Vodafone and O2 team up to battle Everything Everywhere
Mark Bridge writes:
With just three working days for many people in the UK last week, you’d be forgiven for thinking nothing much would happen. However, you’d be wrong.
Telefónica UK and Vodafone UK announced plans to pool the basic parts of their network infrastructure in an expansion of their existing ‘Cornerstone’ partnership. It means that Vodafone and O2 will be using the same base stations for 2G, 3G and 4G service across the country. Responsibility is being split down the middle; Telefónica UK will take care of the east, while Vodafone UK will have the west. I imagine the dividing line running conveniently between the headquarters buildings in Slough and Newbury respectively.
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Business-to-business mobile phone dealer A1 Comms, which also runs online retailers BuyMobilePhones.net and Mobileshop.com, is reported to have acquired the Go Mobile franchise business from Shebang Technologies. The franchise operation was set up last year and branded as the Purple Partnership.
A1 Comms, which was founded in 1997 and is based in Derbyshire, currently employs 75 people. The company had previous run a number of high-street shops before focussing on its B2B and online businesses.
Shebang, the company behind the Go Mobile retail chain, is planning its own mobile virtual network.
The Go Mobile network will be promoted online and via Go Mobile stores. It's a prepaid service and, unlike many other MVNOs, will be available with a choice of handsets.
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Mobile News reports that staff in the 40 Go Mobile stores owned by Shebang have been told they must either join its franchise program, run by The Purple Partnership, or face redundancy.
Apparently 84 staff are affected; if they don't want to run their own store, they will be offered positions at other franchise stores or a redundancy package.
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Tanny Price has left her role at Brightstar Europe to run the business-to-business division of Daventry-based distribution company Shebang, according to a report in Mobile News.
She’d joined Brightstar in June 2009 after 11 years with Avenir Telecom.
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