Latest On Apple's Phone: Cingular Out, MVNO In?

[iMacZealot]

I hope it's not T-Mobile. They are not in North Carolina. Sure they have roaming agreements with Suncom, but you can't get a local NC number, nor a local number for most of SC. That's a couple million people right there that would not have access to an Apple phone.

It's my understanding that there are a few more US states that have a zero presense from T-Mobile other than roaming agreements.

They are not a "real" national carrier that provides local numbers nationally in the US. They are only national in the sense that they have roaming agreements nationally.

edit: Also, if a company does not own numbers locally, you can not port your number from another carrier to them in that area.

T-Mobile is most certainly a real national carrier! They won the 2006 JD Power and Associates Award for Customer care in all six regions in the United States. And if they don't provide local numbers, what are they giving you then, Paleolithic phone numbers???? I know several people with T-Mobile with a local number.

You mentioned that you are in North Carolina, which the reason why they don't have coverage there is because SunCom is sort of their "counterpart" if you will. After all, SunCom gets a lot of phones only T-Mobile gets, such as the Sidekick/hiptop.

edge was att wireless' stop gap effort for 2G GSM. GSM is dead. EDGE was dead a few years ago. CDMA based EVDO or UMTS are minimum requirements for next generation wireless applications. Cingular has chosen UMTS and has said publicly that they have no interest in supporting 4G efforts. Verison and Sprint use EVDO for their 3G network which is faster than UMTS. I would have to hope and guess that since EVDO is becoming the 3G defacto standard apple would chose it.

UMTS/HSDPA is NOT CDMA based. It is actually TDMA based, like GSM. While it does have a CDMA over-the-air interface, it is intended to replace GSM and its other sister technologies. EVDO is intended for the CDMA carriers (Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, US Cellular, Cricket, metroPCS) and will be a far cry from defacto as over 80% of the world is still using GSM. And second generation GSM is still amazing technology, and it and CDMA cannot be compared, just like apples and oranges or Macs and PCs.

 

[Lord Bodak]

Going in as an MVNO on Cingular's network would be a disaster. First off, as an MVNO they're probably doomed to fail (ESPN Mobile anyone?). People aren't going to change providers for a specific phone, ESPECIALLY when they'll be able to find an unlocked one on eBay and stay with Cingular or T-Mobile (or any of the other GSM carriers in the world).

 

[iMacZealot]

I would suspect perhaps the iPhone available with several different carriers. Do you really think Apple would go the MVNO route with only one phone to sell? Unless a smattering of iPhones are coming at us, I would suspect that it'll available just through GSM carriers. However, Apple could look to minimize risk by taking a bunch of money for exclusive rights to say, T-Mobile, but it doesn't seem like the Apple thing to do.

Helio, a new MVNO carrier using Sprint's network, launched this May with just two phones. While they are not homemade phones, they are super customised, and they are launching another two phones by Christmas. One of their launch models is already out of stock.

I doubt Apple would launch as a Cingular MVNO because Cingular doesn't do that too often. Sprint, I believe, sells its network the most to MVNOs.

 

[lorductape]

?

does anyone actually care?

solution to apple's carrier problems (unless the t-mobile deal is official)

MAKE THEIR OWN NETWORK!!!!

🙂

Pure Genius!

 

[Maestro64]

WHy not WiMax

Here is another ideal to consider. Instead of going after the traditional networks and providers and as many have pointed out many of those networks whether GSM or CDMA do not have enough bandwidths to make an Iphone really usuable.

I think they will deploy WiMax iPhone since the chip sets are standard based verses proprietary technology from Qualcom and others for CDMA and GSM which have very close relation ships with the current cell phone companies and service providers.

WiMax is the next generation wireless technology which will be deployed by companies like Earthlink for wireless broadband internet access. This is something I can see Apple doing verses trying working a deal with the current services providers.

 

[SMM]

Speculation

My company has ~80% of its' workforce in the field. For the most part (~75%), they have not had direct contact with their main office. If I were to hazard a guess, 1/3 of these employees would benefit (or the company would) from being connected. One of my current projects is to automate our field operations.

