What does Apple’s RCS adoption means for the messaging world? 

•  Sharing between the two different smartphone families will support clearer pictures and videos, read receipts, typing information, and users will be able to share locations and some files in a better way. 
• Google had taken a primary role in the introduction of a de-facto set of standards and its latest innovation by Google is not supported in the GSMA standard.
• The industry still has to sharpen the RCS channel for business messaging – there is plenty of work to be done.

Apple will implement Rich Communication Services (RCS) messaging in iPhones in 2024, as a software update later in the year.

This was reported by 9to5 Mac as a direct statement from an Apple insider. The direct quote seems to have provided a way to release the announcement without making it too prominent or officially sanctioned. 

Apple had resisted integrating the standard until now: its CEO, Tim Cook, said it did not see customer demand for RCS in 2022. 

The announcement is a politically balanced approach: it introduces the new technology without celebrating it. After all, Apple is not moving away from its successful Apple to Apple messaging platform, iMessage. 

Apple is holding closely to iMessage, and it is here to stay. Nor is Apple stopping its foray into business messaging, the paid services offered to companies that want to run customer services or promotional campaigns via phone messages. 

It is an RCS announcement, and not an “RBM” (RCS Business Messaging), but the news is big – even if expected to an extent. 

Apple Business Messaging is here to stay. What the news brings is much-needed interoperability of multimedia messages across Android and iOS.

A user trying to reach a different OS smartphone would have to be dropped to SMS or MMS when attempting to include a picture. RCS will bring better person-to-person messages across the standard messaging services that a user found from their phone.

It’s GSMA RCS, not Google’s RCS

The carefully crafted announcement is careful to avoid any message to Google, which launched a very public campaign about “green vs. blue” bubbles – referring to the colours in the iMessage for SMS. Instead, Apple is making a direct reference to the currently published standard by the GSMA. 

In recent years, Google has taken a primary role in the introduction of a de facto set of standards.

What will be the impact on users?

With the new upgrade, Apple users will still be sending iMessages to other iPhones but will be able to send better messages to non-iOS devices. 

Sharing between the two different smartphone families will support clearer pictures and videos, read receipts, typing information, and users will be able to share locations and some files in a better way. 

In addition, users won’t be charged per message for SMS and MMS, but they will only be charged for the data. 

This is often part of a bundle for a smartphone, or can even be done using WiFi.

Things do get a bit blurry though as the latest innovation by Google is not supported in the GSMA standard. Google messages might be encrypted end to end, for instance. 

The impact on OTT apps

As mentioned, Apple had resisted integrating the standard until now: with its CEO pointing to weak customer demand for RCS in 2022. The question of demand is an interesting one. People on the street are not asking for RCS, but they are downloading apps such as WhatsApp, Viber or Signal. 

They voted for advanced multimedia messaging with their thumbs and downloaded billions of OTT apps. In effect, the big winners of the fragmentation between the default messaging apps for iPhones and Android were the alternative over-the-top apps that provided a more consistent approach thanks to a global base and cross-device service consistency. 

The announcement is now too late to provide a real worry for a player such as WhatsApp: it is already well-established in Latin America, Europe and parts of Asia. 

The change will not affect its usage base immediately. If Google and Apple were to back the service for deeper device integration in future, that might represent a challenge for Meta and other messaging companies.  

What does it mean for business messaging?

There is plenty to be happy about; the RCS inbox was likely to become a SPAM box without some real personal messages.

SMS personal traffic was dwindling and left the universal messaging platform to be the inbox of one-time passwords, reminders and advertising.

A strong person-to-person service is a necessary complement to the business services that are now the main source of revenue.

Without personal messages opening rates will plummet and so will the return on investment of campaigns. This is good news; however, this is not the answer to all the problems of RCS. 

The industry still has to sharpen the RCS channel for business messaging – there is plenty of work to be done.

RCS is local; and bureaucratic in some places, with patchy support from operators, and pricing is complex in comparison to simpler OTT offers.

The RBM industry cannot blame external factors now. It has a great opportunity, but it has some catching up to do, fast.

• Dario Betti is the CEO of MEF (Mobile Ecosystem Forum), a global trade body established in 2000 and headquartered in the UK, with members across the world. As the voice of the mobile ecosystem, it focuses on cross-industry best practices, anti-fraud and monetisation. The Forum provides its members with global and cross-sector platforms for networking, collaboration and advancing industry solutions.