With the launch of its new protocol, Pixl8r, at the GSMA World Mobile Congress this week, Ericsson hopes to offer telecom operators a way to not only increase the traffic through their networks, but to tap into – and monetize – the web of relationships that have been woven by popular social network sites.  

Antony Beswick, Strategic Product Manager at Ericsson, says that the Pixl8r protocol, combined with Ericsson’s white-label Social Media Portal, enables operators to transform the public switched data network (PSDN) into a social network that encompasses other social media sites on the web.

The Social Media Portal combined with Pixl8r enables a mobile user to send pictures, messages and videos directly to other phones and, simultaneously, to all of their social-media sites, then receive SMS notification when someone else comments.

“This is instant social status,” he says. “Instead of finding a message in my junk-mail folder that says someone commented on my social network status, I upload content to the Social Media Portal, put my phone in my pocket, and five minutes later I get an SMS – a comment.

“That is the ultimate – taking this whole user-generated content trend and making it real, making it now, making it rich,” he says.

Beswick says Ericsson’s Social Media Portal and Pixl8r address the challenge facing operators. “Internet companies, media and telcos – they are all aiming for this environment in which you have the context-driven communication client on your phone, which shows you the presence of all your friends, and how you can communicate with them right now.

“That’s where Pixl8r comes in,” he says.

Telecom operators using the Social Media Portal with the Pixl8r protocol can launch branded social-media services that, for the first time, reach beyond the isolation of their individual silos. It allows them to acquire a piece of what many consider to be the most valuable data in today’s market, “the social graph,” or the mapping of relationships on the web.

Beswick calls Pixl8r the “glue” that can bind the world’s mobile networks together horizontally. It creates revenue opportunities through increasing data traffic and also opens avenues for new revenue streams such as premium content and mobile advertising, without necessarily competing with social media sites. “It’s a win-win situation for everybody.”

Another advantage is that the service can engage users to communicate with present and future mobile services, especially services that are not being utilized up to their full potential such as MMS and video calling.

Beswick says the time is right to introduce Ericsson’s Social Media Portal because most mobile subscribers have yet to figure out how to download the clients they need to access their social-networking sites on the handset. “Once they do that, it’s very hard for the operator to jump in and add value to that,” he says. “This loyal base of users is still waiting for the operator to show them how to do this. With Pixl8r, operators can say to their subscribers, ‘I will hook you up to all your favorite social networks. Click here.’”