Email would be the first obvious application, but near real-time data collection would be of even more benefit to the Company. So, I have scaled down some applications, which run decently in a Citrix shell, and at the current Cingular bandwidth. Recently, I have been looking at various tablet PC's and small footprint laptops. I am surprised by how few attractive products there are and/or how much they cost. The price/performance ratio is absolutely dreadful.

I have been asking myself why no one seems to be really jumping out to capture this market. Granted, there are some players out there, but nothing to really wow you. Then I started remembering some of the rumors I have read here, some of the patent applications and job descriptions for engineers specializing in the various technologies associated with this type of product.

I wonder if Apple is getting ready to pounce on this? It is right up their alley. Any opinions?

 

[mgauss]

My $ 400 a month on cell phones will go to Apple

4 phones in this family

 

[SeaFox]

the iPhone has the be the biggest rumor engine of them all.

Come now, the Powerbook G5 is the biggest rumor engine.

what does "(MVNO) on Cingular's network" mean ? In my area, Cingular absolutely STINKS.. even the city council called in Cingular reps to #$@# them out.

What did the city officals think they were going to accomplish? This is cell phone service, there are no gaurantees of service quality enforced by law and a cell phone is by no means a necessity of life. If the service sucks, why doesn't everyone in town change carriers? That's what the free market is about.

i always thought they'd be the guys who released an unlocked, unbranded, un-network affliated phone. I think that would be the smartest way to go. Drop in a SIM and go.

Yup, yup. That's what I'm waiting for. I'm not going to go through the hassle of porting my number just to get an iPhone and I'm not interested in being a second-class citizen on someone else's network. I'm not on contract, I like my current plan, and aren't most MVNO's prepaid?

 

[iMacZealot]

4 phones in this family

11 phones in mine, and the sad thing is there are only 7 people in my family.

 

[kresh]

And if they don't provide local numbers, what are they giving you then, Paleolithic phone numbers???? I know several people with T-Mobile with a local number.

You mentioned that you are in North Carolina, which the reason why they don't have coverage there is because SunCom is sort of their "counterpart" if you will. After all, SunCom gets a lot of phones only T-Mobile gets, such as the Sidekick/hiptop.

hehe Paleolithic 🙂

You know several people in North Carolina with local numbers?

Yes SunCom has an agreement with T-Mobile. SunCom also has an agreement with Cingular, actually when Cingular bought AT&T, Cingular had to divest themselves from alot of markets in North Carolina and these customers were turned over to SunCom. SunCom promptly required every ex-Cingular customer to resign their contracts and purchase new phones. It was a huge stink, all over the news for weeks.

But the agreement would not help in this situation. Since T-Mobile does not have local numbers here, one would have to go with SunCom as there are no local numbers for T-Mobile. In our area Cingular actually leases their block of numbers from Sprint.

Any company you decide to have cellular service with has to offer local numbers in order to use them. US Cellular is similar as they only offer local numbers for the very western part of the state.

The absolute best way to see where the towers are that your cellular provider owns (thus provides local numbers for) is to look at the coverage map for their prepaid service. Most providers only allow the use of prepaid phones on their "owned" networks and charge you for use on other networks.

I worked for Alltel for 3 years and am currently the Market Director for another national CDMA carrier. In my 15 years in the cellular industry, it constantly amazes me that there is cellular service in the US at all. The spectrum (A side and B side radio frequencies) ownership is so fragmented across the US that it is almost impossible to know who owns what, where!

 

[MikeTheC]

Confirmation

Well, folks, I suppose it's time to announce...

And, after all, if such an announcement as this is to come from anywhere, then why not from he who is the MikeTheC...

I can now unofficially confirm that it is now confirmed. But only unofficially.

 

[iMacZealot]

hehe Paleolithic 🙂

You know several people in North Carolina with local numbers?

Yes SunCom has an agreement with T-Mobile. SunCom also has an agreement with Cingular, actually when Cingular bought AT&T, Cingular had to divest themselves from alot of markets in North Carolina and these customers were turned over to SunCom. SunCom promptly required every ex-Cingular customer to resign their contracts and purchase new phones. It was a huge stink, all over the news for weeks.

