Alec Saunders SquawkBox

It was hard not to get caught up in the excitement over the Nexus One announcement at the beginning of this week.  With pundits declaring that Google’s entry into the smartphone market would be a game changer, and reviewers claiming that Nexus One was like an open Apple iPhone, the hype meter was fairly off the charts! 

Disappointingly, Canadians making a trip to the Nexus One web page were confronted by a notice stating that the phone was not yet available in Canada.  No matter, many of us said, we’ll just buy it on eBay.

That might not be such a good idea. 

The patchwork of 3G bands emerging in North America makes the Nexus One a very poor phone for most Canadian mobile customers. Rogers, Telus and Bell operate on 850Mhz and 1900Mhz frequencies, while the Nexus One operates on 2100Mhz, 1700Mhz, and 900Mhz.  For Canadian customers of the big 3 carriers, high speed data on Nexus One will not be available.

There is a ray of hope for Canadians who want a Nexus One.  One carrier in Canada providing service on the 1700Mhz AWS band today is Wind Mobile.  The as yet unlaunched DAVE Wireless will also apparently provide 1700Mhz service. 

Frankly, the most deflating part of this launch story is that 3G hasn’t meant an intelligent rationalization of frequencies.  We remain mired in the tar-pit of frequency allocation strategies, driving up handset costs in order to support roaming and effectively locking specific devices to specific carrier networks.

Meh!

My venerable BlackBerry Curve has just come out of contract with Rogers, so I’m in the market for a new BlackBerry and my pals at RIM tell me that the BlackBerry 9700 “Onyx” is the one to have.  Not only that, but here in Canada Telus and Bell have both just launched new HSPA+ networks that compete directly with Rogers.  Unless you’ve been living under a rock, there’s no way you could have missed the full page ads that Bell has been running in the papers.

Identical networks, identical phones… it seems like an ideal opportunity to compare service providers, no?

On the surface, it looks as if Bell and Telus are getting really aggressive.  Bell’s price for the 9700 is $229, Telus’ $249, and Rogers $299. Winner, Bell!

And what about the plans?

My experience on iPhone has shown me that I’m not a super heavy mobile data user, and I’ve got a 3G stick so I don’t need to tether to my laptop. I’m looking for a modest number of minutes that can be used throughout North America, and a data plan that will give me between 500M and 1G of usage in any month.

• For $40/month Rogers offers 450 local minutes.  1G of data is an additional $30, and North American long distance is $25, bringing the total to $95, plus taxes, fees and so on.
• For $65/month Telus offers 450 local minutes plus 1G of data.  Add a North American LD plan for another $35, and the total is $100, plus taxes, fees and so on.
• For $60/month, Bell offers 600 local minutes, plus 1G of data.  The North American LD plan adds another $30, and that brings the total to $90 per month, plus taxes, fees and the like.

Heavens!  Bell offers more for less money than Telus or Rogers.  Bell wins again!

Even taking into account the $35 activation fee that Telus and Rogers would charge me to switch, over the lifetime of the contract Telus is the most expensive at $3,884, and Bell the cheapest at $3,504.

Note that this doesn’t take into account the fact that Bell has given me an extra 150 minutes of usage per month as well.  Since I rarely exceed 450 minutes per month on this device (my primary phone is the iPhone) it’s unlikely I would need that insurance policy, but it’s certainly nice to have.

When you net it out, I could save $215 over 3 years by switching from Rogers to Bell.  That’s $5.97 per month. 

Is it enough?  For most people, probably not. I might switch this one phone away from Rogers just to see how good the Bell network is, but ordinarily even I wouldn’t consider the switch for $6 per month in savings.

I’m still waiting to see what happens when the real competition starts between these behemoths.

There was big news here in Soviet Canuckistan today.  Next month, Bell and Telus will both start selling the Apple iPhone.  What?  “How is that possible”, you ask. “Aren’t Bell and Telus tied to ancient CDMA technology?”

Both are rolling out network upgrades to HSPA technology in time for the 2010 Olympics, putting them on an equal footing with Rogers.  Bell says that they will be lighting up their HSPA network by the end of November – less than two months away – while Telus hasn’t made a commitment on dates yet.

It’s not just about the iPhone, however.  Both networks should work with any foreign phones that support the appropriate HSPA networks.  Bell and Telus customers will have access to an extraordinary range of phones that were previously only usable on the Rogers network. Bell has even said that they will unlock handsets for customers (for a price).

This is a great day indeed, because finally, meaningful competition is coming to Canadian networks. 

I was feeling my oats yesterday when I twittered a CBC piece on the high cost of mobile service in Canada.  The CBC piece struck a nerve, as I had just read Andy Abramson’s comparison of US and European mobile operators approach to service.  I have to say, I had no experience like Andy’s last year trying to buy voice and data SIMs throughout Europe.  It was easy in Germany and Spain, horrid in Austria, the Czech Republic and Denmark, and I had given up by the time I reached the Netherlands. Voice service wasn’t hard to get in those places, but prepaid data?  Fuhgeddabout it!  Nevertheless, I’ve not had great experiences with our local carriers ability to service the customer either. 

In any case, Mark Goldberg swiftly missiled off a piece of email to me this morning saying:

The CBC story you linked to is 2 weeks old.
I have written 5 blog posts that discredit the OECD study… according to the OECD, US rates are the worst – worse than Canada in all categories… do you really believe that?
Check out:
http://mhgoldberg.com/blog/2009/08/unravelling-oecd-flaws.html
http://mhgoldberg.com/blog/2009/08/ctia-letter-refutes-oecd.html
http://mhgoldberg.com/blog/2009/08/cost-of-free.html
http://mhgoldberg.com/blog/2009/08/canadian-wireless-data-leadership.html
http://mhgoldberg.com/blog/2009/08/oecd-study-needs-reality-check.html

Oops.

It’s actually true, in my opinion, that Canadian rates have fallen and become very competitive.  Two years ago I spent $500 to $700 per month on  mobile service with Rogers, with one phone.  Today I buy service for 4 phones and a USB data stick, all with generous 3G data plans plus 16Mb/s home internet for about the same price as I paid two years ago for a single phone.

I don’t believe the OECD study any more than Mark does.

When was the last time you got paid to upgrade your phone?

If you were one of the folks who rushed out and bought an iPhone 3G a year ago, and then watched with dismay as Apple delivered the faster, better, stronger iPhone 3GS this past spring, then you’ll be very interested in this news.  You can now upgrade from your iPhone 3G to the equivalent 3GS, and maybe even pocket some money for the effort.

Here’s how it works.

Rogers is currently running a special promotion whereby you can upgrade your iPhone 3G to a 3GS for $99 (8G), $199 (16G), or $299 (32G).  The only catch is that you have to agree to extend the term of your contract by another year. The upgrade itself is easy, though. Simply visit your local Apple or Rogers store, or give Rogers a call, and upgrade.  I recommend the Apple store, because Rogers seems to be out of stock on iPhone’s across the country.

Next visit Best Buy Canada, and take advantage of their trade-in program.  You can trade in a variety of different mobile phones for Best Buy gift card credit. It turns out that the trade-in on a working 16G iPhone 3G, in the original packaging, with all of the accessories is $227. And the upgrade (purchases at the Apple Store) was just $199.

Presto.  You now have the latest iPhone 3GS in hand, and you made $28 courtesy of Best Buy.

Sweet!