABI Research’s DPI and Traffic Management Competitive Assessment" - here.

Citrix: LTE Video Data is 5X Compared to 3G

A new report by Citrix (Bytemobile) finds that:

• Mobile network traffic volume associated with video has increased worldwide over 2013 and now represents 52% of worldwide mobile network traffic volume, as compared to 45% in Q2 2013 

• On a daily basis, social networking is the most popular mobile application, with 40% of mobile subscribers engaged, followed closely by news & information at 37% and shopping at 30%

• There are 1.5x more requests for video over LTE than over 3G. These result in 5X more video data volume served over the LTE network than the 3G network due to longer viewing times and higher resolution content 

See "Citrix Data Shows New Trends in Mobile Subscriber Data Usage" - here.

Sprint's Reasonable Network Management Practices - Fairness, Limit top 5%, Video Optimization

Tammy Parker reports to FierceWireless that "Sprint's pledge of unlimited data [see "Will New Competition Drive AT&T to Bring Back Unlimited Data?" - here and "Sprint CEO: 'we have no plans go to tiered data pricing'" - here] is looking increasingly less sustainable, as the carrier maneuvers to rein in network traffic generated by its heaviest data users and ensure quality of service for the majority of its customers. Postpaid as well as prepaid Sprint customers, including those on its Virgin Mobile USA and Boost Mobile sub-brands, have begun receiving notices alerting them to new data "prioritization management" the operator will employ as of next month to prevent network congestion .. Prioritization can include a reduction of throughput or speed for those targeted users connected to congested sites".

Sprint's "Open Internet Information" page (here) says that 

• Sprint uses various tools and techniques to manage its network .. Sprint's network management activities may include identifying spam and preventing its delivery to customers, detecting malicious Internet traffic and preventing the distribution of viruses or other harmful code or content, allocating spectrum and network resources amongst customers, devices, and price plans, and using other tools and techniques to deliver the best possible broadband Internet experience of Sprint's customers
   
• Network bandwidth isn't infinite. In times of network congestion, the network segment or sector impacted doesn't have enough bandwidth to fully serve all customers requesting it. The network is designed to dynamically allocate available bandwidth in a way that is fair to all users. The fairness algorithms below describe the approach. The resulting impact to the end-user experience is that the user may temporarily experience slower-than-normal data speeds until the congestion has passed.
   
• On the Sprint 3G (CDMA) and 4G LTE networks, Sprint uses a proportional fairness scheduler algorithm that allocates network resources based on radio frequency signal quality and other metrics. During times of congestion, the proportional fairness scheduler algorithm ensures no one user is deprived of network resources.
   
• On Sprint's 4G WIMAX network, Sprint may periodically measure a user's bandwidth usage on a specific network segment or sector, as compared to the overall bandwidth usage for all users on that segment or sector. At times when an individual user is consuming high amounts of bandwidth and at the same time the overall bandwidth is being used by all users on that network segment or sector at high levels, Sprint 4G customers may experience a temporary adjustment in available network resources until the conditions for network congestion have passed.

• Sprint currently employs prioritization to improve data experience for the vast majority of users on Sprint’s CDMA and LTE networks. The heaviest data users consume a disproportionate share of network resources and cause a negative user experience for the rest. To more fairly allocate network resources in times of congestion, customers falling within the top 5% of data users may be prioritized below other customers attempting to access network resources, resulting in a reduction of throughput or speed as compared to performance on non-congested sites .. in addition to the heavy user treatment outlined above, Sprint also reserves the right to alter the priority of other customers on specific devices or plans on the Sprint network. Customers on devices or plans subject to prioritization management may experience a reduction in throughput or speed
   
• Optimization is deployed for RTSP and HTTP video traffic and all HTTP web traffic [by Citrix/Bytemobile - here]. Video optimization uses four basic technologies [see "Sprint Migrates from a "Basket of Tools" to Consolidated Video Optimization Solutions" - here]:
    
• Video Delivery Synchronization: Delivers video "just in time" to the mobile device. Intent is to eliminate network waste associated with transmitting video that isn't watched.
   
• Quality Aware Transcoding: Matches video quality with network conditions in real time. Optimizes video for the bandwidth available to the user. Intent is to minimize or eliminate annoying video stalling. Similar in concept to the optimization techniques already employed by sites using adaptive streaming.
   