But the agreement would not help in this situation. Since T-Mobile does not have local numbers here, one would have to go with SunCom as there are no local numbers for T-Mobile. In our area Cingular actually leases their block of numbers from Sprint.

Any company you decide to have cellular service with has to offer local numbers in order to use them. US Cellular is similar as they only offer local numbers for the very western part of the state.

The absolute best way to see where the towers are that your cellular provider owns (thus provides local numbers for) is to look at the coverage map for their prepaid service. Most providers only allow the use of prepaid phones on their "owned" networks and charge you for use on other networks.

I worked for Alltel for 3 years and am currently the Market Director for another national CDMA carrier. In my 15 years in the cellular industry, it constantly amazes me that there is cellular service in the US at all. The spectrum (A side and B side radio frequencies) ownership is so fragmented across the US that it is almost impossible to know who owns what, where!

I understand the local numbers thing, but just because North Carolina doesn't get local numbers doesn't mean T-Mobile isn't a real, national carrier.

North Carolina sounds funny when it comes to cell phones. I like Suncom's phone selection a lot better than anyone else's, and it sounds like SunCom's the only way to go out there. Here in Colorado, CDMA dominates, but T-Mobile has a big presence here, too. Cingular is nearly non-existent.

That AT&T thing sounds awful. Did a lawsuit occur in that? Also, I think Cingular's numbers are leased in a lot of places. In case you haven't used the reverse phone lookup on whitepages.com, it will tell you who the service provider is, but everytime I look up the two people I know with Cingular, it comes up saying Blue Licenses Holding, Llc or Routt County Wireless (which isn't a local carrier nor is Denver in Routt County.)

Yeah, the whole spectrum thing is funny. My dad is a doctor, and one of his patients worked for Qwest Wireless, and he put in a tower for us by our house because there was this deadspot nearby. Since Qwest sold their network to Sprint, it's now a Sprint tower, and the funny thing is, it also looks like a T-Mobile tower on their coverage check. And i can't tell if Verizon has one there or not. My phone has bad reception. It's so odd.

 

[yg17]

If Apple does want to go MVNO, it makes perfect sense to chose cingular. They have the largest digital network in the U.S... perfect for downloads...

Here comes the iPhone..

Cingular sucks. If Apple goes with them, it will be a huge mistake.

7 weeks till our Cingular contract's up!

 

[Ja Di ksw]

Well, folks, I suppose it's time to announce...

And, after all, if such an announcement as this is to come from anywhere, then why not from he who is the MikeTheC...

I can now unofficially confirm that it is now confirmed. But only unofficially.

Ha, you want to unofficially confirm when it's going to happen as well? Only unofficially, of course 🙄

 

[Rend It]

That's funny...

...Everyone has a TV. Everyone NEEDS a TV. Everyone LOVES their TV. Not everyone needs a cellphone. Not everyone LOVES a cellphone.

Cellphones have become a burden on society. Why do we need to be intouch every second of the day? We don't. Cellphones are the only form of technology out there that actually causes grief for other individuals. Think about it, how many times has the movie you are watching, the dinner you are trying to enjoy or the church mass you are trying to worship at been interrupted by the "lovely" little blaring chime of a cellphone? Or even better yet, that person picking up the call and talking on it as if the person on the other end of the line is more deaf than Helen Keller. How many times has someone cut you off in traffic or almost hit you, only to get a look at them to see that they are gabbing away on their phone, oblivious of the fact they almost killed you?

Gee, maybe I'm weird, because I actually DON'T own a TV, but I DO own a cell phone. I think the cell phone serves a much greater purpose to any society than a television. Let's see..call people I love and care about, or waste my brain watching the garbage on cable. Hmm.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[iMacZealot]

I've believed it since the beginning of the rumors and it is getting more and more rock solid.... there will be NO iPhone.

I think it has gotten to the point that people think it will be out so bad that the rumor has been allowed to live on.

Why would Apple want to get into the cell phone business? I could think of only one good reason... the iPod will not last for much longer unless they add some serious additional functionality to it.

