Monday, February 4, 2008

Vodafone's new data plan - playing catch-up with '3'



Vodafone has cut their mobile broadband rates. In a way this is good news as more small businesses will go for this option so they can check their mail while on the move.

I know some of you may be thinking that people always had the option of using Blackberry, but that option is expensive and not convinient for everyone.

So what is Vodafone offering:

  • £15 (promotional period only) for upto 3G of data (18 months contract) and free USB modem
  • £20 for 1GB of data on No contract + you buy your own modem

Even though this looks good initially, '3' has been offering a much better package:

  • £10 for 1GB - 18 months Contract gets you a free Modem or Pay as you go with No Modem
  • £15 for 3GB - Same terms as above
  • £25 for 7GB - Same terms as above

The only problem with '3' is that people dont trust them enough (even though i used them and generally never had problems).

In any case this is still good news but the operators need to understand that they will have to lower the price slightly more before the critical mass adopts this whole heartedly. I say that £5 for 1GB and £10 for 3GB is a good starting point.

With more people adopting Mobile Broadband, operators will be forced to provide better services which in turn mean that they will have to move on new technologies like HSPA+ and LTE asap. This is because these new technologies increase the capacity and speed and the connections will become much more reliable.

We will have to wait and watch which operator has the courage to take the bold step of £5 for 1GB of data.

Ps: One of my colleague for India mentioned that you can get unlimited data using GPRS in India for Rs. 99 (< £1.5). Can anyone confirm?

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