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Google Plans Major Play In Wireless Partnering With Sprint and T-Mobile
MojoKid writes There's a new report suggesting Google is partnering with select wireless carriers to sell its own branded wireless voice and data plans directly to consumers. According to sources and the "three people with knowledge of the plans," Google will tap into networks belonging to Sprint and T-Mobile for its new service, buying wholesale access to mobile voice and data in order to make itself a virtual network operator. That might sound disappointing on the surface. Had Google struck a deal with Verizon and AT&T, or even just Verizon, the deal could potentially have more critical mass, with great coverage backed by a company like Google and its services. The former might be a winning combination but at least this is a start. The project will be known as "Nova," which is reportedly being led by Google's Nick Fox, a longtime executive with the company. Apparently Fox has been overseeing this for some time now, and it seems likely a launch will take place this year.
Would any wireless company enter into an agreement like this?
As a consumer I'd love to see google kill one of those fuckers off but why would they put themselves in that position?
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
Those are the 5 questions any article is supposed to answer.
And it does not say why?
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
Do you really want to give Google yet more access to your personal information / habits? Jesus Christ, they already know almost everything about you. The next thing you know, when you call Papa Johns for pizza you'll start seeing targeted ads for Dominos the next time you log on to the net on your PC. Good grief.
Maybe. The devil is in the details, and I'm looking forward to learning more about it. But Google has a shitload of money and they blow way too much on useless crap that no one wants like Google Glass and autonomous cars. They're launching fiber now here in Austin, giving Time Warner and AT&T some much-needed competition. Backing underdogs like Spring and T-Mobile makes me think Google may end up owning both. One thing Google does well is networking.
However, there is one caveat: will Google be sniffing all the traffic it sees on these newly-acquired traffic just to harvest it and sell to advertisers. THAT's where I draw the line. My ISP has only ONE JOB: connect me to the web without getting in the way. That's what I pay for and that's what I currently get.
Kind of curious why google went with a CDMA carrier in Sprint and a GSM carrier in T-Mobile. Certainly makes billing and other tasks a bit more...unique.
They may be afraid of being made irrelevant by a deal like this, but they're much more afraid of being made irrelevant by a deal with their competitors. Imagine how different the market would be today if the original exclusive iPhone contract had been with someone other than AT&T.
Besides, one likely end scenario if this goes huge is that Google buys their partners.
I think Google only really cares about data. Perhaps the Google-branded service will be LTE-only, including voice over LTE. If so, then they don't really care about CDMA or GSM. They may even ignore voice and tell people to use the Google Hangouts dialer with Google Voice.
That would be a pretty reasonable strategy for Google, since they're certainly going to be mostly interested in the data side of things anyway.
There is a company called Ting and they already do this same thing with the same carriers.
Apparently Fox has been overseeing this for some time now, and it seems likely a launch will take place this year.
BATMAN
If he talks within range of any phone in the city, you'll be able to triangulate his position.
When you've finished, type your name to switch it off.
FOX
I'll help you this one time...
But consider this my resignation.
Can anyone with a better understanding of the economics of the industry speak to potential impacts on consumer pricing? It certainly feels like prices have risen as the number of competitors fell. Seems like this could add some additional competition for Verizon and AT&T, although I don't know if prices would change in response.
Welcome to the real world, it's full of this kind of shit.
Perhaps Google wants to go after the Xiamoi/Kindle model where most money is made on selling apps and value-add services, rather than phones or typical telephony.
Right now the cellular phone industry (at least in the U.S.) is highly vertically integrated. A single company owns the service, owns the towers, owns the POTS connections, and sells the phones. This has resulted in people begrudgingly subscribing with a provider not because they like their phone selection or service plans, but because they have the best network. Or subscribing with another provider because they have an exclusive on a phone. etc.
IMHO this vertical integration is a tremendous impediment to market forces trying to improve price and quality, and needs to be split up. You should be able to buy the phone from anyone. Get your service subscription from anyone. They should be able to contract with individual tower owners to create a network. And connect to the POTS independent of everything else I've just listed. This would make competition orthogonal within each of these layers. The best phones would sell the most independent of other factors. The company with the best plans and prices would get the most subscribers independent of phone selection or tower buildout. Tower networks providing the best coverage would be available to all service providers willing to pay. And POTS interconnects would, like it has for VoIP, be driven down to the cheapest cost for reasonable quality.