• Video Transcoding: Transcodes video with intent to optimize the video experience for the user while efficiently using network bandwidth. Provides for the elimination of video waste using techniques like replacing less efficient video codecs with more efficient ones. Optimizes video for the mobile device the customer is using.
   
• Intelligent Caching: Caches optimized video in the network with the intent of eliminating delay associated with internet video sites.
   
• Web optimization uses three basic technologies:
• Caching: Caches web pages to help avoid delays associated with retrieval of the same internet content multiple times.
   
• Text/Binary Compression: Lossless compression of data and binary files using standard compression techniques supported by HTTP-compliant browsers.
   
• Image Compression: JPEG and GIF compression designed to reduce the size of images while maintaining no user perceptible loss of quality.

See "Sprint slams on the brakes for top 5% of data users in congested areas" - here.

Citrix: Smartphone Users Want Sponsored Data; Blame MNOs for Video Stalling

As we say here -"if it is free, give me two". So it is true also for "Sponsored Data", according to a recent survey by Citrix.

"The survey of adult smartphone and tablet owners, conducted by Wakefield Research found that a majority of subscribers say they exceed their mobile data quota (and watching Video is not the prime reason!) – even more fear exceeding it"
 

• 82 percent fear the data usage impact of mobile apps on their monthly data limit and have avoided using an app because of that fear. Subscribers using iPhones are more concerned about data overages than Android smartphone subscribers (66 percent versus 48 percent)
  
  
• 67 percent of those who watch at least one mobile video per month say they have exceeded their monthly data limit. This drops to 36 percent for those who watch less than one mobile video per month
    
• 71 percent of men and 62 percent of women would engage more if sponsored data plans were available.
  

See "Citrix: Mobile Data Users Fear Exceeding Their Quota, Open to Sponsored Data Plans" - here.

Flash Networks (40%) and Citrix (30%) Lead the Mobile Optimization Market

Flash Networks announced it has "..achieved the highest market share among network optimization providers, moving up to 40% based on research conducted by {Core Analysis}. Flash Networks has achieved market leadership following its acquisition of Mobixell [see "No Longer a Rumor: Flash Networks Acquires Mobixell" - here], previously the number two video optimization vendor. According to the research report, the combined company has grown faster than the market, showing both market dominance and strong growth.

Breakdown as follows:

1. Flash Networks (40%) 
2. Citrix [Bytemobile] (30%)   [see "Citrix: Traction in Bytemobile Business; Need to Wait for Revenue Recognition" - here]
3. Venturi Wireless (8%) 
4. Openwave mobility (8%) 
5. Allot, Avvasi, NSN, Opera, Vantrix (in alphabetical order) (14%)

The market share calculations are based on number of individual deployments from a proprietary {Core Analysis} database, collecting data such as vendors, resellers, value of the deployment in term of total cost of ownership for the operator, operator name, country, and region. This data is cross-referenced from vendors' and operators' individual disclosures".

See "Flash Networks named number one mobile optimization vendor with 40% market share" - here. 

[ABI]: Big Data Analytics Moves from IT to Telecom Vendors

 
A new report by Sabir Rafiq [pictured], Research analyst, ABI Research finds that "Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) collect large amounts of data from their network, but the use of the data collected is what really counts .. MNOs and Communication Service Providers (CSPs) are actively looking into Big Data and Analytical solutions. They need tools that can impact their businesses and find new ways to reduce costs, improve efficiency of the networks, increase and generate new revenue streams, and increase QoE.”

Big Data Analytics are no longer the exclusive province of IT Software, as leading telecom vendors such as Astellia [see deployments with Eastlink, Bouygues, Zain, Orange, 3], Ericsson, Nokia Solutions and Networks, and Huawei have stepped up. Software vendors, including Citrix [see "Citrix Adds Zettics' Big Data Analytics to ByteMobile" - here] and Guavus [see "Guavus: Characterization of OTT Traffic without DPI" - here], offer big data and analytical solutions to help telecoms collect and analyze data effectively”

See "Telco Big Data Analytics is the New Frontier as Mobile Traffic Hits 200 Exabytes in 2019" - here.