I believe that Apple has more to gain from the "iTV" model plan than going cellular.

Everyone has a TV. Everyone NEEDS a TV. Everyone LOVES their TV. Not everyone needs a cellphone. Not everyone LOVES a cellphone.

Cellphones have become a burden on society. Why do we need to be intouch every second of the day? We don't. Cellphones are the only form of technology out there that actually causes grief for other individuals. Think about it, how many times has the movie you are watching, the dinner you are trying to enjoy or the church mass you are trying to worship at been interrupted by the "lovely" little blaring chime of a cellphone? Or even better yet, that person picking up the call and talking on it as if the person on the other end of the line is more deaf than Helen Keller. How many times has someone cut you off in traffic or almost hit you, only to get a look at them to see that they are gabbing away on their phone, oblivious of the fact they almost killed you?

My family has a TracFone. ONE TracFone. It is to be used when we are out traveling or when someone is out shopping and might need to call back home for something. No conversations are held on it, that's why a have a Verizon bill each month for my home lines. Besides, why would anyone think I would want to hear their conversation with someone about how "Brad is such a dick because he hasn't called me in 3 days. Do you think I shouldn't have slept with him on our first date?"??? ***Real conversation I had the "privilege" of "over hearing" right behind me in my ear one day standing in line at the mall.***

Where are the GOOD rumors. Like about what new Mac Apple is coming out with? Or what new feature the iPod is going to have to blow everyone away again? How about this one, "When is Asteroid coming out???"

I'm tired of iPhone this and iPhone that. Give it a rest people. How long has this rumor been going? Maybe the better part of 18 months? Every single Mac Expo and Convention gets this crappy rumor attached to it and NOTHING HAPPENS.

Ahhhhh.... I feel much better now. Thank you.

1) Not every conversation I hold on my phone talks about a one night stand.
2) I don't scream into my cell phone.
3) I leave my phone at home when I go to church.

You can decide whether your cell phone controls you or if you control your cell phone.

And let's face it: cell phones are EVERYWHERE! People have them. And iPods are EVERYWHERE! People have them, too. And, in my opinion, music players move fast. Portable music players change majorly every 10 or so years. I think the cell phone and iPod are a natural fit. They're things everyone has and uses everywhere. And if Apple can pull off another beautiful, seamless product, then get ready to see as many iPhones as there are RAZRs and iPods combined.

And sometimes, the oldest rumors come true. The Intel Mac rumors have been floating around since 1991, and it became a detested rumor, but it finally came true...

 

[WaRrK]

The Apple iPhone - From the team that brought you Duke Nukem Forever!! 🙄

 

[fixyourthinking]

Cingular is not the only GSM carrier in the USA.

T-Mobile is pretty big too. They have just purchased a ton of bandwidth for new high-speed services.

Remember the T-Mobile CEO saying "we have a similar vision as Apple" ?

That's why Cingular went with Microsoft, they know they didn't win over Apple. So, this is most likely going to be a T-Mobile partnership (whose corporate parent has a HUGE presence in Europe).

TMobile is actually pretty small when compared with the top 3:

Cingular
Verizon
Sprint/Nextel

The top 3 comprise 78% of cell phones in the country.

I doubt the comments from the TMobile CEO had much to do with the decision.

Cingular is currently is the only major carrier that does not have an MVNO based on it's lines. (As far as I know)

Verizon has Alltel & Virgin Mobile
Sprint has Virgin Mobile, some TraCphone & other prepaid offerings

AT&T wireless used to have SunCom as an MVNO, but when they merged with Cingular they went independent - putting up their own towers and leasing some towers from Cingular.

It's my opinion that Apple will be a Cingular based MVNO and that the phone will work on TMobile and SunCom - but just won't be supported - just like Cingular phones are now. IE - I can buy a TMobile Sidekick on eBay and use it on Cingular, I just don't have the same plan or all features available to me.

The only alliance that I see Apple may have with T-Mobile is that Danger - which makes the semi-exclusive T-Mobile SideKick has Steve Wozniak as an investor.

