AT&T wants customers to use less data

Less may be more when it comes to wireless data--at least that's the way AT&T sees it. The telecom giant is considering ways to encourage customers to use less wireless data as its network struggles to keep up with demand.

That's an issue other big companies may face as the Internet and its capacities grow by leaps and bounds. And it's an issue that IT managers must consider as the technology becomes an even bigger part of their working environment.

"What we are seeing in the U.S. today in terms of smartphone penetration, 3G data, nobody else is seeing in the rest of the planet," Ralph de la Vega, president and chief executive for mobility and consumer markets at AT&T, told analysts at a conference in New York. "The amount of growth and data that we are seeing in wireless data is unprecedented."

That may be the result of AT&T's success with the iPhone. Owners of the devices are big users of network capacity as they surf the web. And the company has been criticized for delayed text and voice messages and sluggish download speeds.

De la Vega said the company intends to focus first on educating consumers about their data consumption in the hope they would cut back on their own.

"We're going to try to focus on making sure we give incentives to those small percentages to either reduce or modify their usage, so they don't crowd out the customers on those same cell sites," he said.

For more on AT&T's data issues:
- see this New York Times article

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