Deutsche Telekom to offer Groupon Deals Across Europe

Deutsche Groupon

Groupon has certainly taken 2012 by the horns and is off and running with the bulls. In a story that broke very early this morning, Deutsche Telekom (NYSE ticker symbol: DT and still owner of T-Mobile) announced a working arrangement with Groupon. The telekom gorilla will now be able to offer Groupon’s local deals to Deutsche Telekom’s subscriber base across Europe. 

By now it’s evident that Groupon is the Mac daddy of daily dealers. One thing to keep in mind that many of the companies they have acquired and personnel that are now Grouponites may play key roles as the big G travels down the daily dealing highway. Case in point; Michael Shim, a former Yahoo executive who came over to the G-side about a year ago to become its VP of mobile marketing and partnerships, is the man behind Groupon’s partnerships. It looks like Michael has certainly gotten the ball rolling. This could be the start of other, similar deals with other carriers.

The deal

This represents the first carrier deal for Groupon. The deal will include marketing activities as well as “deeply integrating” Groupon’s offers into Deutsche Telekom’s services. While the deal looks like it is mainly aimed at T-Mobile wireless customers, the joint press release also notes that “selected fixed” services will also have access to Groupon.

One of the key operating factors for any mobile service NOT directly integrated into that phone’s operating system is that users will have to make the effort to download apps. Many phones still require users to “turn on” those services to get automatic notifications. Mobile web services are even less automatic. This is one area that this deal hopes to address most immediately: starting sometime in the first half of this year, Groupon’s local offers will be pinged directly to subscribers “without the need for a separate download,” say the companies.

It is interesting to note that the Deutsche Telekom deal announced today, does not appear to extend to T-Mobile USA. Considering that is one of Groupon’s largest markets already in play, I can’t imagine there would be any kind of anti-trust issues. Either way, this is also a big step for T-Mobile as the company moves forward its plans to use the network for more mobile data.

Source: The Wall Street Journal