Now, you can look at that coincidence from two angles:

1) It's just something Woz saw promise in
2) He's been there (at Danger) as a technology partner/development partner for Danger all along to be able to assist Apple first hand with their own Phone efforts. A plant, if you will.

Personally, I see the iPhone as being something very very similar to a Sidekick ... but better.

 

[peharri]

As is usual with anything to do with the iPhone, this is ill-informed speculation based upon small nuggets of information that do not imply anything remotely close to what's being suggested, and where the rumour becomes more absurd with every added detail.

Is there going to be an iPhone? I have no idea. I was convinced there wouldn't be, but with Motorola firing shots across Apple's bows with changes to the ROKR, and Apple trademarking "iPhone" everywhere, it seems possible however ridiculous it may be.

Is it going to be on an MVNO? Depends. Is Apple, by releasing the iPhone, just planning on killing its own media business, or is the long term strategy the complete destruction of Apple itself, with huge investments in burdersome businesses pursuing strategies the company is completely unfamiliar with and which can only ever appeal to a tiny minority in the country?

Does Cingular's announcement in any way preclude the possibility of the iTS going "online" in a cellular form? Answer: Did any of the amateur (and a few of the professional) "analysts" actually BOTHER, at any point, to READ what Cingular itself was proposing? Cingular is setting up a NON-EXCLUSIVE system for music distribution that involves THREE COMPETING STORES. You're saying that this means Cingular will refuse, point blank, to add the iTS.

Why? Where the hell do you get that from? Cingular's being neutral and you're saying it means Cingular has somehow decided against allowing the iTS to join in the fun when it's ready to do so?

This story is plain awful. It shouldn't be on page 1. It shouldn't even be on page 3. It's a bunch of speculation based upon evidence that doesn't remotely back-up the speculation given. It serves only to pander to a minority of Apple Phone fetishist's wet dreams. Apple will, apparently, because Cingular is currently allowing three competing music stores to operate on their network, reject Cingular, operate an MVNO, sell only the "iPhone", a revolutionary phone that's an iPod and a cellphone, and a Newton, but actually just a phone, but it's also a 770, but actually no it's an iPod with wireless connectivity, on it, and due to their inexperience somehow make this all work and get 75% market penetration in six months and save the iPod!

Oh come on! What the hell? What the hell!

Can you rumourmongers come up with something a little more concrete. You know, something that actually makes sense. Yes, you want a phone. And I'm quite sure Apple can design a nice one too. Hey, tell you what, I want Mac OS X to run legally on my Thinkpad too. That doesn't mean they're going to do it.

What's the difference between Mac OS X running on a Thinkpad and an iPhone? I can see how Apple can make a profit and increase their marketshare by selling Mac OS X for Thinkpads.

 

[peharri]

UMTS/HSDPA is NOT CDMA based. It is actually TDMA based, like GSM. While it does have a CDMA over-the-air interface, it is intended to replace GSM and its other sister technologies. EVDO is intended for the CDMA carriers (Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, US Cellular, Cricket, metroPCS) and will be a far cry from defacto as over 80% of the world is still using GSM. And second generation GSM is still amazing technology, and it and CDMA cannot be compared, just like apples and oranges or Macs and PCs.

You're right in that systems like EVDO can't be used with UMTS, but you're introducing inaccuracies in the way you argue it. UMTS runs over a variety of air interfaces, none of which are TDMA.

W-CDMA is a CDMA air interface, like IS-95 (which is the air interface specification that's frequently referred to by the name "CDMA", but this is misleading as the words refer to a type of multiplexing, not a specification and protocol. IS-95 is a specification and protocol. Likewise IS-136, also known as D-AMPS, was frequently called "TDMA" in the US, but both GSM and IS-136 use TDMA air interfaces, using completely different implementations. GSM's is actually wideband and frequency hopping, making it a spread spectrum TDMA system.)

UMTS runs over W-CDMA.

A modification to W-CDMA is HSDPA. This is still a CDMA air interface (it's only a modified W-CDMA.) UMTS runs over HSDPA too, and indeed that's the air interface used for UMTS by Cingular.