Product Announcements: Sandvine, Tilera/Procera, Openwave Mobility, Citrix/Bytemobile, Aricent, Ulticom, Elitecore

MWC announcements, 2nd round:

• Sandvine Usage Management Brings New Mobile Billing Innovations (here): "Sandvine announced the launch of Usage Management release 5.0, which offers new capabilities to help both fixed and mobile communications service providers (CSPs) create, manage and implement new service plan offerings .. SmartRoam .. Pay-Per-Click Billing .. ServiceDesigner"

• Tilera Chooses Procera Networks’ NAVL Engine for SDN and NFV Architectures (here): "Procera Networks and Tilera announced the availability of DPI-on-a-NIC for high performance deep packet intelligence. .. This integrated solution for SDN and NFV environments combines Procera’s Network Application Visibility Library (NAVL) software development kit with Tilera’s TILEncore-Gx™ Intelligent Application Adapters and ART software framework on a Network Interface Card (NIC)." 

• Openwave Mobility Launches Industry’s First NFV-ready Audio, HD and Media Optimization Solution (here): "Openwave Mobility announced General Availability of DynaMO, the latest incarnation of its congestion control software ..The solution can also be deployed in a virtualized environment with dynamic scaling that is fully aligned with the industry initiative for Network Function Virtualization (NFV) .. DynaMO uses a combination of contextually-selective and congestion-aware optimization techniques. It provides the highest quality of video experience by intelligently adapting video optimization to fit the original video with each user’s device. DynaMO monitors individual users’ data sessions, optimizing video only when networks are congested and to the extent where smooth playback can be achieved".

• Citrix Powers Data Monetization for Mobile Operators (here): "Citrix announced ByteMobile Insight, a big data analytics solution designed to provide immediate, actionable intelligence for mobile operator monetization, marketing and customer care organizations ..  ByteMobile Insight is a purpose-built solution encompassing data acquisition, processing and business intelligence. It collects and enriches usage, location and customer relationship management (CRM) data from a wide variety of sources, including ByteMobile platforms deployed in the mobile core network. Actionable intelligence is delivered to any operator organization via a sophisticated, interactive user interface as ready-to-use reports or via API or file extracts".

• Aricent Launches Multi-Technology Universal SON – A Self-Optimizing Network Solution That can Automatically Optimize 2G, 3G, and 4G Networks Simultaneously (here): "Aricent launched an advanced self-optimizing network solution called Universal SON (Uni-SON). It automates optimization of multi-technology and multi-layered radio access networks thereby reducing operational expenditure (OPEX) and improving user experience significantly .. The biggest advantage of Uni-SON is that a single solution can help automate the optimization of 2G, 3G and LTE networks simultaneously. Its centralized architecture helps to capture a global view of the network, with decision variables spanning across different technologies and network layers".

• Ulticom Upgrades Successfully Deployed DSC Product (here): "Ulticom announces the availability of Release 4.1 of their Diameter Signaling Controller (DSC).. Release 4.1 brings enhanced congestion avoidance, and simplified integration with operational management systems. Feature enhancements in Release 4.1 include: Enhanced SLF-based routing (SLF=Subscriber Location Function), Simplified operational management of connections, Congestion Avoidance via intelligent, prioritized traffic redirection based upon message content, Enhanced operational capability to allow improved network monitoring and flexible formatting to ease integration with back-end network management systems".

• Elitecore introduces Passpoint-enabled Hotspot 2.0 and ANDSF support in its Wi-Fi Service Management Platform (here): "Elitecore Technologies announces that its SMP is ready to support PasspointTM certified Hotspot 2.0, an approach introduced by Wi-Fi Alliance for public access Wi-Fi to provide secure Wi-Fi access (Access Network Delivery Selection Function) from a list of Wi-Fi networks available for the client devices. Hotspot 2.0 complies with industry standards, which provides better bandwidth and seamless experience to alleviate mobile carrier traffic overheads. It will allow devices to discover and automatically select and connect to Wi-Fi networks based upon user preferences and network optimization. No user intervention will be required, all the user has to do is turn on the device and get automatic secure Wi-Fi connectivity.

Citrix: Traction in Bytemobile Business; Need to Wait for Revenue Recognition

 
Quotes from Citrix' Q4 2013 earning call regarding the Bytemobile business, by David James Henshall [pictured] - Acting CEO, CFO, EVP Operations, Principal Accounting Officer and Treasurer:

• "In our ByteMobile business showed good traction in Q4, signing multiyear contracts with large telcos in Japan, Pacific and EMEA. Although revenue for these contracts is going to be recognized over extended periods of time, we still beat our revenue goal for the year [see also "Bytemobile deals are large and infrequent" - here]
   
• Yes, the primary offset was around ByteMobile. Q4 a year ago, we had one really large transaction that it was actually be -- we're able to recognize it all in that order [see "Citrix Outlook for Bytemobile Business ($15M/Q4)" - here].
  
