KEY POINTS:
As the Herald reported last week, Telecom is to spend $300 million building a new mobile phone network that will reduce its reliance on the increasingly marginalised CDMA technology its 027 customers currently use.
Juha from Geekzone, who originally broke the story, has more detail
here.
This is good for consumers because it is good for competition.
For a long time, there were two barriers to switching mobile provider - you couldn't take your number with you and even if you could, you'd have to buy a new phone switching from Telecom to Vodafone or vice versa, because the networks used different technologies.
Now we have number portability and soon we will have compatibility across Vodafone, Telecom and even New Zealand Communications, if it ever gets off the ground.
The greater scale means the economics are better for everyone, especially consumers. Telecom will guarantee that current mobile phones will continue to be supported on the CDMA network for "at least the next five years".
With the new network to start being built later this year and completed within two years, that gives Telecom customers some pretty good options when it comes to handset and service choice.
If you want to hang onto your Pinkilicious handset for a few years you can. If you've been hanging out to get the N91 music phone that Vodafone supports, but like the calling deals on 027, you'll soon have the best of both worlds.
Telecom will use the WCDMA/HSPA technology for the new network putting it on the GSM/UMTS/LTE evolution path the majority of mobile operators around the world use.
What do all those funny acronyms mean? More handsets, better roaming options, better support of laptops that have mobile broadband chips built into them and hopefully a swag of new services Telecom customers have so far been missing out on.
Telecom has already hinted at this: "We have a long standing and productive relationship in place with Hutchison and are actively engaged in discussions with them on how best to work together in light of this announcement today," the telco said today.
Coverage will be provided utilising a blend of WCDMA/HSPA at 2100 MHz and GSM/EDGE at 850 MHz technologies, which has good range and building penetration so opens up new options for getting mobile broadband out to rural areas.