Yet another modification to W-CDMA is HSUPA. This is also still CDMA, and UMTS runs over that.

While I'm just throwing facts out there, UMTS can also run over 802.11, using a system called UMA. (GSM can do the same thing)

Anyway, nothing about UMTS is TDMA. It's using CDMA (except for 802.11 which is an essay by itself.) It's not the same CDMA specification and protocol as Sprint/Verizon, but it does use a CDMA-based air interface.

What are the differences? Well, the big one is that Sprint/Verizon's CDMA, which is known as IS-95 and IS-2000, and/or cmdaOne and CDMA2000, use 1.5MHz slices of spectrum, whereas W-CDMA uses 5MHz slices of spectrum. This, and other protocol and encoding changes, means W-CDMA is better at handling a variety of different types of data (in terms of the reserved bandwidth you need for audio/video, and more bursty pattern you need for web access, etc), though supposedly it degrades poorly as you go further from a tower.

For more information, take a look at Wikipedia.

 

[ccrandall77]

UMTS/HSDPA is NOT CDMA based. It is actually TDMA based, like GSM. While it does have a CDMA over-the-air interface, it is intended to replace GSM and its other sister technologies. EVDO is intended for the CDMA carriers (Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, US Cellular, Cricket, metroPCS) and will be a far cry from defacto as over 80% of the world is still using GSM. And second generation GSM is still amazing technology, and it and CDMA cannot be compared, just like apples and oranges or Macs and PCs.

Not quite true. UMTS uses W-CDMA as it's underlying protocol. W-CDMA is a mixture of CDMA and, to a lesser extent, GSM technologies. UMTS/HSDPA is the route that current GSM/GPRS/EDGE carriers are going since it's an easier upgrade path. (Check out Wikipedia or Google for W-CDMA for more info).

 

[peharri]

Not quite true. UMTS uses W-CDMA as it's underlying protocol. W-CDMA is a mixture of CDMA and, to a lesser extent, GSM technologies.

W-CDMA is just an air-interface standard. It's not a mixture of anything. It was originally designed for the Japanese FOMA system and was subsequently adopted by the 3G GSM people.

It is a CDMA air interface, but it's unrelated to IS-95, the popular US standard used by Sprint and Verizon that's frequently called "CDMA" as if the terms are interchangable. It doesn't contain any GSM, and it doesn't contain any IS-95. It is, however, like IS-95, a CDMA system, and UMTS, which uses it, is a version of GSM.

UMTS/HSDPA is the route that current GSM/GPRS/EDGE carriers are going since it's an easier upgrade path. (Check out Wikipedia or Google for W-CDMA for more info).

That's correct.

 

[CEAbiscuit]

I was once excited about the iPhone, but the more and more specualtion I hear about it, the word "Newton" keeps entering my mind.

 

[sbrhwkp3]

Cingular sucks. If Apple goes with them, it will be a huge mistake.

7 weeks till our Cingular contract's up!

Cingular is awesome. I get service everywhere.

 

[ccrandall77]

W-CDMA is just an air-interface standard. It's not a mixture of anything. It was originally designed for the Japanese FOMA system and was subsequently adopted by the 3G GSM people.

It is a CDMA air interface, but it's unrelated to IS-95, the popular US standard used by Sprint and Verizon that's frequently called "CDMA" as if the terms are interchangable. It doesn't contain any GSM, and it doesn't contain any IS-95. It is, however, like IS-95, a CDMA system, and UMTS, which uses it, is a version of GSM.

Not exactly.

From Wikipedia:
"More technically, W-CDMA is a wideband spread-spectrum mobile air interface that utilizes the direct sequence Code Division Multiple Access signalling method (or CDMA) to achieve higher speeds and support more users compared to the older TDMA signalling method of GSM networks. W-CDMA is a competitor to CDMA2000."

And if you look at this presentation on page 9: http://www.ieee.or.com/Archive/diversity_in_3g/diversity_in_3g.pdf

you'll see that the W-CDMA standard did evolve from GSM and CDMA (IS-95).

There are a lot of other references out there too, but these are the 2 I have readily available.