  This quarter, we had strong bookings, but very little of that was recognized in the period. They were all -- well, not all, but the vast majority were multiyear transactions that will come in over the next 1 to 3 years. So that's the primary delta. If you look at that business as a standalone, the recognized license revenue would have been down 50% or so due to these rev recs that we talked about".

See "Citrix Systems Management Discusses Q4 2013 Results - Earnings Call Transcript", by SeekingAlpha, here.

Citrix Adds Zettics' Big Data Analytics to ByteMobile

Citrix announced the ".. establishment of a strategic partnership with Zettics .. leverage Zettics’ best-in-class analytics capabilities to enhance the ByteMobile portfolio of traffic management and analytics solutions for mobile network operators. The agreement is expected to result in new product offerings during the first half of 2014 .. will improve operators’ ability to capture and analyze all of the data usage on their networks and to take action based on that analysis. The partnership will further enable the combination of rich experiential data from ByteMobile platforms and subscriber-centric data from other network sources to deliver sophisticated new mobile analytics solutions"


See "Citrix Boosts Mobile Analytics Capabilities with Zettics Partnership" - here.

Citrix Expands SP Business: Acquires Skytide

The following announcement appeared in a blog post (rather than a traditional press release): "I’m happy to share that Citrix has acquired Skytide, a privately-held company that enables service providers to measure and monitor streaming video as a critical part of their CDN video delivery infrastructure [see "Why Should Telcos Build their Own CDN?" - here]. 

The holistic understanding Skytide delivers  – and the insight that flows from it – is what enables the service providers as well as the businesses in each of these domains to strike the appropriate balance between the cost of delivery, the quality of the experience and the revenue implications for the stakeholders".

  

The post, by Chris Koopmans [pictured], VP and GM, Service Provider Platforms, Citrix explains that "The acquisition of Skytide builds on our current service provider business, extending our reach beyond mobile and into the CDN, thereby benefitting communications service providers of all varieties. We’re excited to welcome to our team a talented group of innovators who excel in analytics software design; and who share our commitment to customer excellence and passion for defining the leading edge of video delivery".

See Chris' (co-founder of Bytemobile) guest posts on my blog - "Video adverts – glass half empty or half full for mobile operators?" - here and "Seeing is Believing: Monetizing Traffic through Differentiated Services" - here.

See "The Mobile Video Paradox: Why Insight Matters" - here.

Citrix: Mobile Ads Generate 1.6% of iOS/ 2.2% of Android Data Volume

Citrix Bytemobile published its "Mobile Analytics Report, November 2013" (here) that "provides insight into subscriber behavior and related factors that affect subscribers’ quality of experience (QoE) with mobile data services".

Main findings:

• Three applications - Media Player, Browser and Google Play - generate 83% of mobile data volume associated with Android devices, with Media Player accounting for more than half. This is similar to application use on iOS devices, as reported by Citrix ByteMobile in Q2 2013. On iOS devices, Media Player, Safari and App Store generated 77% of mobile data volume.
   
• Mobile ads constitute a small fraction of monthly quota -  generated 1.6% of iOS data volume, as compared to 1% in reported in Q1 2012 and 2.2% of Android data volume, as compared to 2% reported in Q1 2012.
   
• The ratio of mobile subscribers receiving image-based ads versus video-based ads is 20-to-1.

• In the Q2 2010 Mobile Analytics Report, ByteMobile found that 90% of mobile video data by volume was associated with the FLV format, which is primarily associated with laptops. Today, the primary mobile video format is MP4, a format which is most closely associated with smartphones. This MP4 traffic represents 67% of global mobile video volume.

Citrix: "Bytemobile deals are large and infrequent"

Statements regarding the Bytemobile business made during the Citrix' Q3 earning call (see "Citrix Reports Third Quarter Financial Results" - here).

David James Henshall [pictured], acting CEO of Citrix:  "just in general, the ByteMobile business is maybe on track to what we have thought in terms of dollar contribution [see "Citrix Outlook for Bytemobile Business ($15M/Q4)" - here]. We're probably a little bit behind in building out the go-to-market motion from where we'd like to be. As you know, selling into a carrier is a different beast. It's a longer sales cycle. The deals are large and the deals are infrequent, and they tend to be multiyear in nature. But we've got a good pipeline opportunity of what we call new logos. The timing, of course, is very hard to predict, but they're out there and we're ramping well. 