The MVNOs were one step in this direction. They partially decouple the service provider and tower networks. I've often wondered why an MVNO doesn't contract with multiple tower owners, which is what Google is doing if it's in talks with both Sprint and T-Mobile (most newer CDMA phones work on both CDMA and GSM networks). The Google Nexus phones (and to a lesser extent the iPhones) are another step in this direction - the same Nexus phone works on all carriers. It's not locked to a specific carrier if you don't buy it from the carrier.
They picked the two worst companies of them. Shittiest coverage of them all. Probably another google glass.
Perhaps yahoo instead of yippee?
I'm sure Deutsche Telekom would welcome a Google buyout.
Had Google struck a deal with Verizon and AT&T,
...they would be fucking dead to me. Seriously, AT&T is one of the worst companies that there is. And I've never been a Verizon customer, and I sure hope I never will have to be, because everyone's Verizon stories sound just like my AT&T stories
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Easy answer.
AT&T and Verizon represent the two top carriers. They're not about to share any of that marketplace with Google, whom they view as a threat / competitor. Sprint and T-Mobile really have nothing to lose here, so they'll take business in whatever form it presents itself.
I'm waiting to see what happens if / when metros are able to roll out their own citywide wifi networks.
Couple that with wifi voip capable phones and, all of a sudden, the need for cellular services within those areas goes right through the floor.
Considering cellular / wireless is the current Golden Goose for the two major telecoms, I can probably understand why they lobby so hard to
prevent it.
I've had google fiber for about a year now, and I must say that I have never had to contact customer service. The service they've provided me has been incredibly reliable.
They both have clauses in the contract that if Google reaches a certain amount of subscribers they can renegotiate the contract.
http://techcrunch.com/2015/01/22/why-googles-plan-to-sell-wireless-probably-doesnt-scare-network-providers/
Apparently I'm the only person on the Internet who doesn't hate T-Mobile or think they have shitty coverage. Seriously, their coverage is awesome. Yes, I realize that's subjective/geographic, but they work splendidly for me. It's like T-Mobile followed me around for a whole year and put towers exactly at all the places I go.
Then I go look at prices, and realize I could switch to something .. "better" .. by spending a lot of extra money, money which would get me .. uh, get me .. something?
I would argue it's just Google's way of getting into the wireless market by pouring money (of which they have an inordinate amount) into "weak sisters" in the cellphone business.
The reason I say that is that the lowest penetration of wireless is in rural areas, and the lowest penetration of non-dial-up Internet access is in rural areas (irrespective of speed). So, the biggest need for Internet access is in the very areas where the "weak sisters" have virtually no presence. I believe that puts the lie to the expressed intention of broadening Internet access.
Cell and Internet services in rural areas are plagued by a single problem: Inadequate population density to make capital investments worthwhile. You can roll-out celltowers or fiber in an urban area rather economically, because of the density of customers from whom the fixed costs can be (relatively) quickly recouped. However, getting the capital to do that in a rural area runs up against the need for investors to recoup their investment, which they value as an inverse function of time (i.e., faster ROI is better). Therefore, it is more expensive, and slower to recoup in rural areas, because of a smaller number of potential customers...so, from the contemporary view of investing, "It makes no sense." That's why I claim their just buying their way into eventual ownership of Sprint and/or T-Mobile.
Does this mean I can use a Nexus programed for T-Mobile's GSM network on Verizon's CDMA network in really rural areas where there is no GSM service? Cool.
People will buy "Airtime By Google" more then "Airtime By Sprint" because Google doesn't (yet) have a legacy of toxic customer disservice.
Any Virtual Mobile Network Operator (there are quite a number, I'm on Republic Wireless) has to pay the marketing to acquire customers and take financial risks on payment terms.
The difference is that Google could help Sprint & TM with technical capabilities, backend networking, and organizing
Also Google will gain direct understanding about the performance and capabilities of wireless networks to inform them about how to design Android. And Google will learn how to run a wireless network, which they will eventually do from their satellites.
Google wants to run a comm system which will seamlessly transfer from wifi to terrestrial wireless to satellite wireless, and sell ads by the exabyte.
The company I worked for had a product they called Nova. The Spanish speakers immediately associated it with No Go which is the Spanish translation of Nova.