Du the math

In a meeting with Coca Cola senior management a couple of years ago, the company’s regional md revealed how his life is governed by a continuous check of Coke’s retail presence. Every day, in shops, on planes, in bars, at vending machines, was spent checking whether Coke was beating Pepsi?

In this morning’s Emirates Business 24/7, Osman Sultan, CEO of Du, admits to a similar compulsive disorder: he says he feels a “quiet sense of achievement” every time he answers a call from an 055 prefix.

He must be short on thrills. Despite Du claiming to have passed the one million-customers barrier, a straw poll of friends and colleagues suggests very few people are using a Du number. Etisalat numbers continue to dominate – people still assume mobile numbers start with an 050 prefix. For the most part, the only people using a Du number are new arrivals; many Etisalat customers have booked a Du number, but don’t use it.

This is hardly Du’s fault. With no room to wriggle on price, the UAE’s second mobile operator has limited means to differentiate itself from the incumbent (not helped by both preferring lower case); there is not much of a compelling argument for consumers to shift operators. ‘I have a Du number but Etisalat matches the package, so why should I change,’ says one colleague.

Du has stated it wants 30 per cent of the UAE market by 2009. What it doesn’t say is whether this by market value, traffic or prefix.