As far as ByteMobile as a product, we have a new release .. ByteMobile 7, which is shipping this quarter [see "Citrix Enhances Bytemobile w/Internet Radio Opt, User Experience Indexing, More Protocols" - here], enables mobile operators to really differentiate service by managing things like Internet radio traffic and User Experience Indexing and some pretty cool features there that will add value to their networks. So it's early for us. It's an early segment and one that, I think, we'll keep focusing on into next year"
 

Sudhakar Ramakrishna [pictured], SVP and General Manager of Desktop & Cloud added: "Release 7 actually has a lot of features that continue to expand what's called the wireless spectrum efficiency and optimization that we've been delivering in the ByteMobile context to our customers. We've also added capabilities to help them meet and rate their users more effectively, thereby enabling them to deliver differentiated business models. So that's on the ByteMobile stuff. There is a level of NetScaler attach related to ByteMobile deployments [see "Is the Optimization Market Declining?" - here].

However, the main focus on NetScaler is, call it, supporting telco data centers, which typically tends to be different buyers within the same telco. But we're using our ByteMobile presence, ByteMobile sales teams and the broader proposition that they're delivering to gain additional traction on the broader NetScaler portfolio gives us. So there's some limited attach as it relates to ByteMobile directly. And then there is also a focus on expanding into their data centers". 

ByteMobile Features.

See "Citrix Systems Management Discusses Q3 2013 Results - Earnings Call Transcript", by SeekingAlpha - here.

{Core Analysis}: Video Optimization Market Reaffirms its Maturity; Citrix ByteMobile Leads

A new report of the video optimization market, by Patrick Lopez [pictured], Founder and CEO at {Core Analysis} finds that "The market trend for the segment reaffirms its maturity. Like last year, the summer has been quiet in term of activity while spring and the fall remain the high RFx quarters. We have recently seen two large groups select their vendor in the space (Telenor and Orange), more or less wrapping up the tier one group selection process for this cycle in mature markets. Growth in this segment now comes from Latin America and South East Asia, where many groups (Singtel, America Movil, ...) have yet to formulate / finalize a strategy in the space".

• Citrix ByteMobile remains market leader, both in deployments and revenue. The deployment relative market share is decreasing slightly to 29%, while revenue market share is increasing.
  See also "Is the Optimization Market Declining?" with Citrix Bytemobile revenues, here.
   
• Mobixell Networks remains number 2 in deployments with 23%, once again growing its market share over the period
   
• Flash Networks remains a strong third with 17%, growing as well faster than the market

See "Video optimization mid-term update" - here.

Citrix Enhances Bytemobile w/Internet Radio Opt, User Experience Indexing, More Protocols

Citrix announced the ".. release of ByteMobile 7 ..  available now for deployment on the T-Series Adaptive Traffic Management System (see "Bytemobile Launches Integrated DPI, Caching, Optimization and NI Solution""- here)

Among the new features: 

• Internet Radio Optimization: Managing the Mobile Music Boom .. to provide mobile operators with the tools to confront this reality, enabling them to reduce Internet radio traffic volume by up to 30 percent with no perceptible effect on the subscriber listening experience. 

• User Experience Indexing: Measuring What Subscribers Actually See: Separate scores for web and video experience, each based on a greater number of factors encompassing both content delivery and visual quality; The ability to establish any given subscriber’s absolute UXI score and a relative UXI score, which assesses that user’s experience relative to other users; The ability for operators to ingest, in real-time, per-subscriber UXI scores for use in analysing—and responding to—trends in the individual and collective subscriber experience.
   
• Adaptive Optimization: Apply When Needed .. a second generation of adaptive optimization and related capabilities, which include: Video stalling is reduced by up to 30 percent .. The required degree of optimization, if any, for a specific user is predicted based on a running history of factors such as UXI score and available network bandwidth .. File downloads are up to 30 percent faster, with the greatest benefits seen on LTE networks.
   
• IP Traffic Classification: A Key Enabler for Consolidation - the T-Series is now able to classify more than 800 different IP applications and protocols representing the full scope of data traffic across the network. These classification abilities give mobile operators all the tools necessary to collapse separate DPI elements into a single adaptive traffic management element.
  

See "Citrix Supercharges Mobile Subscriber Experience with ByteMobile 7" - here.